In May of 2014, Bill McDermott took over as CEO of SAP, and he made the cloud one of his first priorities. For 40 years, SAP has delivered boxed, on premise software solutions to its customers, but will slowly make the shift towards cloud-based applications.

While this news made headlines, many in the enterprise software field had already begun to make this shift, answering the call from customers to improve development cycles and deliver more agile solutions.  The increase in demand for cloud solutions has put pressure on enterprise software vendors to innovate solutions more quickly, improve their go-to-market strategies, and in some cases, overhaul their business models.

However, a successful shift in focus to the cloud requires more than modifications to deployment and pricing. It also means a shift in culture. The biggest shift in culture? Sales.

Changing Focus From Sales to Service

Enterprise software sales have historically been driven by one thing and one thing only: license revenue. The more licenses the sales team can crank out into the market, the more successful the company. However, a shift towards cloud applications requires a shift from a culture of hard-selling to a culture of customer serving.

In order to compete in a cloud-based world, enterprise software sales teams need to start thinking differently about their customers. Companies do not make money based upon how many software applications they own. They make money by using those software applications strategically to do their jobs better than the competition. As renowned Harvard marketing professor Theodore Levitt once said, “People don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill; they want a quarter-inch hole!”  Your customers don’t buy supply chain software, for example. They buy outcomes. They want to see reductions in cost, improvements in productivity, increases in revenue and market share, etc.

As enterprise software solutions continue to move to the cloud, providers and vendors must realize that their software isn’t the end result for their customers. A change in pricing or an increase in options won’t keep a company competitive. Instead, success will be defined by how quickly and effectively the sales team can shift their thinking away from selling towards serving.

Is Your Sales Team Ready for the Cloud?

If your enterprise software company is shifting its product offerings to the cloud, you will need to think strategically about your sales staffing. Is your existing team ready to make the move from sales to service? If you are looking for sales professionals to help you expand into the cloud, Strategic Search Solutions can help. We work exclusively in the enterprise software space, which means we understand trends in the job market and we have cultivated a strong network of sales talent that is ready to help move your business forward. We work closely with each and every client to learn as much as we can about their business today and where they want to go in the future so that we can make the best recommendations for both immediate and long-term hiring and retention strategies. If your organization is ready to start winning the cloud wars, contact Strategic Search Solutions today.