Online platforms and collaboration

Online platforms are key for channel collaboration, says Andy Horn

Key to streamlining any organisation is having easy access to information online. For vendors, presenting information to resellers in a timely, coherent manner is a fundamental issue.

Online platforms are increasingly important to reseller and vendor relations. Our expectations are driven by our experiences as consumers.

We can use a travel website, for example, to select, configure, price and pay for a holiday. Resellers expect that sort of functionality with their online business relationships too.

In the telecommunications market, there is huge demand for easy access to accurate information and interactive systems.

Resellers need to access pricing, delivery dates, orders, fault tickets and billing details and place and configure orders online as well.

If they can track the entire lifecycle of their orders, they can be more responsive to their customers, reduce administration and eliminate many frustrations associated with manual processes.

They can focus on their core business and revenue generating activity.

Online collaboration also has a positive impact on the day-to-day relationship between vendors and resellers.

If the transactional tasks are easily done online, we can spend more time on business planning and developing joint approaches to market. Online takes the ‘noise’ out of the relationship.

While there are many online tools for resellers, vendors must ensure user adoption and continual improvement.

Many system roll-outs fall flat because they are not properly tested with the user community. Resellers need to play a part in the development through rigorous testing and beta trials.

We are going to see increasing investment in online collaboration in the next couple of years because the benefits are so clear.

Today, most online platforms offer a secure way to expose service providers’ core systems to their partners. They are going to get increasingly sophisticated.

As different back-end systems are combined at the web level, they will be able to provide up-to-the-minute data and transaction processing so that sales and marketing functions are much faster and more efficient to complete.

Increasingly, we are also going to see service providers white-labelling their online systems so resellers can offer the online system to their end customers.

We find that resellers increasingly want to form true long-term partnerships with their chosen vendors. Online platforms will be at the heart of that closer collaboration if properly designed for the reseller community.

Andy Horn is head of the UK SME division at Colt