Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

Anticipated Q4 Expense Items Toward $3 Billion in Cost Reductions

Dell Shares — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 21:01:33 GMT

In March last year, we announced actions to enhance the company's competitiveness , improve our cost

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

Dell IR — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 21:08:35 GMT

Thanks for your comments. We recognize that there is sometimes a gray area in the SOHO space, where small office and home office buyers sometimes buy a home consumer product or vice versa. We do our best to listen to customers and we decided to split the Small Office from the Home Consumer site several years ago once it was apparent that each customer segment had different requirements. The hardware and services sold through each channel continue to have distinct technical requirements, services, and marketing needs and there is less and less overlap as time progresses. Customers can still order whichever machine best fits their needs, and we encourage customers to go online to order the systems of their choosing or to call Dell directly to determine what will work best for them.

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

jervis961 — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 00:18:16 GMT

Sure I can call in or shop on the small business site but why should I have to adjust the way I do things? Isn't Dell the one who is supposed to adjust its methods in order to improve sales? Dell adjusted all the other sites in order to provide better options and sell the home products why can't they do the same for the home customers? Same goes for the EPP site where I can't buy a Precision. Then there is the whole pricing differences on the sites. Why should I need to check the Home, Small Business and EPP sites to find the best price on a configuration? Why do I usually find the prices on the Small Business or Home sites (with coupons) are cheaper than using my EPP discount (where the coupons don't work)? Dell just doesn't seem to be concerned with the Home consumers.

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

Lynn Tyson — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 15:56:52 GMT

Thanks to those of you who posted comments about the reorganization we announced on December 31, 2008. What many people do not realize is that within our regional structure we have always been aligned by customer type and this has been a key point of differentiation for Dell over the last 24 years. Customers, especially commercial customers (large global, public and small and medium business), benefit from this structure because they have one point of contact – one point of accountability at Dell. Rather than for example speaking to our services team, hardware team and software team individually – our customers have one single point of contact within Dell who understands their needs and can leverage the resources within Dell to provide the optimal solution. So the globalization of our customer segments is not a change to our operating discipline. It really is about taking it to the next logical step as globalization becomes a reality for businesses certain types of customers have similar needs no matter where they work or do business around the world. This was proved to us after we globalized our consumer business last year – we vertically integrated the business from sales and marketing through product development and design. This yielded a more nimble and efficient business – one that was able to be more innovative and responsive to the specific needs of consumers. With respect to the sale of products from different segments, we routinely sell small and medium business machines to the home consumer and vice versa. We encourage any customer who has a specific hardware requirement to contact Dell directly where a sales professional is able to walk you through the hardware and service products that best meet your needs.

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

Dell IR — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 00:00:02 GMT

We have gotten several pieces of customer feedback on the support forum. The Dell team is making frequent updates to the support site and communicating the changes/fixes. Here is a list of the fixes and changes to date, along with the user feedback. The dell team is not done with making improvements to the site, you can expect many more improvements in January: http://en.community.dell.com/blogs/direct2dell/archive/2008/12/16/new-fixes-now-live.aspx http://en.community.dell.com/forums/t/19245975.aspx http://en.community.dell.com/forums/t/19246264.aspx

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

sugarbear18 — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 04:42:44 GMT

Will this be at the expense of the home consumer division? Many of us are small business owners.

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

Thereal-dbk4297 — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 15:14:24 GMT

Hello Lynn, -- What changes if any are being planned for the Home User segment? The Dell tech support forum has many major problems since Dell changed the site two months ago. Lynn, will you support the Home user customers by helping facilitate the needed changes/repairs to the now broken tech support site? --- Thanks in advance, Darrell

re: Dell Announces New Global Segmentation around Key Customer Segments

jervis961 — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:26:18 GMT

I can understand the need to make these moves but I do have a concern. If you read IdeaStorm or the forums you will find many complaints about Dell being too segmented. Many home customers are interested in the business computers and some business customers prefer the home computers. Dell has bridged the latter by offering home computers on the business sites but the home customers do not get the option of business computers. Home customers are told they can buy from the small business site if they like which makes them feel less valued by Dell. I don't see any solution coming from this move, only more of a separation.