It has been sometime since I posted on the Integration Content Marketplace or Content Hub idea that I wrote about in an earlier post. After rounds of discussions and ideations some thoughts on how the Content hub is taking shape and an outline of how it helps different stakeholders..
The content hub powers the value chain across different dimensions
- Sales process – enables the sales teams in communicating the richness of SAP and Partner content on SAP Integration tools.
- Content discovery – customer/users looking to discover content for business scenarios that enables different aspects of their business.
- Content configuration – for specific business scenarios, support on how do business managers configure and use the content effectively?
- Content Management – Enabling the customers to effectively manage their content across configuration, go-live and upgrades.
For on-premise content, the Content Hub is highly relevant during the sales and content discovery phases. It will be used primarily to browse and search content and will be optimized for discovery.
For cloud integration scenarios, the experience extends beyond discovery to support management and monitoring as well. This will be possible due to closer integration of the design time and run-time in the on-demand space.
What differentiates the Content Hub
- Content density – Quality and quantity of Integration content
- User experience – Integrated user experience providing relevant information to the consumers to discover content, it is social by design
- Traffic – site hits and increased traffic on the content hub, making it worthwhile and encouraging partners and SIs to share their content on the site
- Integration – Seamless integration with the SAP Content infrastructure enabling partners to sell and customers to buy. This will include integration with the compliance processes as well for partners to be able to effectively deliver their content through SAP Channels to customers.
What gets listed on the content hub
The Content hub will be designed and optimized (both semantically and in user experience) for Integration content. This is to include
- PRO content – Interfaces, Mappings, Adapters, adapter modules, processes
- HCI Content – Packages, Apps
- API Management Content (announced recently in SAP D Code - Las Vegas)
- Operational Intelligence
Who are the Key stakeholders & value proposition
Following are some of the key stakeholders who should find value in Content Hub; (this is in no order of priority)
a) SAP Sales
- SAP Sales should be able to use the Content Hub effectively to showcase the content depth and variety that is offered by SAP integration solutions today.
- The Content Hub should speak the language of industry, process and business functions to translate the technology conversation to a business conversation.
- The Content Hub should also empower the Sales team to address the questions on which integration technology (HCI, PI, GW) is the best for a given customer problem and how they could choose.
- The Content Hub also enables the SAP Sales team to leverage partner innovation from across the globe and position them effectively
b) Large System Integrators/ Partners
- Large System integrator and partners can leverage their strong branding and existing customer recall to showcase their product, functional and industry expertise in the Content Hub
- Through dedicated sections on the website, large players can showcase their existing content packages and productized services to prospective customers
- Through blogs and whitepapers showcased on the content hub, the System Integrator and the partners showcase their specific expertise
- The Content Hub will have a strong offline presence in industry and SAP events / conferences. These events provide stronger exposure to these organizations to reach out to a more targeted audience
- Lead generation? Customer conversation?
c) Small partners
- With smaller partners, the Content Hub offers them credibility among their existing customers by being listed in the SAP site
- For truly unique solutions that have a strong relevance among customers, the Content Hub offers a chance to break clutter and reach out to the SAP Sales team and the customers
- Similarly, innovative solutions will be positioned through marketing campaigns to attract customers to the Content Hub raising the visibility of the App
- The Content Hub is facilitate conversations in events for customers and consultants to share their content and “app” requirements on PI
- The Content Hub will also work closely with the content owners to ensure that the content is well represented and showcased to pique the curiosity of content consumers
d) Content owners within SAP
- For content owners within SAP, Content Hub provides a way of reaching out to customers.
- Given that the Content Hub will be optimized for SEO and have a strong social media action (e.g. LinkedIn, Twitter), there is a greater awareness generated for the content
- The Content Hub will also work closely with the content owners to ensure that the content is well represented and showcased to pique the curiosity of content consumers
e) Integration customers & Implementation Consultants
- Integration customers will use the Content Hub to discover and browse content that is of their choice.
- IT teams will use these tools to discover pre-delivered solutions provided by customers and partners
- Business process experts will use the tool to engage with their internal IT teams on possible integration options
- Customers will also rate, comment and up-vote content that they find useful and relevant (or not) thereby encouraging good content to bubble up.
- Customers will also leverage the social media integration of the content
- Going forward, customers also see this as an opportunity to share their content and best practices with the larger community
To Browse new content visit : https://cloudintegration.hana.ondemand.com/
In the next post "soon" enough will talk about the value chain, business model and the economy around the Content Hub...
(co-authored with Rathish Balakrishnan)
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