Not all vendors are struggling right now…

I know it wasn’t my job – But,  I am pretty sure that SOMEONE for got to tell the HR Technology Vendors about the bad economy?  I mean what else would explain the results seen (and published) by some of my favorite vendors in the space.

The twitter wires were buzzing this morning with the links to the 2nd Quarter Results for SilkRoad as well as the results for Ultimate Software, an HRIS system. Both had positive results with Silkroad having its 24th consecutive period of sales growth!  Ultimate Software reported a 14% sales increase vs. same quarter numbers the year before!

Lets combine that with the fantastic results that privately held Talent Acquisition/Talent Management/Applicant Tracking/ATS/Whatever we are calling it now is Companies like HRMDirect and ICIMS and it makes you stop to wonder if we are starting to see the uptic – and it happened 2 months ago!

My thought on why these companies are doing so well and some tips to the rest of you vendors that may be struggling.   Here we go:

1.  They are not the most expensive products on the market – They are not the absolute cheapest.  They are robust products with a great value proposition to an organization so it is easy to actually find the ROI

2. They have great sales pros.  That doesn’t mean that they are smooth talking, high pressure, angry closer types of sales people.  They are consultative – want to provide value and respect your time (not call every day to check in on you and if you made a decision yet).  (I worked w/sales reps from all 3 when I was consulting and always appreciated this aspect of their sales process)  They also give enough information on their website for those of us with fear of forms issues (actually – icims – a touch more info would be great, but love the screenshots!) feel like we know what we are jumping into.

3. They are proactive when it comes to the market – when things need to be adjusted – they just do it.  They don’t feel the need to brag about every single client they sign or every step along the way.  They have taken on social media/twitter and are learning to use it – ahead of the other guys. ICIMS has recently started iblog, HRMDirect’s blog (New one launching this fall) is-  believe it or not actually writen by our CEO.  Himself. Seriously. No help.    They are also on Twitter – learning the ropes still – but on nonetheless – their tweets are not slams on other products (Umm…you know who you are – mystery vendor that will remain unnamed but I see through my tweetdeck search) rather an insight into their organization or the industry.   If you are on twitter make sure to follow these vendors – every once in a while, they tweet something cool. @HRMDirect @ICIMS @SilkRoadTweets