Think you know the best route to a sticky customer?
Well, if it’s to offer bulging, apparently-value for money all-inclusive packages of device + connectivity + financing + service AND then to contract for as long as possible, you may want to reassess.
It seems those old ways may well have had their day.
For many end user organisations, the great post-pandemic unlock is presenting the perfect opportunity to take stock of their tech.
And for Managed Service Providers it’s a chance to demonstrate fresh flexibility that better-responds to a new set of customer challenges.
“User behaviours have changed and we believe the most successful resellers will change too,” says Dave Reynolds, UK Managing Director of European cloud telephony giant Xelion, which is at the forefront of this new thinking.
“Shorter term contracts will be the new normal and bundling and financing will no longer be as effective in the sales conversation.
“End user organisations, especially small businesses, are increasingly buying O365 on a self-service basis direct from Microsoft. They are doing so on short-term deals with no need for hardware bundling because employees are now used to the concept of cloud-based softphones and working via apps on their own devices”
“Believing that employees still value the traditional desk phone is totally out of step with current trends. When the pandemic hit, organisations were panic-buying unified communications services from all over the place just in order to keep their businesses functioning.
“Now they are taking stock and rationalising – and they want to adopt a much more flexible approach to procuring the products and services they need, how they procure it and for how long they contract.
“If you’re a reseller that is not only alive to those new dynamics but also willing to change your own approach in response to them, your future success is much more likely.”
Shorter-term contracting is, by its very nature, likely to mean more frequent customer conversations, which in turn improves relationships, enhances trust and presents increased upsell opportunities.
As well as helping resellers change their approach in this way, Xelion also provides them with all of its products for free in order to ensure they have a full and expert understanding of its functionality.
“The partners who use Xelion solutions the most are our most successful,” says Reynolds.
