UC Channel and Influencers - Recent Threads

UC for Chinese market

andyrmit — Wed, 16 Oct 2013 12:25:07 GMT

With China building up the IP infrastructure so rapidly, Enterprises and SPs are looking to adopt UC.

I have currently a few UC opportunities on hand and looking for UC vendors willing to invest in Chinese market.

Please email me to further discuss.

U.C and the Manufacturing Industry

tiffanyfp — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 16:26:59 GMT

A lot of people have cast doubt of the EU's (or Western) manufacturing feature. The numbers are looking bleak, whilst competitors are speeding ahead, getting products in the market faster and cheaper. Bizarrely, although there are employment (or lack of) issues, IT spending remains at an all time high.

Do we think there's still room in these industries for UC? What do you think?

https://www.ggr.net/ggr-blog/entry/87-business-3-reasons-unified-communications-could-benefit-the-manufacturing-industry.html?utm_source=forum&utm_medium=blog&utm_campaign=forumblog

Re: Does Location Matter?

pavila — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 17:47:04 GMT

In the world of sales to small and medium business, many of us have believed that people buy from people. The internet has changed that dynamic.... people buy from people if they want a business relationship, people buy from the internet if they want it cheap. It's the same issue again - am I buying a product or am I investing in a solution that will help my business? The former can be done with a dealer located anywhere that has access to a shipper and a 24-hour remote support system. The latter requires contact, discussions, and on-going conversations - all of which are more difficult to do remotely (although not impossible....).

Of course a single dealer can support a nationwide network of branch offices, but the initial sale to "headquarters" will almost always require a local presence. We're definitely working with a new set of guidelines for selling and supporting.....

Re: Does Location Matter?

Neal Gilbert — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 18:31:45 GMT

When you are talking about a Hosted VoIP solution, location is irrelevant since the only IP equipment at the customers location are the VoIP Phone sets and router. Most phone sets cannot be fixed by a technician and most routers can be fixed remotely. With that being the case, the choice of a Telecom Provider should be based on criteria that matter most to the customer like quality of the products offered, verifiable customer support track record, and existing customer base.

Choosing a Telecom Provider just because they are geographically desirable should no longer be a key criteria IMHO.

Re: The Channel is Doomed

pavila — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 20:29:09 GMT

While I certainly see the picture that you paint, I think you missed a couple of words in your topic... The Channel As We Knew It Is Doomed. It's been a few years since a dealer made a reasonable profit by selling a phone system - of any type. There is a market for Asterisk and there's certainly a market for hosted IP in today's economy. But there's an even larger market that's being served by dealers who are seeing amazing growth even when "no one is buying anything"! The channel is shifting from selling hardware to focusing on the business needs of their customers - and providing tools that will meet those business needs. Integrating communication with business processes, for companies large and small, requires the skill and expertise of the "new and improved" telecom dealer. Identifying UC and other tools that will help a company be more competitive with fewer resources, shorten time to market, reduce expenses, meet the needs of their mobile and remote workforce..... this takes a different type of sale and technical expertise than providing a "phone system and telephones". And there's strong revenue here!

The channel definitely is NOT doomed. But what is doomed are the members of the channel who continue to pursue a strategy based upon selling hardware (i.e. phone systems). I see it as "survival of the fittest". For dealers today, there are so many opportunities available that didn't even exist a few years ago . The challenge is for a dealer to decide which opportunities to pursue. I delivered a keynote on this topic at a vendor's partner event just last Friday and as you would expect, many of the dealers understood the need to change from selling hardware to providing business solutions, but there were still a number of them who just did not want to change from what they had known and what used to work for them (the operative phrase here is "used to"). This last group is - yes! - doomed!

Unlike the extinct dinosauer - the channel is evolving as the industry evolves. Doomed? I don't think so!

The Channel is Doomed

shel.brooks — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 17:26:47 GMT

We use Asterisk - I downloaded it. I buy brand new various SIP phones from multiple DOTCOM types on the net. I have not called a dealer in years. We used to call a dealer every time we needed to take a tele-sh*t. Not anymore.

