Insider #72: Highlights: Conference survey results

IIUG Insider (Issue #72) June 2006 Highlights: Conference survey results Welcome to the International Informix Users Group (IIUG) Insider! Designed for IIUG members and Informix user group leaders, this publication contains timely and relevant information for the IBM Informix community. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Contents: ----------------------------------------------------------------------- * Editorial * Highlights The Conference survey results * Conference corner IDUG/IIUG Europe Conference Vienna, October 2-6, 2006 Conference Revisited - Ask The Experts Just MOMENTS left to save $400 on the Information on Demand 2006 Global Conference! * IIUG Board of Directors corner Handy hints for SIG users Informix new features survey * Education Chat with the Lab NEW! Informix Chat with the Labs Live for Asia Pacific! IDS 10 International EGL User Conference * Developer corner IBM and Zend partner to deliver certified PHP support for IDS Fuzzy Checkpoints and V10 IDS on Windows Series: Installing IDS on XP * Calendar of events * Useful links * Closing and credits ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Editorial ----------------------------------------------------------------------- I will be brief. Not that I have nothing to say but heavy workload in my real job left me very little time.It is 2 AM in Israel and I have just finalized the Insider and am ready to send it out. I do hope you will find this newsletter useful. The none US readers will probably find very little time with the world cup finals going on. But if possible, when you watch the games try to remember the RFID data of the games is stored in an Informix database. Gary Ben-Israel IIUG Insider Editor IIUG Board of Directors gary@iiug.org ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Highlights ----------------------------------------------------------------------- THE CONFERENCE SURVEY RESULTS Many thanks to those who participated in the Conference Survey run last month. We have a whopping 486 responses. That's a fantastic response rate. I personally appreciate the effort 486 of you made. The purpose of the survey was to: Get feedback about the value of the IDUG/IIUG Tampa conference Better understand the reasons why people did not attend the Tampa conference. Gain insights about the effectiveness of some of the programs that the IIUG run. We ran the survey from the 26th of May to the 25th of June. It was advertised once in the "Insider" and we also did two email reminders. A full report on the survey will be available at http://www.iiug.org/survey/results/conference.html. However I have summarized the key points below. The demographics of the respondents Where respondents are physically located, Total, % North America 228 47% Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) 165 34% Indian sub-continent, Asia, Pacific 50 10% Mexico/Central America/South America 43 9% 58% of respondents describe themselves as being Programmers and or DBAs. 11% have executive responsibilities. 18% have IS management roles. About 30% work for companies which employee between 100 and 999 people. 36% work for companies employing over 1000 people. 15% work for companies employing between 10 and 99 emp0loyees with 13% working for companies employing less that 10 people. The balance either work for IBM or do "other". 61% or respondents consider themselves as Informix end users. About the Tampa Informix conference 60 respondents said that they attended the Tampa conference. 426 did not. When asked about the intellectual value of the conference, 21 said that they got great value, 28 thought the conference was good value, 1 thought it was OK and a further 3 were a bit disappointed. When asked about value for money, 7 said it was cheap considering the benefit they got, 30 thought the conference value was fair, 13 felt it was a bit expensive and 3 thought it was very expensive for the benefit they got. Respondents who did not attend the conference were asked for the main reason for their non-attendance. The reasons are: Reason, Total, % My company would not pay for my attendance 136 32% The location of the conference was unsuitable 96 23% I could not afford to attend 59 14% I did not have the time available to attend 57 14% Other (please specify) 36 9% The date of the conference was unsuitable 19 5% The content of the conference was not useful 11 3% I did not know the conference was on 7 2% Total Respondents to this question 421 Respondents who said that the date was unsuitable were asked for an alternative month. There were no clear winners (October and July being the favorites) and no obvious correlation with their physical work location. Even so, if the dates are more suitable it does not mean that the respondents will definitely turn up to a conference. Respondents who said that the location was unsuitable (96) were asked for alternatives. There was a very strong correlation between physical working location and preferred conference location. 55 respondents selected Europe. However, even if the conference is held in the right location 54% still feel that the conference fee is a deterrent followed by 16% who feel that their company will still not pay for them to attend. Unsurprisingly, 75% of the 57 respondents who were deterred by the conference fee, selected the range of $500 - $999 as a reasonable price for a 4 day technical event. 19% selected between $1000 and $1299 for such an event. However, even if the conference is priced at their selection, only 14% would still go. Most respondents are still restricted by lack of financial support by their company and the conference location. Conference events For conference planners there is a very clear message that technical training sessions are the most popular event at an Informix conference. When asked to choose the most important. 56% also selected the technical sessions. The full list is as follows: If you go to the next Informix conference please check all the events that you believe you would personally attend. Event, Total, Popularity, Importance Technical training sessions 311 86% 56% Informix ask the experts sessions 231 64% 11% Informix road map presentations 193 54% 7% Very small group sessions with Informix engineers 186 52% 8% Informix new feature request sessions 180 50% 5% Free Informix certification 154 43% 8% Vendor exhibitions 149 41% 1% Vendor technical presentations 138 38% 2% Key note presentations by IBM executives 135 38% 2% Informix ask the marketers sessions 59 16% 1% Other (please specify) 14 4% - Respondents were asked to check their interest in a list of non-Informix topics. "The Linux operating system" was selected by 52% of respondents with "Operating Informix in a highly heterogeneous platform environment" coming second with 39% of the vote. The full list is as follows Interest, Total, % Developing/Operating Informix alongside DB2 129 35% Developing/Operating Informix alongside Oracle 110 30% Developing/Operating Informix alongside MS SQL 117 32% Operating Informix in a highly heter

<emailer@iiug.org> wrote in message news:mailman.410.1151662091.19084.informix-list@iiug.org... >> My sales representative never calls - what should I do about it? >> Carlton Doe: >> Determine if you have a dedicated sales rep. If you have purchased >> through VARs and other sales channels, you may not have a rep. Question: >> How much do you need to buy? Do you have needs, or do you want warm >> fuzzies from your sales rep to feel important to IBM? (surveyed the room) >> IBM is working on building small-to-med market business for Informix - >> started about 2 yrs ago If you need a sales rep, contact Carlton, he will >> be able to get someone for you Local User Group - Technical sales rep >> should be associated with the LUGs; let Carlton Doe know if there isn't >> one Comments on global partner space - embedding IDS in applications to >> sell outside of their own environment. The message had been we'll let the >> channel drive Informix sales (in the top 2000 customers). Informix didn't >> fit IBM sales model. Mainframes are only sold to very large companies. >> Informix sales should hit more small and medium companies. New >> approach/model - Small & Medium Business emphasis. An outgrowth will be a >> customer advisory board. Global Technical Partner Council. IIUG should be >> focal point for collecting product related feature request. Top 5, for >> example. Perhaps conduct a survey? Correct answer (slightly toungue-in-cheek, but perhaps one we might have hoped would at least have been mentioned): "Contact an IBM Business Partner which specialises in Informix".