Dell is a leading provider of servers in the B2B market, headquartered in Round Rock, Texas. It pioneers the direct sales model and was the first company to record $1 million in online sales. Dell's PowerEdge servers are designed for medium to large businesses and offer affordable performance, reliability, and upgradability. While Dell faces increased competition from IBM and HP, it utilizes a low-cost leadership strategy and focuses on meeting customers' specific needs through mass customization and a variety of marketing strategies to continue growing its server business. The document recommends that Dell enhance customer support, offer data backup capabilities, and increase advertising and showrooms to further engage corporate clients.

1. B2B Project: A Study Of The Dell Server Market Dell headquarters ; Roundrock ,Texas

2. Aims Of Our Project To understand Dells B2B structure in the server market To analyze the Server / IT market including Dells major rivals ● To outline how Dell market their servers to Corporate customers ● To highlight Dells successes / failures and to make relevant recommendations

3. Dells Background Michael Dell established Dell Computers in 1984 Headquartered in Roundrock, Texas Dell pioneered the concept of selling PCs and complimentary products directly Dell led commercial migration to the Internet, launching www.dell.com in 1994 Dell became the first company to record $1 m in online sales ▲ Michael Dell, CEO ▲

4. Dells Business Model

5. The Server Market Research firms can't seem to agree who is top dog in the market in terms of revenue, with IDC giving the number one place to HP, while Gartner said IBM came out the winner The overall server market is now worth US$12.29 billion worldwide, IDC IDC claim global sales revenue increased 4.9 percent on the same period a year earlier "The server market continues to experience solid growth as businesses of all types look to enhanced IT capabilities in order to help drive additional business efficiency, improved customer satisfaction, and accelerated revenue growth," said Matt Eastwood, program vice president of Enterprise Platforms at IDC

6. Product PowerEdge servers: designed for medium-large business customers affordable performance, reliability, and is fully upgradeable Dell has introduced Project Hybrid which includes the production of new blade servers that will leapfrog the competing servers in terms of performance and efficiency in size Dell recognises that the market’s needs have changed from: “who can give me the cheapest box the fastest” to “I have a problem, how can you help me fix it.” Oliver Freaney and Co a medium sized company require: 1) High processing Speed 2) Large RAM( random access memory) 3) Large Hard Disk Space 4) RAID, this is a feature that is there in case the hard disk crashes, this feature will save the information on the hard disk and enables it to be transferred to another disk . Dell delivered their requirements

7. Pricing Delivery charge € 38 VAT at 21% Dell utilize a low cost leader pricing strategy: For example -> € 4776.98 € 6031.24 € 4092.38 € 2803.57 Fujitsu Siemens Primergy BX 600 IBM Blade centre H HP c-Class Dell PowerEdge

8. Packaging Security in transit is a necessity in Dells packaging All servers are wrapped in protective irrigated plastic wrapping, Styrofoam and secured in place in their boxes to avoid damage The packaging in the server market is functional and does not require the aesthetic qualities that a chocolate bar or MP3 player would It’s far less time consuming to unpack its contents than competitors thus saving the prchasing firm precious time and money

9. Critical Issues Dell’s most prominent problem is the continuation and expansion of its direct model Increased competition from rival “copy-cats” i.e. IBM and HP

10. Promotion and Advertising Dell uses a combination of up to at least ten marketing strategies to grow the business. They include Telephone Marketing Direct Mail Internet Email marketing Direct Sales PR Strategic Alliances Lead Response Marketing

11. Target Market • Corporate Clients • Mass customization means the product is generically suitable/ adaptable to any business

12. Conclusion and Recommendations Dell should consider adding showrooms to detail and portray physical operation of their servers to ever demanding business customers Use more “Customer Surveys” to gain market share by better understanding what exactly business users want New methods of advertising should be devised to target business customers more specifically Invest more in Research and Development They should aim to increase company recognition through a national advertising campaign Enhance customer support services Dell could offer online data back-up capabilities