LogMeIn: No-brainer?
In this interview William Emm, Managing Director of Oak Innovation, spoke to Comms Business about his new
relationship with LogMeIn and how he is putting the technology in the hands of his Channel
www.commsbusiness.co.uk
COMMS NEWS
July 2020 | Comms Business Magazine | 17
CBM: Can you shed a bit
more light on the LogMeIn
relationship? Why have you
gone down this route?
William Emm (WE): One of
the reasons why we brought
the LogMeIn proposition
on was because it allowed
us to penetrate the Channel
with a telephony oering.
We had been reluctant to
do so before because it may
have jeopardised our existing
relationships with the vendors
we work with. However, the
LogMeIn suite sits outside of
that and often complements
what the customer already has,
that might be a hosted solution
or a on-premise solution.
It allows them to ll in the
gaps in their portfolio with
things like GoToMeeting, or
GoToConnect.
LogMeIn has a great
oering, with a GoToMeeting
license you get a GoToConnect
license included also. It is
essentially the ability to make
and receive calls for no extra
cost. e combination of the
two products is very powerful,
GoToMeeting is a direct
competitor of Zoom but the
combination of both products
oers much more from the
telephony side.
CBM: What phase are you
in with rolling this out to
Channel?
WE: We are at the beginning
of this journey. We have
approached a few dealers and
we are in the feedback phase.
e oering itself is a
‘no-brainer’ to our channel
community. LogMeIn oer a
service to the dealer where they
will compare the dealers list of
customers against their own
list, it’s all GDPR compliant,
and if there is a match the
LogMeIn customer will then
be registered against that
dealer. From that point on the
dealer will get commission
from LogMeIn just because
there is a match. e reason
they are oering this is because
they will be able to call that
customer and sell them some
more LogMeIn products.
e dealer will then get
commission for that too! It is a
no-brainer!
CBM: Can you honestly see
UK dealers handing over their
customer lists?
WE: Dealers are often reluctant
to give their customer base up
which is understandable. In
the USA there is a lot more
of an agent mentality, here
we have more of a reseller
mindset where we like to own
the customers. e way they
do it doesn’t mean the dealer
has to hand over actual contact
details, it’s just enough to asses
if there is a common customer.
We are also working out an
alternative for resellers where
they can sell the LogMeIn
product to end users and the
contract remains with the
reseller.
is is an opportunity at
a time where partners might
not have resources to call
customers because people are
in furlough or they have made
redundancies, so some dealers
might welcome this just to
keep the money coming in.
CBM: Do you think the UK will
embrace the agent model in
time?
WE: I don’t think the
traditional PBX market and the
hosted market will be changing
much to be honest. For those
partners without telephony
skills I think it suits them
really well, they can do their
core products as normal and
this will just be a part of their
portfolio in this model. I also
think we will see new types of
partners launching that won’t
mind the agent model.
CBM: Where else are you
seeing demand across the
Oak portfolio?
WE: At the moment we
are seeing demand for our
recording and reporting
products on Teams and these
type of products. ere is a few
hosted manufacturers that are
coming to us that aren’t happy
with their reporting and want
to know what Oak can do, it’s
the same for our recording too.
We are having a lot of those
conversations. Companies are
realising that while all these
remote working tools are great
for home working they don’t
have the right type of solutions
in support for the compliance
and statistics side.
However, where companies
have had to re people, or
furlough them, the LogMeIn
opportunity really is a great
chance to get some revenue
into your business without
having to do much. As long
as you get a match with
LogMeIn’s base, then you can
get some commission. Who
wouldn’t want to do that?!
/www.commsbusiness.co.uk