Earlier this year Exertis Micro-P launched its Conect programme, heralding the service as being the first that allows resellers from fixed line, IT and mobile to sell cross-channel without any major outlay or headache. Comms Business Magazine talks to Exertis Micro-P’s Simon Slater about how Conect is knocking down the barriers between traditional channels.
According to Simon Slater people have been talking about the convergence of mobile, IT and fixed line for many years, and yet up until now there has been no significant convergence between resellers making the move from their traditional areas, into other channels.
“Now, Exertis Micro-P has created a platform, called Conect, to truly enable resellers of mobile, IT and comms to connect services including mobile airtime, hosted services, VoIP, employee benefit schemes including BYOD, managed print services and video conferencing via a simple to use, unique and intuitive connections portal.
It brings everything together in a way that helps resellers to easily deliver a full suite of services through a single platform and on a single billing system. Whether they’re an IT, mobile or comm’s reseller, they can expand the range of services they provide to their local community and their customer base.
Conect took us over twelve months to build and it sees the launch of Exertis Micro-P’s connected services strategy of bringing new revenue streams to our customers. It is the first platform and service of its kind to truly remove the barriers to a traditionally complex service offering, and open a simple and profitable gateway for our customers to provide connected services.
Conect is going from strength to strength, with more people signing up to the programme all the time. At a recent reseller Conect event we held on 22 May in Reading, the vast majority of resellers that attended signed up for Conect accounts within two weeks of attending. The reason for this is those resellers understand that we are giving them the opportunity to diversify their portfolios but without the financial and time-consuming effort traditionally required.”
Launching initially with mobile airtime, hosted services and employee benefit schemes, the Conect programme has been extended to include managed print and video conferencing, enabling resellers access to any or all of these services and giving them the potential for continued recurring revenue growth.
“Conect operates on a very intuitive system,’ says Slater. “This lets resellers build a deal and see the commission they’ll make and very clearly the profit they will get from the sale. It’s very simple and enables all our resellers to cut through all that we do, and our customers are as excited as we are about the fantastic results and ease of use that Conect is giving them.”
Mark Rose, Head of Reseller Boosh 365, comments:
“We are a comms reseller and we use Conect for mobile, although mainly for EE services right now, but we are going to start using it for voice over IP (VoIP) connections also.
“We’ve grown a lot over the last two years and we have been able to pretty much point new staff in the direction of Conect and let them get on with it. You only need to show people how to use the system once and it is so simple to use, they can carry on by themselves from there. With Conect they can quickly create full proposals with our logo and branding, as well as providing tariff quotes for customers, saving us a hell of a lot of time.
“Also, Conect cuts down on training time and therefore training costs for us. With Conect you don’t have to bore your staff to death by showing them every single tariff from every single network; they simply tell the system what the customer wants and it shows us the best tariff for each customer’s needs.
“We want to use Conect to sell VoIP, which we already sell but I want to be able to sell it through Conect. We went to a recent Exertis Micro-P Conect event to learn about the VoIP side, and it will make doing business faster and simpler, as it already does for selling mobile.”
Mike Luxford, Managing Director at reseller, MLCS:
“MLCS has been involved with the Conect platform since July 2013. We have actually been installing VoIP handsets and systems for around five years and at the time Conect was launched we were working with another provider, also on the Broadsoft platform that Conect is based on.
“The introduction was fortuitous for us, as we were experiencing delays and issues to the service with our other provider, which was impacting on both our business and our customers’ businesses.
“We have found that the Conect team are knowledgeable, adaptable and very keen to understand what we and our customers require. Indeed, the Conect product has already evolved to incorporate recommendations that we have made, based on our prior knowledge of the Broadsoft platform.
“A key factor in moving to the Conect product was that we were able to introduce mobile devices to our portfolio - phones, tablets and connections - which neatly completes the VoIP and unified communications proposition for our clients. We now offer our clients a single bill for internet access, telephony and mobile communications all backed with our expertise in communications and networks.”