Resellers warned that education must reach the boardroom level
VAR research claims channel firms are failing to influence key decision makers
Resellers are failing to educate the correct decision maker when it comes to selling IT to businesses, Bristol-based reseller LSI Business Solutions has claimed.
LSI concluded that VARs need to not only speak to IT managers, but also have a relationship with someone at board level, following research it conducted. It found two out of five UK IT managers felt that their IT recommendations were often ignored by the board.
Having recommended a technology product that was subsequently rejected, 42 per cent of IT managers polled said this may have been for financial reasons, but over a quarter put it down to management not understanding what technology could do for the company.
Simon Darlington, managing director of LSI, told CRN: “This research has highlighted a communication gap between management and IT managers. It’s important that VARs adopt a two-pronged approach to educating customers, and develop a relationship with both the IT manager and the board to bridge this divide.
“If the board are rejecting technology recommendations from the IT manager, then we can assume that the board are not fully aware of how their own IT systems work.”
Robin Barker, a director at reseller Blueloop, said: “Some firms that value IT in their business will have an IT person on the board. For those that don’t it is often much harder to gain their support on new technology. I think a two-pronged approach from resellers is a good idea because it enables them to get across the true business benefits of the solution to both parties.”
Lee Bevan, managing director of VAR Leapfrog Computers, added: “Businesses prefer to chuck a bit of money at IT each year rather than invest in a decent infrastructure that will last. They don’t realise how important IT is until it’s too late. We recently rescued a firm who’s server had died. We were able to retrieve all its data, but if it had invested in a proper server in the first place it wouldn’t have happened.”