how come dell doesn't automate the quote process? I don't want to fuck around with a salesguy, just tell me what it fucking costs.
This is half the reason I build my own servers. It's impossible to decide what tradeoffs to make when the true cost of those tradeoffs is hidden behind some sales asshole.
They sell SuperMicro equipment, they list prices, estimated power draw, etc, all up-front. You can add machines to your shopping cart, checkout, and you're done.
They've always provided us with fantastic customer service, and stepped up to replace/repair anything that didn't work right, even if the cause wasn't entirely clear (such as a hard drive issue that could have been OS related, but turned out to be a Seagate firmware issue).
Dell does provide prices on their website. You can pull out your credit card and buy a server without talking to anyone. The purpose of a quote is to negotiate a better price.
The purpose of a quote is to negotiate a better price.
I know, which is why I said exactly that in my post =)
That said, I prefer vendors that simply charge everyone the same reasonable price, rather than having such a large profit margin that they can afford to:
1) Pay a sales team to finagle over quotes.
2) Slash their prices on demand.
Obviously, things are a bit different when you're buying in truly massive quantities.
That's what used to be great about Dell, you could price every option you wanted on the website. Then if you had missed a deal or wanted a discount on shipping there was a very nice business customer team in Dublin you could call.
Then Dell gave us a sales manager and all sales had to go through him - to be fair he would often return our calls within a week or t least send an email saying he would call. And quotes through him were generally only 10-20% more than the website price once you had removed all the Server CALS and Office licenses that got added to every machine you asked for.
But of course he wouldn't sell you Latitude or whatever they were calling their low end machines because you were now a medium size customer. In the end we resorted to buying anything for the dev team from the outlet on credit card.
Getting a better deal and spending less time are the two main reasons I go through a rep.
We needed to purchase some blades a year or so ago, and they initially quoted us 45k (which seemed to be well under their website's price). Since we were comparison shopping, we let them know IBM's quote, and after some intense back and forth we got the price down to around 37k (and with some ADDITIONAL components not in the original quote)... a significant savings.
Along those same lines, if we need a new laptop or desktop, the refurbs are usually well-priced, but if speed is important we just shoot them a list of specs and get a quote quickly (instead of spending time on the website comparing optiplexes vs. latitudes, or whatever the different models are.)
As an individual, I don't like to have to deal with sales people either (but it's possible my orders aren't big enough that they can offer much of a discount).
Most businesses don't feel the same way - they like sales guys, because the orders are larger - and it gives them the feeling that they are getting a special, one-off customized offer. No matter what the listed discounts are on the website, they'll always feel like a custom quote is a better deal (because it's part of the salesman's job to give them that feeling).
So what I think he means he gets the automated quote, but since it's not the 'special offer' he's used to getting directly from the sales guy, he's unhappy.
So it seems that the blog author loves the hardware - but not enough to purchase it at the price listed on the website.
My question in general is, how good are the discounts you get from these a sales guys, typically?
And my question to the blog author is: How much of a discount are you losing now, that you'll compromise on the hardware you wanted.
It's not so much that there is a discount, as it is that the market using a sales guys is a lot less.
The reason is that if you use a sales guy, you're considered a "client", and they can get a good idea of your total profitability based on a collective snapshot of everything you buy. If you use the web, they don't.
My GF always does better with salesmen than me. A year or two back I bought her a 32 bit Dell with dual processors, a middling graphics card, and 4G of ram. She didnt like it because it was too underpowered. She sent it back and negotiated a 64-bit quad core machine with 8G of memory, and an an advanced graphics card for 10% more than I paid.
If you don't want to "fuck around with a salesguy" you pay the same price that everyone else does. A few vendors I've dealt with over the years have had a system in place which allows large customers to buy products with discounted prices online, but it isn't common. Even if they do, you can still get a better price by calling, especially if you are able to provide a quote from a competitor.
Yes. that is why I build my own shit. it makes no sense. I waste the time of a highly paid salesguy, and you charge me less than the guy who quietly pays what the website says? that seems backwards to me.
No matter; I usually pay less than half buying parts (which are usually sold in a rational manner) and assembling myself.
Aren't the salespeople paid on commission? In that case I find it hard to believe that you really would be paying less than the guy using the internet.
But then again, the salesguy might be there to ensure future business. The next time you need a server, are you going to pick on the phone and give Mick a call, or are you going to waste your (presumably) valuable time doing some comparison shopping?
Maybe it's worth it to give the through-salespeople orders a discount because there's a person to person relationship built that encourages future sales.
My employer provides a completely customized catalog for each customer. We view this as one of our competitive advantages.
In fact, I'm working on this subsystem right now. For large catalogs and large numbers of customers, this becomes quite challenging. There's a huge volume of data, and keep it current while product pricing, availability, licensing terms, etc. change, is tough.
that's the thing, though, I want less complexity in pricing, not more. Buying parts, unfortunately, even though it means I buy and price compare many more things than buying servers, actually makes the price of my next server a lot more predictable. This is what I'm saying is messed up.
> I don't want to fuck around with a salesguy, just tell me what it fucking costs.
I used to think this way until I started running a business and realized that people are people and they do things like give discounts, while web apps do not.
When we order with a web app we generally follow up with a call to a sales rep to see if we can get a discount (now, or in the future).
This is half the reason I build my own servers. It's impossible to decide what tradeoffs to make when the true cost of those tradeoffs is hidden behind some sales asshole.