Sell Unified Communications with Clarity

David Byrd : Raven Call
David Byrd
David Byrd is the Founder and Chief Creative Officer for Raven Guru Marketing. Previously, he was the CMO and EVP of Sales for CloudRoute. Prior to CloudRoute, He was CMO at ANPI, CMO & EVP of Sales at Broadvox, VP of channels and Alliances for Telcordia and Director of eBusiness development with i2 Technologies.He has also held executive positions with Planet Hollywood Online, Hewlett-Packard, Tandem Computers, Sprint and Ericsson.
| Raven Guru Marketing http://www.ravenguru.com/

Sell Unified Communications with Clarity

Telecommunications has always been an industry filled with mystery and the unknown. For those of us on the inside, everything seems perfectly logical and, for the most part, well thought out. However, consider the following story I heard this week.

Sometime in the last century, a telephone company decided to upgrade its switching technology to deliver new services to its customer base. As part of the upgrade, the dialing plan for the area was going to change in a seemingly benign way.

The change involved moving from four-digit dialing to reach neighbors and friends to seven-digit dialing. This required the user to dial three new digits + the four original digits. The phone company launched a “three + four” marketing campaign. After the switch was fully transitioned, and the new services in place, the telephone company monitored traffic and trouble tickets in anticipation of some customers not understanding the changes. On one ticket in particular, a technician noted that a caller was trying to make a call, but was abandoning the effort after dialing three digits. As the number of call attempts increased and the dialing pattern remained unchanged, the technician decided to call the customer directly to see if he could assist. He first asked if the caller had read the materials sent out by the phone company, to which the response was “Yes.” Next, he inquired as to whether the caller understood the new dial plan and, again, he received a positive response. Somewhat stumped, he asked if the caller had any questions, and the caller said, “Why, yes I do. I am having a most difficult time finding that plus sign on my phone. Where is it?”

With the dramatic transition from TDM to IP communications, and the continuous innovation of Unified Communications (UC), we should not forgot that we are asking people to make buying decisions that to us, again, seem logical and simple, but may not be fully understood or appreciated by our prospects. For example, it is easy to forget that the most appreciated UC capabilities by small businesses is voicemail-to-email, auto-attendant and music on hold. Sure, UC solutions can do a lot more, but how much more can a prospect absorb and fully understand the value of in the first exposure? Progressing the sale and use of UC may require staged introduction of features and benefits. After the most appreciated features are understood, introduce IM, presence and collaboration, with a dose of business continuity. Move from there to integrated mobility, and complete with the concept of anywhere, anytime, any device.

Clarity should be our objective when educating prospects on Hosted UC. And just like the ever-vigilant telephone technician, don’t assume the prospect understands. Ask. 



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