At this time of the year bloggers everywhere look back and reflect. Some use the timing to highlight significant achievements… and it is in the spirit that I would like to announce my choice for the best marketing in the data warehouse vendor space for 2011.
Marketing is a difficult task. Marketeers need to walk a line between reality and bull-pucky. They need to appeal to real and apparent needs yet differentiate. Often they need to generate spin to fuzz a good story by a competitors marketing or to de-emphasize some short-coming in their own product line.
Below is a picture taken on the floor of a prospect where we engaged in a competitive proof-of-concept. The customer requested that vendors ship a single rack configuration… and so we did.
But the marketing coup is that the vendor on the right, Teradata, told the customer that this is a single rack configuration and that they are in compliance. The customer has asked us if this is reasonable?
This creative marketing spin wins the 2011 award going away… against very tough competition.
I expect this marketing approach to start a trend in the space. Soon we will see warehouse appliance vendors claiming that 1TB = 50TB due to compression… or was that already done this year?
Sorry to be cynical… but I hope that the picture and story provide you with a giggle… and that the giggle helps you to start a happy holiday season.
– Rob Klopp
I think the rational explanation for this is that the Teradata rack is in fact a 3D rack. If you wear the glasses they hand you in cinemas perhaps only one of them shows?
Anyway you’ll pay for more than two ^_^