A friend at another company just threw out their phone system for a hosted plan. I'm not crazy about hosting, but it made sense for them - they have about 12 locations with less than 4 people. One of their Internet service providers offered them hosting and just stole the account from multiple telecom dealers.

I don't see how a telecom dealer willl stay in business. Their model is hardware and the industry is moving to software and service. I guess there are plenty of antiques out there that need service and plenty of newer systems that are destined to become antiques, but I don't see how the telecom dealer will survive this change in the business.

Does Location Matter?

dave — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 18:33:59 GMT

Historically, the telecom dealer was local to the customer. Does it matter any more? Are we seeing dealers increasingly supporting more and more non local customers?

The world is flat and VoIP reduces distance issues and now with centralization of telecom systems it seems a single dealer can support a national network of locations (branch offices).

Thoughts?

Who in the Enterprise Supports Different End Users UC Needs?

admin — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:29:31 GMT

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Tuesday, July 21, 12:46 PM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

While UC network infrastructures, application integrations, and implementation and support costs are very important to IT management planning, they also need to know what technologies different end users involved in high-value business processes require to perform their jobs most efficiently and effectively. Who in the organization will represent the selective UC technology needs of specific end users inside an organization?

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Thursday, July 23, 9:22 AM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

I should qualify the "WHO" in the enterprise as being one (or more) of the following:

- Business Managers

- Communication Application IT Management

- Business Application IT Management

- Individual End Users

- All of the above

- Other

What do you think? Which of the above will be most available or knowledgable to be involved?

Dave Michels

Posted: Friday, July 31, 11:17 PM

Joined: 4/15/2009
Posts: 6

I don't think it will be a centralized group any more. Telecom has always been centralized because of the PBX. IT was always centralized because of the glass room. When I was an IT Director at GE, we policed things pretty good. We had to worry about data base integrity, off site backups, disaster recovery, etc. We slowed things down. I imagine groups today will just go find a cloud service and be done with it. I see the same thing with voice. Hosted solutions, APIs, companies like Twilio, wireless solutions, etc. I think organizations will have a real tough time trying to keep UC and voice projects centralized moving forward.

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Sunday, August 2, 10:02 AM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

Dave,

I think you are right on about technology decentralization, i.e., wired and wireless networks, business process applications software, mobile endpoint devices, etc. Mobility will also drive hosted application services for both business users and consumers. But I think that the bottom line for control of who will use what UC technologies will come from two sources - business management, that will require operational flexible connectivity and interoperability away from a wired desktop for their business processes, and the individual end users, who will decide what devices and software applications they will use when away from an office desktop.

IT management's role will be to match these two sources of requirements and provide cost-effective technology options to support such needs. As I have pointed out many times, UC flexibility is not merely required to support internal business users, but must also support key external end users who are involved in a high-value business process. That means business partners and customers (consumers) who contribute to the "human latency" in the performance of a business process. Customers and customer-facing staff, in particular, need UC support because they are the key to revenue generation and achieving business objectives, as opposed to simply reducing costs.

So, how do we represent those two user constituencies, business process management and individual end users, in defining operational UC needs for IT to implement and support one way or another?

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Friday, August 7, 10:19 AM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

What can and should still be centralized is for business process call and message routing to a non-specific recipient ("person-to-process-to-person"), as opposed to a direct "person-to-person" contacts. That applies to both customer contacts as well as internal suppport activities, e.g., IT "Help Desk" functions. With UC presence, these can all be more efficiently handled by whoever is qualified and available (Skills-based routing) and not limited to just conversational voice connections. Any form of contact that satisfies both parties can be used. With increasing "smart-phone"mobile accessibility and various flavors of messaging, what I have labeled as "as soon as possible" (ASAP) communications will be very acceptable in most business process situations.

