Lotus for IBM Business Partners: Communicate. Collaborate. Innovate.
Recently, I had the chance to attend Lotusphere in Orlando, Florida. Over 7,000 clients and IBM Business Partners were the first to learn about some amazing new products and enhancements, and you should have heard the buzz! If you were there, you know what I mean. And if you weren't, listen to the opening general session webcast; your concept of enterprise-grade collaboration and communication is about to change! From impressive new products focused on small and medium business, to some pretty amazing integration with SaaS and beyond, we have some terrific new assets that can help you increase productivity, innovate, and drive new revenue.
Need an update of all the news from Lotusphere? Check the Lotusphere 2008 press releases and see what was said about the Lotusphere announcements.
For those who would like to see the Lotus products up close, I recommend that you attend a Lotusphere Comes to You 2008 session in your neighborhood. This series of client events is an excellent alternative if you missed the event in Orlando.
IBM Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino
If you're invested in Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino, or are interested in the new Web 2.0 technologies, you'll want to take a look at our latest version. Not only does it continue to provide the top-notch functionality you've come to expect, we've added expanded Web connectivity and some truly cutting-edge features.
For example, the My Widgets area of the sidebar will allow you to access both public and internal widgets—like Google maps. You can configure these widgets to be activated by certain phrases or text patterns in e-mails. That means you could receive an e-mail from a customer and the Google Maps widget will show you a map of where they're located. So not only will you know who you're talking to, but also how to get to their office!
There's also the Lotus Notes Traveler which provides mobile support for Lotus e-mail, calendar, address book, journal and to do lists. You'll be able to check your e-mail from your telephone. Also, we announced a new Domino Web Access "lite" mode for better performance over low-bandwidth connections, allowing you to do business from anywhere in the world regardless of your Internet speed.
For a preview of the these features, watch this YouTube video that demonstrates the new Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino products.
Lotus Connections
Lotus Connections is social software for business. You can find and collaborate with experts, easily locate people and information, help build closer customer relationships, and foster bottom-up, community-based innovation. Lotus Connections 2.0 is due this year and adds a new widget-based home page that lets you aggregate and filter social data from all Lotus Connections services into a single, customizable view of your professional network. Lotus Connections also supports new languages and integration with communities like Facebook. Watch this video for more details about Lotus Connections.
Lotus Foundations
This one has me really excited! Lotus Foundations is a family of software servers designed to address the "S" in SMB—it's geared toward firms of 500 people and under. It provides the small business client with a complete collaboration system including anti-spam, anti-virus, backup and recovery, print services, and rock-solid e-mail. And the best part is you can set it up end-to-end in 15-30 minutes. That's less time than it takes to have a pizza delivered!
Over 3,000 Business Partners are already selling this solution. They've found that the Lotus Foundation server can be installed and configured remotely, meaning you don't need to travel to get your client configured. One Business Partner has already done this over 150 times! It's quick, it's easy, and you'll be able to integrate your solutions into the core platform for your end customers.
More Lotus Foundations offerings will be coming to compete head-to-head against Microsoft, so expect others to follow.
"Bluehouse"
"Bluehouse" is great news for those of you who want to enter or expand your footprint in the Software as a Service (SaaS) market. It's an integrated suite of collaboration services delivered over the Web to help clients meet the needs of their business and it is ideal for small and medium business. You can store and share documents securely, use a Web browser to access your files from anywhere, and collaborate with others using any type of file. You can even manage your projects with the "Activities" feature. It's as simple as launching the application, inviting the right people, and starting your to do list. And that's just the beginning.
For clients who don't want an on-site solution, "Bluehouse" offers all the collaboration tools they need at a low cost.
Lotus Sametime
Celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2008, Lotus Sametime is planning to expand with the addition of two new amazing software offerings. The first—IBM Lotus Sametime V8.0 Advanced—is due near the middle of the year and will offer ground-breaking new features like persistent chat rooms and "Skilltap" expertise location. Very cool! And the second—IBM Lotus Sametime "Unified Telephony"—is due later this year and will simplify unified communications deployments in companies with multiple telephone systems. It's simple, it's efficient, and it's something you'll want to leverage when available!
Learn more about the OEM agreements and growing customer adoption rates marking the 10th anniversary of Lotus Sametime.
How to get US$3,000 in co-marketing
All this great news wouldn't be complete if we didn't have a special offer for our Business Partners, so here it is. When you submit a qualified Lotus-related customer opportunity into IBM Sales Connections, you'll receive up to US$3,000 to generate even more opportunities through proven lead generation benefits like trade show package, telemarketing, or pipeline generation. Learn more on how to take advantage of this special offering.
Ready to take on Microsoft? We say "Game on"!
"Game on" is a new competitive promotion designed especially for Lotus customers. It gives you a 25% rebate when you sell Lotus Notes competitive trade-up software and CEO enhanced collaboration software, in addition to migration services. And that's on top of any VAP or SVI margins you might get! Find out more about competitive migrations to IBM Lotus Collaboration (IBM ID required).
Stay tuned; there's more to come
Lotus isn't just about Lotus Notes and Lotus Domino anymore. I've touched on just a few of the new products and capabilities today, so be sure to check out the links to find out more. And make sure you visit the Lotus section for Business Partners so you can be the first to know when we launch even more new products and features.
Stay tuned for my next newsletter, where I'll return to my "Practical and profitable" series, and outline ways you can get the most out of IBM in the quickest amount of time.
Christopher Wong
Vice president of marketing and strategy, ISV and Developer Relations
IBM
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