Spend Matters released its first SolutionMap, an essential tool for procurement executives and their teams to assess and understand vendor capability on an ongoing basis. – Press Release, April 10th, 2017
I received an e-mail from Azul Partners VP of Marketing Carina Kuhl in which she shared news regarding Spend Matters’ release of its first SolutionMap.
Describing it has being a “Groundbreaking Persona-Based Comparative Vendor Analyses of Procurement Technologies,” I must admit that her e-mail peaked my interest. Part of the reason for my interest is the fact that other than the occasional “rankling” of Jason’s sensibilities, in which he has questioned everything from my functioning gray matter to admonishing me for going against the harmonious flow of the procurement blogosphere, I have been predominantly persona non grata. Who knows, maybe my name was accidently added to the list 😉
Regardless, it would be rude of me to ignore Carina’s overture, especially if she gets fired for sending it to me.
After reviewing the material that was included in the e-mail, some questions immediately came to mind. Here they are in no particular order:
1. How is the SolutionMap different from say a Magic Quadrant?
2. Reference is made to “rankings (that) are based equally on demonstrated technology/solution capability as well as on customer input.” I realize that “customers” respond to certain “questions,” but how do you identify and engage the customers who participate in this exchange? In other words, how do you source or solicit these customers?
3. Reference is made to an interpretation of the rankings. What is the basis of this “interpretation?” For example, is an algorithm utilized to weight the responses?
4. How large is the customer pool upon which the “interpretation” is based?
5. Finally, let’s consider the following disclaimer; “Spend Matters does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in SolutionMap and does not advise users to select only those with the highest ratings or other designation.” How do you believe that objectivity can be maintained when some of the companies that are referenced in the SolutionMap are also sponsors of the Spend Matters blog?
There are of course several other questions that I have, but the ones above represent a good start.
Back to you Carina.
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Carina Kuhl
April 11, 2017
Sure, Jon, I’m happy to respond and clarify:
1. How is the SolutionMap different from say a Magic Quadrant? A couple of things:
– We have a lot of respect for other approaches. But we believe our approach is more appropriate for today’s technology buying climate. Instead of 1 “2/2” chart, there are 6 for the E-Procurement SolutionMap based on different procurement personas to take organizational requirements into account – as well as the vendor’s unique value proposition and solution strategy. We are also publishing (this month) different views just for Invoice-to-Pay (a separate solution area) and procure-to-pay (P2P) which includes E-Procurement and Invoice-to-Pay — so 18 different charts in total! It sounds like a lot, but this is the type of detail that allows organizations to “self-select” for their own needs and persona(s).
– Each participating vendor completed an extensive RFI including a mandatory 90-minute live demo — in certain cases, the demonstrations were longer and carried out over multiple sessions
– In addition to the analyst rating, SolutionMap includes a customer rating based on real-life experiences with the solution
– Any vendor can request to participate in the RFI process (start by creating a free http://spendmatters.com/almanac/ listing)
– The comparative, persona-based graphics are available for free to everyone (https://tinyurl.com/eProcSM)
– Finally, SolutionMap is updated quarterly post launch to actively reflect market developments (and more and more vendors participating in the process). In a cloud world, vendors often update their solutions monthly or quarterly — and analyses should reflect this.
2. Reference is made to “rankings (that) are based equally on demonstrated technology/solution capability as well as on customer input.” I realize that “customers” respond to certain “questions,” but how do you identify and engage the customers who participate in this exchange? In other words, how do you source or solicit these customers?
The vendors identify the customers during the RFI process (and I imagine they’d send us their favorites). The customers shared their real-life experiences through a survey which results are used in an anonymized format to inform the customer scores – and never attributed to a specific customer. It’s the kind of insight every procurement pro seeks when assessing a solution or tool. We’ll be adding “self-sourced” RFI responses from our direct practitioner relationships to complement the vendor references in the future.
3. Reference is made to an interpretation of the rankings. What is the basis of this “interpretation?” For example, is an algorithm utilized to weight the responses?