David Zimmer

Posted: Thursday, August 13, 9:39 AM

Joined: 12/17/2008
Posts: 1

The question on the table is "Who will represent the user's requirements." I believe the obvious answer is "the users." I believe the users are speaking, but in many cases, no one is listening. Over the years of seeing technology deployed and used, I have seen some interesting applications of the features. Some users use the software and hardware in ways never imaginged by the creators. That fact speaks more to the ingenuity of the users than the creativeness of the developers. Therefore, the users will determine how they will use UC technology. In order for that to happen, UC facilities need to be available.

I believe the bigger problems lies in the lack of process developing requirements for the system. In my recent article, I defined a requirements gathering concept called IT Cube - Six Perspectives to Project Requirements. I published an artilce similar to it focused more toward the UC industry and called it Will the REAL DefinitionS of UC Stand Up: 6 Perspectives For A Single Definition.

In both articles, I discussed the six perspectives of any particular product or service.

To answer the question of who will reperesent the end users of UC, the answer is two-fold: the users must represent themselves and the business analysts must collect, analyze and collate the requirements into solution sets to let the users create their final solutions

The users must represent themselves. The beauty of UC is its ugliness: flexibility. Because of the many features involved in UC, users will adapt it for their use. For the mobile person, he will make more use of the mobility features. For the more stationary person, she will make more use of the stationary features. For the support staff, though, the variety of resulting solutions becomes a nightmare (different topic for a different time).

For example, email still is an important communication medium. For a mobile person, the use of a smartphone with a decent keyboard is a life-saver. But as a stationary person, the dinky QWERTY keyboard on the smartphone won't cut it, therefore, they will use the more robust and feature-rich email components.

The users will create the solution they need for their particular requirements. They need the building blocks and mortar to tie together. Fortunately, it is easier these days than the days of yore from the user's perspective to complete the process.

Of course, that makes it more difficult for the technology staff to create and support. They need to know what to supply and then learn how users will create the solution. The tech staff may be proactive and put together solutions that meet specific user groups, which points back to the requirements of the systems and the lack of requirements gathering processes.

For many companies, I find gathering requirements is a race to implementation, not a process with methodical steps involved. Fortunately, with the adoption of industry standards such as

Project Management Institute 's 42 processes (PMBOK v4),
International Institute of Business Analysis (BABOK v2), and
IT Infrastructure Libraries and IT Service Management,

we can put structure into the requirements gathering process with resulting benefits such as measureability, clarity, and requirements/functionaly grouping.

With the proper processes, business analysts can gather the requirements for the system. The end users represent their needs and requirements, which the analyst must document. From the gathered requirements, groupings of end users will emerge so packaged, supportable solutions can be delivered.

With that said, analysts must consider the other perspectives mentioned in the UC Cube article so their requirements can be met such as ROI, business justification, alignment with business initiatives and strategies, etc. No perspective exists in a vacuum, therefore, the final result must be a balancing act distilling all the viewpoints into something tangible and beneficial to the organization.

So, to answer the question "who will represent the users' needs," the answer is clear: the users themselves first and foremost and the business analyst is responsible for putting them in a form that can be implemented.

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Monday, September 28, 9:43 AM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

To confirm your view about UC implementation planning responsibilities, I have started to see pundits, analysts and consultants increasingly warn IT management NOT to second-guess end user needs and requirements for telephony and UC technologies, especially when planning to replace legacy business telephone systems. One of the biggest mistakes IT/Telecom can make is to try to select new technology without doing any "homework." (And not just comparing pricing costs!) That "homework" is to ask business management what their current communications-based business problems are and what their new operational business process requirements will be in light of UC capabilities. If they don't have any answers yet, its time to find out more before making infrastructure implementation decisions, including the use of hosted services vs. traditional technology ownership, and the growing role of wireless mobile devices in business contacts.

