Customer Awards Program Description and Criteria

The Sage Customer Awards Program recognizes your outstanding achievements as a valued customer. This annual program honors your accomplishments, innovation, loyalty, and partnership, and in 2009 will award one winner in each of the following six categories:

For information about the rules and judging process, please download the Sage Customer Awards Program Rules & Regulations PDF.

Innovation

The Innovation award recognizes the extraordinary achievement of a customer that has adopted Sage applications as an enterprise-class solution for their industry. This company must recognize significant technology and business benefits by committing to the Sage platform, and achieve world-class performance while enabling business processes to deploy throughout the organization. The winning entrant will demonstrate exceptional alignment of business objectives to long-term industry trends, differentiate themselves to their customers, and achieve at least one of the following: outstanding ROI, user adoption, or gains in efficiency and effectiveness of existing resources. Efficiency is the ability to perform existing tasks faster while effectiveness takes a new approach for potentially new processes.

• Supply your name and contact information.
• Provide the name of the Sage product that you utilize.
• Include the date when the Sage product was installed and what hardware you are using to run the software.
• Discuss the unique nature of your industry, how you fit into the market mix, and how you tackle the business challenges of this industry in a unique manner with a competitive offering. Additionally, detail how Sage assists you in achieving a differentiated value proposition for your customers.
• Scope—Indicate what business problem or opportunity the Sage product implementation addresses and what the measurement/classification/scope is for the problem or opportunity.
• Mention the user adoption strategy (if applicable) and any unique approaches and challenges that were faced.
• Impact—Note any efficiency and effectiveness that resulted from the implementation of the Sage application.

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Rookie of the Year

The Rookie of the Year award recognizes a new Sage customer who has achieved and exceeded their stated objectives, established a new trajectory for their organization to deliver upon financial, service, process, and/or employee goals. The winning entrant will stand out among peers as achieving customer intimacy, operational excellence, or a unique product and/or service offering. Complexities of implementation or unique approaches to addressing a business challenge are two examples of achievement.

• Supply your name and contact information.
• Provide the name of your company and the Sage product that you utilize.
• Include the date when the Sage product was installed and what hardware you are using to run the software.
• Discuss the stated objectives for the implementation and results tracked against those objectives. Mention how Sage (and the implementation partner, if one was used) helped achieve those objectives, and the areas of improvement still to be achieved.
• Scope—Indicate the unique nature of the implementation as it addresses specific business challenges or opportunities.
• List any “Moments of Truth” during the first year of implementation and utilization that stand out as learning opportunities.
• Discuss your strategy toward customer intimacy, operational excellence, or unique product and/or service offering, and how Sage helps achieve these goals.
• Impact—Note any practical or measurable results in your business (sales, expense reduction, efficiency gains, profits, etc.) from using the Sage product.

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Best End-to-End Deployment

The End-to-End Deployment award recognizes the outstanding achievement of a customer who has implemented and integrated two (or more) Sage applications and realized synergies from the combined result. This company has recognized both significant technology and business benefits by committing to Sage and its complementary platforms, resulting in a world-class business management solution. The winning entrant will demonstrate the combined benefits that standalone implementations could not achieve.

• Supply your name and contact information.
• Provide the name of your company and the Sage products you utilize. (Minimum of two (2) Sage products must be in use at your business.)
• Include the date when the Sage products were installed and what hardware you are using to run the software.
• Scope—Indicate a business problem or opportunity that the Sage product implementation addresses, and the size of the problem or opportunity.
• Specify how your organization decided upon an integrated solution and what technology and business benefits were to be gained through such a strategy. To what degree were these benefits realized?
• Explain how an integrated solution is greater than the sum of its parts.
• Impact—Note any practical or measurable results in your business (sales, expense reduction, efficiency gains, profits, etc.) from using Sage products as an integrated solution.

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Best Use of Customization

The Best Use of Customization award recognizes a Sage customer who has best configured and/or customized their Sage application to align with the business objective sought. Unique and creative utilization of a Sage framework leads to a sustained competitive advantage when configured and customized to align with business processes and objectives. The winning entrant will explain both the business landscape and challenges faced, and how the Sage solution was adapted to address those challenges.

• Supply your name and contact information.
• Provide the name of your company and the name of the customized Sage product.
• Include the dates when the Sage product was installed and customized and what hardware you are using to run the software.
• Scope—Indicate a business problem or opportunity that the Sage product customization addresses, and the size of the problem or opportunity.
• Point out the implementation/customization partner who was involved and the level of expertise and workload that was provided.
• Explain the business landscape and challenges you face and that makes your firm unique to your industry.
• Clarify why the implementation required customizations and what business and technology objectives were sought.
• Describe the nature of the competitive advantage achieved relative to competitors in your market. What makes this advantage sustainable?
• Impact—Note any practical or measurable results in your business (sales, expense reduction, efficiency gains, profits, etc.) from using customized Sage product(s).

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Community Stewardship

All companies measure success differently—some through profits and shareholder value, others through intangible benefits derived from products and services. The Community Stewardship award is designed to recognize an outstanding organization that emphasizes the local, national, or global community in an effort to better the lives of the people who the organization strives to serve.

• Supply your name and contact information.
• Provide the name of your organization and the Sage product that you utilize.
• Describe your organization's business and the constituents it serves.
• Explain the impact your organization has on its constituent stakeholders and what sets you apart from others who try to serve the same demographic.
• Give details about your organization's community outreach efforts.
• Include the date when the Sage product was installed and what hardware you are using to run the software.
• Scope—Indicate a community problem or opportunity that the Sage product implementation addresses, and the size of the problem or opportunity.
• Explain how your organization is outstanding in its efforts and how the Sage product lends itself to accomplishing your goals and objectives.
• Impact—Describe the impact of using Sage products on the community problem or opportunity.

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Lifetime Achievement

Sage seeks to recognize an organization that exemplifies the long-term benefits derived from the use of its applications. Through tumultuous economic environments and shifting technology trends, companies must adapt to the challenges of the market. The winning entrants will demonstrate how they have achieved or exceeded stated objectives for 10 years or more, and how Sage facilitated this performance.

• Supply your name and contact information.
• Provide the name of your company and the Sage product that you utilize.
• Describe your company's business and the background of its industry.
• Include the date when the Sage product was installed and what hardware you are using to run the software. (Must have used the Sage product for a minimum of 10 years.)
• Indicate major challenges that have arisen in your market over the past decade and how your company has addressed those challenges. Explain how Sage and/or the business partner or certified consultant assisted in that process.
• Explain your company's objectives over the last decade and how Sage and/or the business partner or certified consultant played a part in those objectives.
• Scope—Describe what business problem or opportunity the Sage product implementation addressed initially.
• Discuss any “Moments of Truth” during the past 10 years that stand out with regards to your business and Sage.
• Impact—Note any practical or measurable results in your business (sales, expense reduction, efficiency gains, profits, etc.) from using the Sage product since its implementation.

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For information about the rules and judging process, please download the Sage Customer Awards Program Rules & Regulations PDF.

If you need further information about the Customer Awards Program, please e-mail your questions to customer.awards@sage.com.