Frankly, Jon, as head of marketing I don’t make the sausage – the analyst team does…But I do know solution scoring is based on analysis of individual vendor capability, including in-depth tech reviews, a highly detailed Spend Matters RFI and live demonstrations and Q&A by the Spend Matters team. The Customer Value score stems from aggregated direct customer input (survey-based). A lot of effort has gone into creating the personas and assessment framework – more details are published on PRO, e.g.:
https://spendmatters.com/2017/03/31/e-procurement-persona-understand-requirements-mass-customize-vendor-shortlist/
AND
http://spendmatters.com/2017/04/10/vendor-summary-report-e-procurement-solutionmap-q2-2017/
In these, we share the specific solution/technology and customer input emphases for each persona — it’s transparent (that’s our aim!)
4. How large is the customer pool upon which the “interpretation” is based?
Some vendors only submitted a handful, others 20+ references – all sharing relevant insight on how the solution (and implementation process) works in real-life.
5. Finally, let’s consider the following disclaimer; “Spend Matters does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in SolutionMap and does not advise users to select only those with the highest ratings or other designation.” How do you believe that objectivity can be maintained when some of the companies that are referenced in the SolutionMap are also sponsors of the Spend Matters blog?
That’s a fair question, Jon, and I know you hold somewhat of a black-and-white view on this yourself. I can assure you that Spend Matters is not dependent on any one revenue stream or any one customer (or set of customers) — we have no customer concentration whatsoever in our business. And it’s in our best interest to objectively report on procurement technology of all colors to safeguard our credibility within the procurement industry. We’re aiming for a new level of transparency – and would welcome suggestions on how we can be even more transparent into our SolutionMap process.
Best,
Carina
piblogger
April 12, 2017
Thank you for your reply, Carina.When you have the opportunity, please refer to the Twitter exchange that has just started. Here are a few of the comments so far:
“Coupa: sponsor of spend matters are placed well. Yet Bravosolution and IBM Emptoris not ranked at all? Intriguing!”
“Others missing! Due to process?”
“You cannot send something like this out to market, influencing procurement without being fully transparent.”
Carina Kuhl
April 12, 2017
Hi Jon – Sure, in response to the tweets:
We’ve outlined the ratings / persona criteria and scoring in great detail in both our free and subscriber materials (And happy to have an analyst share in great detail with you if you’d like offline, including our detailed weightings inputs on the personas from our PRO brief – LMK).
Coupa performed as they did because of how they scored in the solution/technology review and customer analysis. Other providers did not participate for various reasons and we welcome them in the future (Contact info@SpendMatters.com to be added to the growing E-Procurement RFI list for Q3).
As to BravoSolution, I can speculate that their updated P2P solution (baseline code is from Puridiom), per our coverage (http://spendmatters.com/?s=bravo+puridiom), is just coming to market this spring and perhaps they’ll participate in the future.
IBM Emptoris does not have a P2P solution.
As to transparency, we are happy to answer questions directly on this (as we have) or get into even greater detail on a one-to-one basis with people as well.
Best,
Carina
piblogger
April 12, 2017
Thanks again for your response Carina. Be sure to follow the tweets as I am sure there will be more questions.
Carina Kuhl
April 12, 2017
My pleasure, Jon.
We’ve also issued a SolutionMap Q&A webinar to take place on May 4th at Noon Central with the analyst team:
https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=reg20.jsp&referrer=&eventid=1408536&sessionid=1&key=F78309E4EEDE587EA0B2D7E2B96A7F05®Tag=&sourcepage=register
piblogger
April 12, 2017
Will it be recorded for on-demand playback?
Carina Kuhl
April 12, 2017
Yes, it will be, Jon.If you register and you can’t attend ‘live’, the recording link is sent to you afterwards. For others who want to listen afterwards, the recording is posted on the Spend Matter site in the archive: http://spendmatters.com/research-library/video/