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Friday, October 30, 9:48 AM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

I want to call your attention to the interesting white paper by Blair Pleasant, highlighting the end user's perspective of benefits from unified messaging (UM) features. It does a good job of summarizing and confirming much of what we expect users, who have access to UM capabilities, to say (after the fact). They will then be able to reportfrom experience more efficient and flexible messaging capabilities, including UC-based "click-to-call" benefits such as responding to a message with a "call back."

https://ucstrategies.com/white-papers/end-user-insights-the-real-value-of-unified-messaging.aspx

The study specifically noted that UM benefits will apply to customers as well as customer-facing internal staff, reinforcing the need to view UM and UC as important to direct customer interaction activities (contact center), or what I call "Customer UC." This view expands traditional emphasis on inbound customer person-to-person telephone contacts to include inbound messaging and outbound process-to-person messaging contacts and time-sensitive notifications. The latter is based on integration with business process self-service applications and what is now being lebeled as Communications Enabled Business Processes (CEBP).

CEBP, coupled with the rapid consumer adoption of multi-modal mobile "smart-phones," will explode the use of UM capabilities as an integral part of both enterprise UC for internal use, as well as for "Customer UC" interactions. However, this all begs the original question posed in this Forum, who in the enterprise will be representing the different end user needs (internal staff, customers, business partners) and priorities for UC (and UM) for implementation planning? Will it be line-of-business management, IT management, individual end users, or all of the above?

If all of the above, how should you orchestrate their involvement and who should be in charge?

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Tuesday, December 1, 11:46 AM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

End users can’t always speak for themselves. They may know what their problems are, but may not know how best to remedy them.

It is at this point they will need the help of “experts” who know what solutions are available and how best to utilize them.

Read this piece about how IT can help end users move forward in defining their UC solution needs, while also helping to justify their implementation

Industry Changes Impact UC

admin — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:25:31 GMT

Brenda Perea

Posted: Friday, July 24, 11:33 AM

Joined: 12/11/2007
Posts: 6

VoiceCon UC eWeekly is A Cooperative Project of VoiceCon and UCStrategies.com

"Is it possible that UC will become widely used, but not the profit-making machine some envisioned at the start?"

Allan Sulkin

Posted: Friday, July 24, 11:39 AM

Joined: 7/24/2009
Posts: 1

Marty, Just read your Voicecon eWeekly UC piece , and I agree totally that the Nortel UC MCS 5100 solution is definitely stronger than what Avaya kluges together. I think that Avaya, however, may decide to keep its own platform in place if only due to internal organization politics. It would be difficult for Avaya to port its UC capabilities to Nortel product, because too much of the software is embedded in Aura Communications Manager code, but it could be done over time. Sometimes companies make the wrong decision, and Avaya has shown to be an expert at this. It took a long time to develop and market Modular Messaging to replace the Audix and Octel platforms, and it may take as long to integrate the Avaya and Nortel UC offerings.

I am also wondering how Avaya plans to generate significant revenues from its UC platform, if many of the feature-specific station user license fees are given away free as part of its Enterprise edition for Aura CM or for only $50 per user with Standard edition. I don't think that UC, by itself, will be a major revenue generator for Avaya or others when the license fees are bundled with the generic software package. It appears that many UC capabilities will become standard at no additional cost to the customer. The application servers, third party equipment, won't generate much in way of profit. Blackberry would profit more from mobile applications. Is it possible that UC will become widely used, but not the profit-making machine some envisioned at the start? And what happens if Google Wave takes off?

Marty Parker

Posted: Friday, July 24, 11:59 AM

Joined: 7/24/2009
Posts: 1

Hi Allan,Thanks for your message. I think the eWeekly article will be posted on NoJitter tomorrow, so we can share this dialog with others.

You are exactly right on the three issue you raise below. The eWeekly is suggesting how New Avaya “could” act, and avoided comments on past acquistions. It is a new executive team, so want to give them the benefit of the doubt; however, the killer behavior exists in Avaya Labs, who can choose whether to play nice, getting the best of the two portfolios, or to play badly, making up all the reasons this can’t be done.

Yes, you’re right that Avaya will be tempted just to keep their own conferencing portfolio, Meeting Exchange (even the name shows little innovation), but the Nortel MCS/Diamondware/Web.alive suite, with Microsoft and IBM integrations, is much further along. If there are actually open, standards based products at Avaya, there is no reason not to do this. All of Avaya’s Meeting Exchange products were acquired, so there is almost no dependency on Communication Manager or on the management suite.

