Tinsley Consulting
David Tinsley runs a small consulting business in Tampa, Florida. He's listed on our web site as a trained specialist, and as I was perusing our web statistics I noticed that he recently received some click-throughs from us, so I called him to see how things went. His experience is pretty typical, so I thought I'd write a short post explaining a bit about his business.
First, big advice for you if you're a reseller who wants to be listed on our site: be sure your web site is up-to-date and that you look like you sell RP. Many customers click through, only to disappear if they see a page that doesn't look relevant to their goal, which is to find a Response Point phone system.
In this case the customer we referred to him is a typical small business: ten employees, has an existing but ancient phone system that is costly to maintain, doesn't want to get ripped off.
After the initial contact, David went back and forth several times with the customer. Does it do X? Does it do Y? Why should I buy it from you when I can get it online? David explained all the advantages of dealing with a local reseller: fast and personal response, objective advice, flexibility.
Ultimately you know what clinched the deal? It was the demo. He showed them how the whole system could be up and running in 20 minutes -- not the whole afternoon that a competitor would need -- and then he let them operate it themselves. Response Point really is easy, so you can rely on that as part of your entire presentation. Don't be shy about letting the customer touch and operate it for themselves -- RP is not going to let you down.
How did David make money? Well, once he was in the door showing the system, it was easy for him to show the customer the value of David's other services like network analysis and PC maintenance. He packaged his whole set of offerings in a way that represented real, total value to the customer. It was a clear win-win.
What about you? If you've got a story about how you sold an RP system, please tell us.