Who is selling? Who cares?
It’s summertime, which means inevitably my kids will want to throw together a lemonade stand and see what kind of cash they can rake in to go buy Legos or Reese’s peanut butter cups. They haven’t really grasped the concept of paying for their raw materials yet (like the 10 frozen containers of lemonade they pulled from the freezer), but they have learned something fascinating about sales. Selling lemonade is energizing. From what I can tell, this sale caused a flurry of new activity:
- The marketing person holding the “Lemonade 25¢” sign hops up off the grass and waves it wildly.
- The operations folks that make the lemonade run in the house to get some more ice.
- The salespeople run out in the street to slow down any cars coming that way.
Similarly energized are the vendors who sold new core systems to the 80+ larger hospitals who made the switch in 2011. With KLAS just completing this 2011 clinical market share research, I am reminded of the lemonade stand. There is great energy that comes from knowing what you do is making a difference and that NEW people want to hop on board.
Conversely, how tough is it to be on a team where nothing is being sold? With my kids, it led to lots of lounging in the grass, complaining about the heat, and wondering if Mom and Dad bought the wrong kind of lemonade.
For healthcare providers, the bad news is that only two vendors sold to more hospitals than they lost. Who cares? Well . . . people who want to survive the current market turbulence. GE Centricity Enterprise is no longer offered, and the replacement effort (Qualibria) may now be coming through the joint venture with Microsoft (Caradigm). McKesson, after no Horizon clinical sales in 2011, found energy among those looking at Paragon and chose to make a significant strategic shift to the product that was of most interest to the market.
How will this impact the others in the same boat?
- Siemens sold more than almost everyone, but also lost quite a few.
- MEDITECH is moving lots of MAGIC customers to v.6, which creates loads of energy, but they lost several larger customers in the churn.
- Few hospitals have left Allscripts, but they are barely on the radar for new buyers.
With all that energy, you may want to pay close attention to which other cars are stopping at your core vendor’s lemonade stand and which ones are driving away.