ACE is another question. Again, it is better in my opinion, but the Avaya engineers and product managers will likely say that Avaya Application Enablement Server, which is now buried in Aura, already has all the needed integrations to Communications Manager. Of course, they will be missing the point; for UC, the important integration is to the rest of the technology stack, especially applications on desktops and mobile devices, and ACE is way ahead on that.

Lastly, as to whether UC can make a difference, given Avaya’s packaging and approach, well, that’s the entire point. If they choose just to keep selling PBXs, their supposed 25% share will fall back to 10%, just like ATT/Lucent’s 35% share dwindled when those parent companies thought they had better technology and customers would not embrace upstarts with IP Telephony architectures.

The new spending is on the UC elements. If Avaya chooses to bundle those with Communication Manager so as to pump up the “PBX” share, rather than focusing on share of the new spending, they will be sorely disappointed in 3 – 5 years’ time. We’ll see.

Thanks for sharing your always valuable perspective.

Blair Pleasant

Posted: Friday, July 24, 2:43 PM

Joined: 1/2/2007
Posts: 14

Allan: I think the revenue from UC will come not so much from the UC products and licenses themselves, but from value added capabilities like application integration, vertical applications, professional services, etc. Professional services will be key - especially when we start getting more into CEBP or business process integration with UC. The call control vendors (eg switch vendors) will need to offer vertical applications that they can charge a premium for, since call control will be a commodity. Things like voice mail and UM are being priced so low there's not much money to be made from that, so the vendors will need to get creative and find the value add. This is also where they can differentiate themselves from each other and the likes of Microsoft.

Art Rosenberg

Posted: Friday, July 24, 6:55 PM

Joined: 1/16/2007
Posts: 16

Blair, I agree with you on where the real revenue-generating action will take place.

One way to look at that is going to be a shift from traditional "person-to-person" contacts to either "process-to-person" contacts (personalized,application-initiated notifications or CEBP) or "person-to-process-to-person" contacts (skills-based/availability routing). These contact activities can be heavily exploited by consumer customers and tied directly to revenue-generating, multi-modal experience benefits rather than simply personal time productivity. What will be needed, howver, is for the enterprise to be able to selectively support all aspects of UC flexibility for all end users, including those who are not within the organization, such as business partners and customers.

Dan Aronson

Posted: Monday, August 3, 6:48 AM

Joined: 8/7/2007
Posts: 5

This would be a more interesting conversation if you segmented out the different layers of the supply chain you are referring to when discussing whether or not UC is going to massively or only mildly profitable. However, for those of us working in the UC industry's trenches, the "profitability trail" is actually quite easy to follow on any level.

As long as technology trends in an upward spiral (as it has forever) it will always be in need of refreshing. Therefore, those manufactures of UC that either hold technological industry leadership positions or come to market with new, disruptive technologies (game-changers) will always do well. In other words, I wouldn't worry about Cisco, Polycom, or Sagem-Interstar going away anytime soon. Those, however, that fail to see new technologies on the horizon and/or fail to begin developing products and services to meet those new technologies will certain fail (see Nortel, Captaris).

However, the best barometer for measuring the UC industry’s wellbeing is really seen at the VAR level. The numbers of healthy and/or growing UC VAR's is tremendous, and their profitability can linked to three major practices. First, the health and wellbeing of their Level I vendors. These typically consist of their IPT vendor(s) plus one or two other complimentary technological leaders such as Microsoft, EMC, HP, etc. Next, all UC manufacturers have developed ecosystems wherein their Technology Partners are encouraged to develop UC add-on applications to fill the gaps in functionality that they themselves do not have the expertise and/or bandwith to create. And seeing the major source of profitability these applications represent, most have even put together programs that incent resellers to bundle applications with their basic UC offerings. This keeps their channel partners in the black and happy. And yes Blair, Fax-over-IP is one of those UC applications frequently included in these bundles. As for Professional Services being a source of profit, well, is that really a revelation? Ask any UC VAR what the single most profitable thing they sell is and they will all, without exception, tell you that it is professional services hours.

