As SAP con­tin­ues to expand and improve its prod­uct port­fo­lio, an impor­tant part of this devel­op­ment is engag­ing with the cus­tomers who reg­u­lar­ly use SAP prod­ucts. There is no bet­ter way to gauge how soft­ware is serv­ing cus­tomers than by direct­ly talk­ing to them about their experience. 

“Con­nect­ing with cus­tomers through­out the devel­op­ment life cycle is crit­i­cal for the suc­cess of SAP prod­ucts,” said Kristin Albright, VP of SAP America’s cus­tomer adop­tion man­age­ment and glob­al head of SAP ear­ly adopter care ser­vices. ​“Cus­tomer input ensures SAP is devel­op­ing solu­tions that are rel­e­vant to their busi­ness needs and bring­ing val­ue to their organizations.” 

Cre­at­ing Paths for SAP Cus­tomer Engagement 

To loop SAP users into the devel­op­ment process and assess feed­back on new and upcom­ing fea­tures, SAP offers sev­er­al cus­tomer influ­ence ini­tia­tives. Through these ini­tia­tives, users can have a demon­strat­ed effect on SAP prod­ucts across sev­er­al top­ics, includ­ing ERP and the dig­i­tal core, HR and peo­ple man­age­ment, and intel­li­gent tech­nolo­gies, to name a few. These oppor­tu­ni­ties extend across a vari­ety of industries. 

“With SAP being cus­tomer-focused, it is great to see the com­pa­ny con­tin­ue to prac­tice what it preach­es and cre­ate forums for cus­tomers to artic­u­late the busi­ness prob­lems they’re try­ing to solve,” said Dan­ny Pan­cratz, direc­tor of prod­uct devel­op­ment at ASUG. ​“Influ­ence has long been a part of ASUG, and long sup­port­ed by SAP. It’s vital that cus­tomers take advan­tage of these opportunities.”

Users can make their voic­es heard through three cus­tomer influ­ence ini­tia­tives. SAP Cus­tomer Engage­ment Ini­tia­tive allows cus­tomers to inter­act with new devel­op­ments in their ear­ly stages and gives users a plat­form to pro­vide ear­ly feed­back on those advances. SAP Cus­tomer Con­nec­tion focus­es on on-premise solu­tions cur­rent­ly in main­te­nance and gives them access to eas­i­ly adopt­able and non-dis­rup­tive improve­ments. Sim­i­lar­ly, SAP Con­tin­u­ous Influ­ence allows users to sug­gest enhance­ments and improve­ments on an ongo­ing basis for cloud-based and new solu­tions. In both pro­grams, users sub­mit improve­ment requests for the enhance­ments they want before vot­ing to pri­or­i­tize which requests should be com­plet­ed first.

“Cus­tomers ben­e­fit from a close col­lab­o­ra­tion with SAP devel­op­ment when they get involved with cus­tomer influ­ence pro­grams. They have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to shape future solu­tions so they can max­i­mize their busi­ness val­ue,” Albright said. ​“The SAP Cus­tomer Engage­ment Ini­tia­tive is focused on devel­op­ing new fea­tures, while SAP Cus­tomer Con­nec­tion and SAP Con­tin­u­ous Influ­ence enable cus­tomers to incre­men­tal­ly improve the prod­ucts and solu­tions in main­te­nance they are using today.”

The SAP Feed­back Loop 

The SAP Cus­tomer Engage­ment Ini­tia­tive is par­tic­u­lar­ly unique in that it grants cus­tomers access to ear­ly devel­op­ments with­in the SAP prod­uct port­fo­lio. Users must apply to par­tic­i­pate in the three cycles that take place through­out the year. Dur­ing these ses­sions, they can par­tic­i­pate in either remote or on-site dis­cus­sions aimed at gen­er­at­ing ideas to address their needs and requirements. 

The ini­tia­tive also gives users a pre­view into the devel­op­ment process of SAP prod­ucts in var­i­ous stages. They can give feed­back on these ear­ly-stage devel­op­ments, gain insight into forth­com­ing fea­tures, and col­lab­o­rate with SAP deci­sion-mak­ers to help shape new features. 

This ini­tia­tive is par­tic­u­lar­ly help­ful for SAP users because it gives them an inside look at the new func­tions SAP is build­ing. ​“This is an impor­tant oppor­tu­ni­ty for SAP users to make sure that the needs of your com­pa­ny are rep­re­sent­ed with­in the glob­al cus­tomer feed­back that SAP is col­lect­ing,” Pan­cratz said.

Get­ting Involved as an ASUG Member 

These influ­ence ini­tia­tives not only help SAP users, but they also allow SAP to hear direct­ly from its cus­tomers and users. This is ben­e­fi­cial to all par­ties, as the soft­ware com­pa­ny can tack­le requests from users and enhance its software. 

“Influ­ence pro­grams with direct cus­tomer input enable SAP to pri­or­i­tize devel­op­ment activ­i­ties and focus on cus­tomer require­ments,” Albright said. ​“These pro­grams pro­vide the abil­i­ty to influ­ence SAP’s devel­op­ment road map for the prod­uct based on real-world needs, bring­ing the improve­ments to mar­ket at the quick­est pos­si­ble rate.”

Learn more about the SAP influ­ence pro­grams and reg­is­ter for the first SAP Cus­tomer Engage­ment Ini­tia­tive cycle of 2020 by March 13.