Marc Benioff is a busy guy.
The latest book by the chief executive of Salesforce.com hit
store shelves last month.
His pioneering sales force automation cloud computing company
reports third-quarter earnings this afternoon.
And the organization's annual sales CRM seminar, the Dreamforce
Global Gathering 2009, kicks off this evening at Moscone Center
and is expected to draw a crowd of around 15,000.
Between all that, Benioff managed to find the time for a
sit-down interview with The Chronicle. But then, a reading of
"Behind the Cloud: The Untold Story of How Salesforce.com CRM
Services Went From Idea to Billion-Dollar Company - and
Revolutionized an Industry" reveals why.
Page 41 informs the reader that making oneself available to
journalists in seminars is critical to business success. In
fact, The Chronicle makes a cameo in the book as the featured
example of how Benioff artfully leveraged reporter relationships
to get his "story told."
That story, by now familiar, is how cloud computing is upending
the business CRM Management software industry, as companies
increasingly opt to run sales force management applications and
workshops hosted online rather than installed on site.
Salesforce.com became a billion-dollar company by recognizing
this demand early and delivering intuitive software that could
be set up quickly and cheaply. It has continued to rapidly
expand even through the recession, as cost-conscious businesses
come to embrace the cloud.
But what the book shows - and the interview reinforced - is the
extent to which marketing automation was key to the company's
success.
That's marketing broadly defined, from ingratiating himself to
reporters by exhibiting a rare willingness among public company
CEOs to slam competitors, to rolling out hyperbolic advertising
like the company's infamous "End of Software" course, to
throwing user seminars and workshops that tapped customers as
product cheerleaders.
Or, of course, by taking the time to meet with the local media
class, say just in advance of such a class . In the wide-ranging
conversation, Benioff, 45, discussed what MC Hammer taught him
about business, why he craves Microsoft's validation, and the
reason San Francisco should get its head out of the clouds.
Q: Within two pages of your book, you cite both MC Hammer
and the Rev. Billy Graham as business influences. What did each
of them teach you about cloud computing and sales automation?
A: It's probably the only book that talks about Billy
Graham, MC Hammer, Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs and Neil Young all
in the same book.
When I look out from my own business career, I tried to learn
from some of the best people, regardless of the marketing
automation industry.
I've been able to kind of glean the essence from them and tried
to bring it into how we've made Salesforce.com into one of the
fastest-growing companies in the technology industry.
Q: What is the essence of MC Hammer?
A: One of the things we learned specifically from him was
that in the rap music industry, the way they apply marketing for
top new songs is something called street teams.
They actually get young people organized in local communities
and get them out marketing these new songs. The street team
concept was something we were able to directly pick up and use
at Salesforce.com.
Q: As you've evolved from scrappy underdog to
billion-dollar public company, how do you ensure that your story
remains a compelling one to tell?
A: Staying relevant is key. When you're telling your
story, you better have a modern story to tell. If I was still
saying the same story I was saying 10 years ago, it would not be
that interesting.
If you look at the top 10 enterprise marketing automation
software companies, a lot of them are important but irrelevant
companies. It's really important to be relevant and important.
Q: Who's irrelevant?
A: I don't want to name names. They're my friends.
Q: You did name names in the book. You say: "Our current
battle: We have to save the customer from Microsoft, Oracle and
SAP." Why?
A: Customers get vested in certain paradigms of
computing, and those large vendors will try to keep that class
of customers in those paradigms of computing for as long as
possible. That's where you basically get the term cash cow.
In our paradigm, we're offering something dramatically lower
cost and much easier to use to release companies from those old
paradigms.
Q: If it's such a compelling proposition, why does any
intelligent company stick with traditional business software?
A: I ask myself that question every day.
Q: As successful as Salesforce.com has been as a pioneer
in cloud computing, at a $7.8 billion market cap it's still
pretty small compared to an Oracle or Microsoft.
What happens when the business software paradigm shifts
entirely, and these giants focus all their resources on this
market?
A: We want them to enter the market, we want them to
validate us, we want them to explain to customers in workshops
and courses what cloud computing is. You don't want to be the
only car company.
When you're the only car company and there's no competition,
customers may not know what a car is, the roads may not be
developed for cars, there may not be gas stations everywhere.
Q: From a 30,000-foot level, what are we witnessing here
in the history of computing?
A: The fundamental empowerment of people who were
previously unempowered. The kind of technology that I can build,
that I can distribute, and that I can use to make either my
community better or my business better is just awesome.
You have this cloud of computing power that is accessible from
anywhere on any type of device in any kind of geography and any
kind of language and any kind of currency.
Q: You have long San Francisco roots. If you could change
one thing about the city, what would it be and why?
A: I just cannot understand why we can't have better
school classes. That private schools are the only option for the
kind of high-net-worth crowd, I think, is ridiculous.
It should be a major initiative. It should be something we're
all working on. We have to get our head out of the clouds.
All this green stuff is great, it's great we don't have plastic
bottles or plastic bags and all of that, but how about some
great school courses?
Q: What do you think about the local business climate?
A: We're one of the largest tech companies, if not the
largest tech company, in San Francisco. It's been hard to stay
here because of the way that the city taxes you.
If we moved to Oakland, we would save our shareholders quite a
bit of money. I don't really want to move there because I like
San Francisco, but I don't really think the Board of Supervisors
understands how easy it is to make those choices.
Source: James Temple
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