BMS Blog: SBS Consulting in the UK

A few Microsoft promotions worht taking a look at in case you missed them on the SBSC blog:

Savings on Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 licences for small and medium size businesses

(url is: https://partner.microsoft.com/UK/40094536)

Prior to the next Microsoft Exchange Server release, you can help your small and medium size business customers acquire Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 email technology. Use this promotion to offer your customers savings on Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Standard Edition server licences and client access licences (CALs).

Rebates when you sell and provide services on selected server products

(url: https://www.serveroffer.com/)

Available until 31 December 2009, we are offering service rebates when you sell and provide services for Windows Server 2008, Windows Small Business Server 2008, Windows HPC Server 2008, or Windows Essential Business Server 2008.

Windows 7 Professional upgrade promotion

(url: https://partner.microsoft.com/UK/40113458)

From 1 September 2009 to 28 February 2010, you can increase your Windows desktop operating system upgrade business by motivating Microsoft Volume Licensing customers in small and medium sized businesses to upgrade their PCs running Windows XP or Windows Vista operating systems. Use this promotion to offer savings on Windows 7 Professional operating system upgrade licences - with or without Microsoft Software Assurance for Volume Licensing.

July’s meeting is fast approaching and this month we have 2 speakers who can help maximise your exposure and help control your managed services costs:

First up is Ranbir Sahota of Vitis PR, a Public Relations company specialising it IT PR:

Our broad-range of tech experience spans open source, internet security, network security, biometric security, web application security, public sector technology organisations, business intelligence, document management, content management, business process management, biotechnology, telecoms network infrastructure, enterprise software, software testing, web conferencing, digital marketing recruitment, clean tech, Chip and PIN security, VOIP, mobile workforce and outsourcing.

For our clients we target specialist technology trade, national and broadcast media.  We have also conducted successful campaigns for clients that provide software or hardware for the following sectors: retail, logistics, security, financial services, education, recruitment, hospitality and marketing.

For start ups
Few start-ups can hope to compete with established players using traditional marketing strategies, but with a well thought out public relations strategy even the smallest companies can be heard without having to spend large amounts of their funding on PR.
For small to medium sized companies
The Vitis PR team has years of experience designing and implementing campaigns that help small to medium sized (SMEs) companies take on the established players.

Second up is Christian Nagele of CentraStage:

CentraStage is an IT support platform with a difference. Designed and built in the UK for the IT support company servicing the SME marketplace, it simplifies the management and support of thousands of remote devices over multiple customers, giving IT support companies visibility and control of their environment through a web-based management interface. Uniquely, however, and unlike many other managed service platforms and support technologies, at £1 per device per month CentraStage is priced to go on every device – PCs, laptops, servers – and works out of the box.

With the core functionality of CentraStage being remote support, audit and monitoring, software deployment and configuration, reporting and web-based administration, CentraStage allows cost-effective management of customer devices through a single system.

The CentraStage pricing model means no upfront capital investment - you pay monthly for what you use. Simply log in, deploy the CentraStage client software and you are up and running.

Looks like it’s going to be a great meeting. I’ll send out a calendar request shortly but as normal the meeting is at the Arden Hotel, 5pm for a 5:30 start.

Posted on UK SBSC blog is info on promotions due to end soon. You’ll have to be quick if you want to take advantage of them:

Promotion

End Date

BPOS 27% discount

30^th June 2009

Power Through The Downturn – 10% Open discount selected products

30^th June 2009

Windows Server Services Rebate

30^th June 2009

Claims submitted by 31^st July 2009

5% price promotion on Open License for Government

30^th June 2009

Windows Client 10% Software Assurance

31 August, 2009 (extended from 30 June 2009)

Up to 10% discount on BPOS –EA/EAS & MOSP

31 August, 2009 (extended from 30 June, 2009)

Thanks to Emily for the reminders

Have you taken a look at Microsoft Pinpoint yet, and more to the point have you checked your profiled solutions work on there?

Pinpoint is a new lead generation tool that customers can use to find your solutions. Launching this month it offers a user friendly interface, customer ratings, reviews and partner spotlight features.

It is recommend you enter your solutions in Solution Profiler. If you have existing solutions in Solution Profiler, we recommend you visit the Pinpoint information page on the Partner Portal to ensure these solutions are Pinpoint-compatible. Use the Microsoft Pinpoint Content Guidelines to succinctly communicate to customers what your company does and how your offerings can benefit them.

I checked out or existing profiled solutions and they all looked fine. Weirdly putting in our postcode doesn’t bring us up though! I’ll be sending an email off to Microsoft about that asap!

When is a customer not a customer? The first time they don’t pay you – that’s when.

