SPONSOR
ADDRESS
The Dawn
of a New
Beginning
I have spent a lot of time
speaking with colleagues
throughout the channel
and one thing has become
very apparent and that is that
positivity and reaction to
change will get us through
this Coronavirus disruption.
It’s often said that ‘the night
is darkest just before the
dawn’ and I really feel that as
we move out one of the UK’s
darkest times we are staring
at an amazing sunrise for the
channel.
e making of us will be
in how we prepare for this
sunrise as the way we sell to
end users may have changed
forever. I think the thought of
letting a sales person through
your front door is now a
world away from what end
users want. e big question
I asked myself myself was, do
we, as a channel, ‘drink our
own Champagne’? Are we, as
a collective sales force, experts
in using tools such as MS
Teams, UCaaS applications
and intelligent proposal
generating tools? Can we
engage a customer on our rst
meeting via this medium and
can we then professionally
deliver the proposal via screen
share and video? Two months
ago, I think the answer would
be no, but Coronavirus has
driven large scale adoption and
usage of collaborative apps at
end user level. is in itself
means that whereas in the past
the end user may have wanted
a salesperson to drive two
hours to come and see them as
a way of showing intent, they
are now used to using video
applications and are therefore
much more accepting of
engaging via this medium.
As we slowly come out of
lockdown, I think the move to
new ways of working will be
the biggest opportunity that
we as a channel have had since
the move to ISDN. In fact this
will swallow up the ‘ISDN
switch o ‘ as an opportunity
as it will mean that end users
will have migrated away long
before the deadline. We need
to make sure that we are
the ones that help with the
deployment of these new best
of breed technologies.
I think another big
question we are all asking
ourselves is, will there be
a mass switch o from the
remote working applications
that were deployed as a
reaction to Coronavirus? For
many years we have been
preaching the benets of being
able to work from home when
it snows and we can’t get to
work but for most it fell on
deaf ears as at worst it only
aected us for a few days and
we got through it! Now we
nd ourselves buried deep in
an avalanche and having to
remain at home I think most
of the these deployed home
working applications will
remain live as an insurance
policy for if this ever happens
again.
As the dust settles there
may be a review of those
rushed deployments; have
we purchased the right
subscription or product, is it
business grade and can we as
a business work with it for the
future. ere will be a rush,
possibly a stampede, from all
those organisations that have
on-premise PBX’s to make sure
they have solid working from
home technologies. All of this
represents a huge opportunity
Paul Gibbs, Sales Director, MyPhones
for us in the channel.
With thousands of
businesses reviewing their
oce space, desk space
requirements and how their
employees work, when we
come out of this we can be the
architects of the new normal
and create stickier customers
than we have ever seen before.
In summary our craving
to go back to ‘normal’ will be
met, as we move out of this,
but I think normal will never
look the same again and for
the channel therein lies the
opportunity….
6 | IP Telephony 2020 www.commsbusiness.co.uk
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