MARKET REPORT SaaS
“For a reseller, the cloud SaaS model means vendor selection is more critical than ever. The reseller could be
effectively ‘married’ to a vendor for many years to come – not necessarily because of lock-in, but because of the
investment required in selecting a suitable solution. “ Carl Boraman, Director of Strategic Alliances - Tollring
Lindsay Willott, CEO, Customer ermometer
as any applications that may
be added in the future. is
promises to secure more revenue
over an extended period and
reduce the burden of integration
with an ever-growing range of
applications.”
Graham Wilkinson at
Beyond Connectivity believes
there are many factors to
consider such as how quickly
do you go to market and how
quickly do you take on new
technology and show you are
capable of delivering that.
“Across existing customer
bases there will be entrepreneurs
happy to embrace new
technologies whilst others
will sit back and watch as the
market matures. It’s important
to be at the forefront of leading
technologies and are able to oer
that within your portfolio to
stay one step ahead. is applies
to resellers, distributors and the
vendors themselves.”
According to Carl Boraman
at Tollring, building a channel
willing to promote, sell and
support your products is not
always easy.
“e channel is ensconced
and well-invested in Capex
sales, high levels of engineering
expertise, proven sales models
and rich, upfront income to fund
sales commissions, marketing
and customer support. Under
this model, the risk lies with the
end customer, not the reseller or
the vendor. However, in the SaaS
world it’s much easier for the end
customer to churn or switch to
an alternative product or service.
For a reseller, the cloud SaaS
model means vendor selection
is more critical than ever. e
reseller could be eectively
‘married’ to a vendor for many
years to come – not necessarily
because of lock-in, but because
of the investment required in
selecting a suitable solution.
e channel must do their due
diligence to a much higher
level when choosing a SaaS
vendor, and look for dierent
things to when they would
have evaluated an on-premise
solution. ese SaaS vendors will
dierentiate based on things like
strong roadmaps, innovation,
commitment to security, focus
on quality of product and
service, support, ability to scale
and long-term commitment.
ere’s a lot of new vendors in the
SaaS market looking to rapidly
build a customer base and sell up.
It’s also key to look at
vendors who can demonstrate
nancial stability and long-term
protability. SaaS vendors who
depend on major investment
to succeed and may have not
yet turned a prot, need to be
considered very carefully. After
all, the SaaS disruptors can be
very quickly disrupted by new
vendors and business models.”
ED SAYS…
When it comes to Software as a Service applications the boot is most definitely and
firmly on the foot of the user. No longer tied into the up front or long lease expense of
a CAPEX solution means that users can shop around to get the deal they want almost
at will. The reseller does however still have plenty of ammunition to fire in the form of
bundled services solutions, other forms of differentiation and by providing customer
service excellence.
whereSaaS products may sit
naturally alongside an existing
service, delivering an increase in
customer revenue and customer
lifetime value.
ere is clear benet for the
owners of reseller organisations
to sell software on a recurring
revenue basis as it provides
stability and can signicantly
increase the value of their
business when planning to exit.
However, everything in their
business has to adapt to selling
SaaS. e key questions to face
are, how do you dierentiate your
oering, and how do you fund
your business? And, critically,
how can you get your sales
team to buy into a new “pay per
month” commission plan?
Ultimately, the opportunity
SaaS brings in terms of reducing
costs, opening up new markets,
driving up shareholder value
etc, are signicant and will
undoubtedly outweigh the
disadvantages. As long as the
move towards cloud and SaaS
is done in a phased approach,
with careful management and
minimal disruption, it should
benet everyone involved: from
the vendor to the end customer.”
Nearly 70 percent of software
vendors work with the channel
in some way so how are they
differentiating their go to
market strategies to recruit
and retain channels?
Reiterating the emerging trend
for companies to purchase an
ecosystem rather than a single
product, Renat Zubairov at
elastic.io, says the smartest thing
that software vendors can do
is demonstrate the integration
capabilities of their product.
“Functionality no longer
reigns supreme, and with the
continued rise of the integrated
enterprise and Internet of ings,
the channel is increasingly
attracted to pushing products
with interoperability at the core.
A software solution with
built-in integration-platform-asa
service (iPaaS) dierentiates
in the channel by oering
complete interoperability with
any existing architecture, as well
40 | Comms Business Magazine | November 2019 www.commsbusiness.co.uk
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