When choosing a new supplier there are few things that are expected, good quality products, excellent pricing, great portals and good support. Most suppliers advertise these elements, however few single out customer service as a differentiator. Companies like Rackspace tend to be the exception rather than the rule, advertising fanatical support as an ethos.
Does a track record for great customer service influence your decision?
When you are looking for a new supplier do you ask for references or service statistics? The companies I spoke to at a recent channel event don’t. The feedback I gathered was that decisions had been made on price. This was to ensure the end user had their requirements met at the right price with enough margin for the reseller. Companies were prepared to accept lower levels of service for the products at the price point they needed, until they felt their business was no longer valued and other suppliers could offer a competitive alternative. Companies that had been burnt by poor service delivery in the past, were much more interested in support available.
Research from Forrester’s
A recent report by Forrester’s stated that 71% of companies felt that valuing their time was the most important thing a supplier can do to provide them with a good service. This seems to work in the channel, with companies demanding high-quality, self-service portals to manage quoting, ordering and provisioning of services directly. End users are often on the phone demanding answers and partners don’t want to wait for third party answers.
73% of companies said that voice was the most important communications channel with web self-service, web chat, social media and email closely behind. Many channel suppliers have support portals, videos and guides, which often can be re-branded for partners to send to their end users to manage changes themselves. Most have ticketing systems they respond to within SLA and some suppliers are using social media to communicate with customers.
The Jola team has operated in the voice and data channel for most their careers. ‘Customer First’ is our most important company value. Everything we develop is designed to be easy for our partners to quote, order and manage. We provide white label materials and tailor our training programmes to meet the individual needs of our partners. We operate a variety of channel programmes to meet every requirement and measure not only the speed of our responses but the satisfaction of our answers.
If you are looking for a new supplier of hosted voice, internet connectivity and mobile data solutions, consider Jola.