So the answer to your question is a resounding yes. Like anything else done right, UC is and will continue to be wildly profitable.

Criteria for Selecting a Vendor

admin — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:20:49 GMT

Pam Avila

Posted: Tuesday, October 20, 5:20 PM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

There are many factors to be weighed when selecting a primary vendor for any UC implementation.

Anonymous

Posted: Wednesday, October 21, 9:48 AM

I’m evaluating a new UC solution for my organization and have a few questions regarding how heavily vendor performance should be weighed against product performance. For instance, with the persistent bankruptcies, mergers and acquisitions in Telecommunications marketplace, how much should I worry about the financial track record a vendor? After all, it seems the troubled ones will just be acquired by a larger competitor or “rescued” by some Venture firm.

RN Birge

Posted: Wednesday, October 21, 10:24 AM

Joined: 10/21/2009
Posts: 4

Even if a struggling company is acquired by an (arguably) stronger one, there are still major business disruptions created for the 1-3 years that it can take to assimilate the acquired company. And with the enormous debt some companies are taking on, it will be a long time – if ever – before they can “sell their way out”.

Robyn Thompson

Posted: Wednesday, October 21, 10:26 AM

Joined: 10/5/2009
Posts: 4

To play devil’s advocate, some companies have a good track record of successfully assimilating technology & personnel. Aastra has made several acquisitions in the last 4 years and has a provided investment protection for customers by creating applications with open standards that can enhance existing solutions rather than forcing an immediate conversion.

Pam Avila

Posted: Friday, October 23, 9:41 AM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

Given that some of the long-recognized “names” in the industry are in trouble, it seems there are no sure bets. I wonder if it is really riskier to go with a lesser known vendor if they have a solution that meets the customer's needs?

RN Birge

Posted: Friday, October 23, 11:42 AM

Joined: 10/21/2009
Posts: 4

Brand recognition can be as a result of large market share, but it could also be the result of a huge marketing budget. Look for vendors that invest in R&D and customer satisfaction rather than simply marketing. One great measure is of a vendor’s track record is to talk to their customers.

Tod Rehner

Posted: Friday, October 23, 1:04 PM

Joined: 10/23/2009
Posts: 1

My CIO won’t consider a vendor unless they are highly rated by industry analyst firms. How much weight do other companies place on these independent evaluations?

Anonymous

Posted: Tuesday, October 27, 2:42 PM

If you’re going to include industry analyst reports as part of your evaluation, ensure that you have the research in context (not simply a single quote). Also, look at research from more than one firm as they each have different core competencies. Look at their comments in relation to your specific needs rather than in general; concentrate on trends rather than absolutes.

RN Birge

Posted: Thursday, October 29, 10:27 AM

Joined: 10/21/2009
Posts: 4

I totally agree with Anonymous about taking the research in context. This has been such a problem that even a Gartner analyst recently blogged about it. It’s just a tool, Gartner may (and often does) recommend vendors that are not in the Leader column and as the aforementioned Gartner analyst points out “an MQ reflects only a tiny percentage of what an analyst actually knows about the vendor.” One final point to think about it…last year Gartner had Nortel in the Leaders quadrant – enterprise customers need to do their own due diligence on criteria that is important to them!

RN Birge

Posted: Tuesday, December 8, 11:42 AM

Joined: 10/21/2009
Posts: 4

Excellent post by Dave Michels "Unified Communications: Through the Magic (Quadrant) Glass" on Gartner's Magic Quadrants.

The Changing Business Model

admin — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:17:42 GMT

Pam Avila

Posted: Monday, July 13, 4:03 PM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

The transition to professional services and solutions is a major undertaking!

Pam Avila

Posted: Monday, July 13, 4:08 PM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

One of the most positive aspects of unified communications, from my point of view, is that it is forcing the reseller community – VARs, Integrators, Telecom Dealers, etc. – to stop selling features and benefits and begin focusing on customers’ specific business needs and problems. The shift in sales strategy seems to be a tough one for many reseller organizations (yes, change is always hard), but I keep hearing from individual resellers that the shift is bringing rewards beyond their expectations. So I’m curious… how hard is it to get a sales staff to change? How long is it taking before a company sees positive results? What has been the success level with the consultative selling strategy?

