According to a recent report by Megabuyte.com, BT, Talk Talk and Virgin Media are being outperformed by much smaller channel suppliers who are reporting healthy growth, with profits and share prices on the up.
Some of the larger providers were affected by accounting errrors and overseas pressures and the channel saw high levels of growth from hosted voice and mobile. Of course channel suppliers still buy from carrier wholesale divisions, but continue to win business from their direct sales teams by collaborating with their partners.
What are they doing differently?
Growing with partners
Channel-focussed suppliers are becoming smarter in helping their partners find and close business, growing average revenue per customer and building new margin streams. Resellers do not see them as a threat and so are relaxed about letting them help directly with customers and with lead generation campaigns.
Multi-carrier portals
Channel suppliers have built relationships with all the major networks and suppliers giving partners more choice for their customers. Partners can quote and order internet connectivity with hosted voice seats, handsets and extras as well as mobile SIMs within a single platform. Hosted voice and mobile services have their own management portals, so resellers can provision and make changes giving them the control they need to support their clients. SMEs are not restricted to just one carrier and benefit from the personalised service they are getting from their trusted supplier - supported by their channel supplier.
Competitive offerings
Channel suppliers have crafted competitive bundles, packaging market-leading hardware and software, designed to suit every pocket with clearly defined USPs. They have added service wraps such as training, white label pre-sales support, white label technical support, billing and collateral to enhance partner offerings.
Personalised service
Channel suppliers offer specialist support, tailored to meet the specific needs of each of the partners they work with. Partners get named Account Managers, Billing and Provisioning Managers, who are all measured on response times and customer satisfaction. Departments are available to deliver personalised training both via webinar and in person to individuals and teams as required. This support helps partners to uphold the high levels of customer service their customers have come to expect.
The Jola team has been supplying resellers and dealers since the birth of the telecoms channel. We are focussed on building a community of partners and helping them to grow profitable revenue streams from internet connectivity and voice. We invest in people, portals and processes to make this possible.
To find out more…