There was a time in the IT SME services sector that you almost couldn’t help but make money – companies were trampling each other under foot to buy your services – well that might be a slight exaggeration but you get the picture! But not any more. Trying to convince customers to part with their hard earned  so you can monitor their systems and ensure maximum uptime and availability can be a hard sell when their cash flow sucks and their own sales have dropped off faster than a Lemming over a cliff.

With that in mind it is even more important that you take a look at your existing customer base and decide which customers are earning you money and which you should get rid of. Now I know that it might be an odd thing to consider getting rid of customers but if they aren’t making you money and assuming you aren’t a registered charity then they have to go – for your sake, your employees sake and your good customers’ sake.

So that brings me on to what we consider a non customer or one that needs to go and how we go about telling that customer. We used to be quite lenient when it came to payments – I don’t mean we didn’t have procedures in place, we have and have had since the beginning. We have however tightened up on those procedures a lot as we were stung by 2 customers whose payments we let slide who then went belly up. Now, as soon as a customer doesn’t pay us when they’re supposed to we give them one chance and one chance only to correct the situation. After that we suspend any services related to non payments until they do pay up.

If they still don’t play ball, we issue a draft small claims court red letter. Experience has taught us that if they don’t pay at that point they really can’t afford to pay and it is time to get rid of them. You aren’t their bank or finance house, but by continuing to provide your services when they aren’t paying means that is exactly what you have become to them. It’s a hard decision but it has to be made.

So now you have weeded out the bad customers what do you do with the additional time and resource that has freed up? You go and have conversations with your good customers and spend more time with them. Keeping your good customers on side during these hard times is incredibly important and if you aren’t talking to them on a regular basis you can bet one of your competitors is!

Following on from my previous post regarding the new brochures they can now be downloaded from the Sales and Marketing Resource Library.

You can get the SBS one directly from here, or the EBS one directly from here.

There are a limited number of printed brochures available but you will only be able to get them by turning up to the next AMITPRO meeting on Tuesday 9th June, and when they’re gone they’re gone! Yet another great reason to get involved with the SBSC community

I also have a load of Harry Brelsford’s SMB Partner Community mags to hand out. Details on the speakers of the June meeting to follow soon.

I’ve just had a sneak peek of a new SBS 2008 brochure that Emily Lambert has given me. For a long time the SBSC community has been asking Microsoft for focussed, UK specific marketing materials and at last it looks like we’ve got it!

The 19 page glossy brochure describes itself as a “brass tacks guide”, and that is exactly what it is. Written in plain English without any noticeable US centric jargonise it covers areas such as "What is a server” and “Sure signs you need a server” before going on to describe 6 key business benefits including:

• Improved Productivity
• Work Anywhere
• Better Sales & Marketing
• Getting online
• Security
• Saving time and money

It then goes on to explain how to buy SBS 2008 with a link directly to www.microsoft.com/uk/smallbusiness/how-to-buy and best of all a whole page explaining what a Microsoft Small Business Specialist is and why you should use them – excellent!This is exactly what we asked for and it is good to know that Microsoft do listen to what UK SBSC partners need.

Emily is currently sorting out the logistics of how we can get hold of the brochures and get them distributed and will post more information on her blog when she has it.

Want to make more of the resources Microsoft make available to you as a partner? Then check out the partner program videocasts.

Microsoft have just launched a series of videocasts to kick start your knowledge of the Microsoft Partner Programme and to help you get the most value from your partnership.  All videocasts are accessible on the brand new Partner Player — you simply pick the videos you want to watch, be that learning about sales and marketing resources, getting the most from your internal-use licences, or hearing tips and tricks about how to successfully renew your programme membership.

More info from the official UK SBSC blog

After a lot of barracking from various Microsoft Partners the literature folders are back!

The new version has subtle Microsoft branding and are great for presenting your company literature to prospects. Every little helps at the moment with the credit crunch deepening and these things aren’t cheap to have printed!

More info on the folders, other collateral and how to order can be found over at Emily’s blog. Order yours now!

As I’m sure you are all aware the launch of SBS 2008 is just around the corner and Sonal Gathani is asking us what we want to see at the UK SBS 2008 launch. This is our chance to ensure the content is relevant and presented in the right format.

So if you’re an SBSC partner or sell and support SBS you are ideally placed to tell  Microsoft exactly what we need and want to see from the event, so lets make sure we all do our bit and provide some feedback.

You can email ideas directly to Sonal at sgathani@microsoft.com or reply to her blog post about the launch event here:

http://blogs.technet.com/sbsuk/archive/2008/06/27/what-do-you-want-to-see-at-the-uk-sbs-2008-launch.aspx