Bill Vollerthum

Posted: Monday, July 13, 4:16 PM

Joined: 1/18/2007
Posts: 1

Making the transition from product driven sales to a practice that focuses on professional services and solutions is a major undertaking. The brutal economy coupled with shrinking product margins from vendors is making the change a “MUST” for any company who wants to survive beyond 2009. Too many companies today, are still depending on meeting their revenue goals by pushing products. The problem is that formula no longer works!

With every capital investment coming under intense scrutiny these days, demonstrating how your solution is going to bolster worker productivity, drive down costs, and improve business outcomes is essential for making the sale. Sales professionals who cannot present a justifiable ROI and deliver a strong technical presence,will fail miserably. Unfortunately, most sales people are inept and incapable of selling in this manner.As such, the worst recession since the Great Depression is going to send many sales professionals to the unemployment line.

Be advised, making the transition to a company focused on delivering pro services and solutions will require a complete overhaul of your sales team. Your employee morale will suffer, financial performance will suffer temporarily, and you’ll experience resignations from your sales team. This fallout should be expected. Most sales professionals who’ve thrived in the past as product peddlers, will not be able to make the change. However, it is absolutely necessary to ensure any chance of survivability in today’s economy. Those companies who fail to act or equivocate with their decision to change will face certain extinction. Don’t expect immediate gratification when making the transition. Patience, conviction to your vision, intense training, mentoring, and periodic performance assessments will be necessary. If you have the intestinal fortitude to make this radical change, prepare for at least a 24 month overhaul process. The corollary will be having a sales team that can effectively compete for larger and more profitable business opportunities. If you have the intestinal fortitude to make this radical change, prepare for at least a 24 month overhaul process. If you can remain financially afloat during this restructure, you’ll be rewarded with larger and more profitable sales. Moreover, you’ll become a sustaining resource and trusted advisor for your customer.

Channel Members - You Need a Name

admin — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 23:15:01 GMT

Pam Avila

Posted: Wednesday, August 5, 3:20 PM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

As voice, data, video, and mobility converged, the "reseller" channel began experiencing its own "convergence". Data VARs, telecom dealers and systems integrators began selling converged solutions - creating a new group within the "reseller" channel. But what do we call them?

Pam Avila

Posted: Wednesday, August 5, 3:39 PM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

For a number of years, I've been writing and speaking about the data VARS, telecom dealers and systems integrators who have been changing their traditional business models and moving forward into a new space, offering their customers solutions that were the result of the convergence of voice, data, video and mobility. Some in this group have even moved beyond basic "convergence" (IP-PBX, for example) to offer unified communications solutions.

Long story short, I'm looking for a name for this group of data VARS, telecom dealers and systems integrators because I'm tired of saying or typing "data VARS, telecom dealers and systems integrators" over and over. I think the name should reflect how a convergence/UC data VAR, telecom dealer, or systems integrator wants to be viewed by their customers, not by the industry itself. I can't call them "resellers" because in no way, shape or form does that term reflect what members of this group actually do or the value that they bring to their customers.

Several of us talked and thought "Solutions Integrator" seemed to reflect what these special "resellers" do. It might be a good name, but "SI" already has a different meaning in our industry. Then I thought of "Business Solutions Provider" ("BSP") because I believe that therein lies the value that this group of "resellers" brings to their customers. But the correct terminology or name is not up to me - I'm no longer a systems integrator. So what's the name for this special group of data VARS, telecom dealers and systems integrators? Help!!!!!!!

Dave Michels

Posted: Thursday, August 6, 11:03 PM

Joined: 4/15/2009
Posts: 6

I never know what the real difference is between VAR, Reseller, Systems Integrator, whatever. They all have different meanings to different people and thus are effectively meaningless terms.

We don't need another acronym.

I suggest UC Provider or (UCP if you must). The provider, whether it be a dealer, service, or even manufacturer is responsible for delivering UC. Today, terms need to be very broad as nothing adheres to models anymore. Retailers are wholesalers, resellers are manufactuers, customers and vendors and sometimes competitors. I have no idea what Amazon is anymore.

UC Providers provide UC solutions - it doesn't matter if their business card says consultant, manufactuer, or dealer. Some manufacturers have professional services divisions, some don't. It gets even worse with badges on the products... Mitel sells IBM servers, IBM sells Aastra Services.

Pam Avila

Posted: Friday, August 7, 11:46 AM

Joined: 7/16/2008
Posts: 17

Dave - I think you're missing the point here. There is a channel out there that vendors depend on to get their products into the hands of the end-user (i.e. generate revenue for the vendors and the companies in the channel). Unfortunately, now that the telecom, data, video, and mobility industries have converged in one fashion or another, we are left with the problem of describing in a few words, those companies in the "channel". Why do we need to have a name for them? Because we/I need to talk about them.

To call them "the channel" is not good enough because in our industries there are actually a number of distribution channels - resellers, retail, service providers, etc. - in the food chain.

And it is demeaning to categorize as simply "resellers" the VARs, telecom dealers and systems integrators who are now providing their customers with "converged" solutions (their term, not mine) by addressing business problems. It's similar to calling an IT manager a technician, when clearly his knowledge, experience and duties have moved him far beyond being simply a "technician".

Do the voice and data industries - and now this converged industry - have too many acronyms? Heck yes! Nevertheless, we need a respectful term for the channel that is ultimately going to grow this industry - you know, those VARs, telecom dealers and systems integrators who have moved off of their traditional business models and are changing the way they sell. And to term them UC Providers is selling them short and not understanding the channel at all. As one of them explained to me the other day, they do not just sell "UC". Sometimes they provide network management, or VoIP, or security because that is what the customer needs. UC may be a part of the solutions that they provide to their customers, but sometimes it may not be. As this former "telecom dealer" explained, they've been providing elements of UC for years - but not as "UC"..... as solutions to businss needs. So forget "UC" in the name.

Bottom line - I'm tired of typing "VARs, telecom dealers and systems integrators" every time I need to mention this special channel. We're looking for a name!

Dave Michels

Posted: Friday, August 7, 1:14 PM

Joined: 4/15/2009
Posts: 6

I think we are basically saying the same thing. You can't find your word, because it doesn't and won't exist. Descriptors like you seek require a reasonable mature model that people can relate to.

When I was young, I used to buy shoes at the shoe store. Everyone knew what was meant by a shoe store. The model was understood. They had those funny looking chairs with mirrors on them. They were not too big, and often didn't have the right size in stock but could get it.

But today, the shoe store has lots of competition. I can buy shoes a big box store (DSW), a warehouse store (Costco), a specialty store (REI), or online in any of those permutations (zappos, overstock, REI). Each of these locations has their own definition of value.That's just the tip of the iceberg, I could go to department stores or factory outlets and everything in between. Is a factory outlet part of the channel?

You want a word or label for all of these. It doesn't exist, the days of the "shoe store" are gone. Telecom and High tech are even worse because of the rebranding. My monitor says Dell, but are they the manufacturer or reseller? Depends who you ask (I don't think they make monitors). Mitel resells Mitel Network Services (MPLS, SIP, etc.), but they resell them through the channel and directly - are they a manufactuer or reseller or distributor?

Even the term "channel" is becoming confused. Is the Amazon Kindle or better yet, the Kindle books sold through the channel? I don't know any more.Amazon creates the Kindle book, but they don't write the content. Does value ad include modification of the product into a new product or is that more systems integration?

I think your attempts to find or create a label are in vain. UC is far too young and too slippery for a model to form and take hold, the dynamics of the industry are ... well dynamic. Instead we have to be speak very clearly about roles rather than titles. The shoe provider or reseller that I worked with specilizes in selection (their value). The good news is confusion increases the need for experts.