Partners: Lousy Vendor Support Is Costing Us Customers

Written by James Anderson
November 15, 2021

"It makes the industry look like they don't care," a partner told Channel Futures.

The channel has a customer support problem.

Subpar implementation and support from vendors have become the norm in the channel, according to partners. Many agencies have added services and personnel of their own to fill the massive gap.

Kairos Communications’ Lucas Salvage

Lucas Salvage is chief revenue officer for Kairos Data Communications. He said his team has taken on a growing responsibility to provide implementation and support services to their customers. And although Salvage said his firm might someday make support a larger component of its business model, he said vendors need to pick up the slack.

“Suppliers should be handling most of that heavy lifting. I should not be the one that’s culpable if my project management team makes a mistake. Because we’re not the ones who are supposed to be doing it,” Salvage told Channel Futures. “And God help me if you leave it to the customer.”

Salvage broke the issue into two main buckets: implementation and support.

Implementation

Salvage said approximately three in four (75%) vendors he works with underperform on deployments. Moreover, he sees suppliers shrinking the amount of effort they put into deployment.

“What I’m seeing is a shift where they are looking to put more of that onus on the customer or folks like myself… We’re doing a lot of this work for the supplier. And instead of charging, it’s almost like the supplier is getting free implementation so their team doesn’t have to do anything,” he said.

In addition, he said the quality of project managers is decreasing.

“It seems to me that the project management teams are getting worse, not better,” Salvage said. “When you do get a project management engagement out of these things, a lot of times it’s pulling teeth to even get together with these folks.”

Salvage said he often waits endlessly for email updates that the project manager promised, when all along he simply wanted to get the customer and the project manager on the same phone call to talk.

Matthew Toth, founder and president of Michigan-based consultancy C3 Technology Advisors, said he employs four project managers, and for good reason. Lack of project management on the vendor side helped create their roles.

Matthew Toth

“I’ve got project managers who essentially babysit project managers from other organizations. So the proof is kind of in the pudding. I wouldn’t need these people if all my vendors did what they’re supposed to do, but they don’t,” Toth told Channel Futures. “But that’s just par for the course. We’ve been dealing with that our whole lives.”

On one hand, vendors may be hiring from a shrinking talent pool. But Salvage and Toth note that their internal project management teams “outshine” those of their supplier partners.

“I’m not undervaluing my team here,” Salvage said. “I’m just saying that we shouldn’t be better at it than the suppliers.”

Salvage’s team holds multiple certifications, enough to in many cases handle the entire process. And often it must. For a UCaaS deal, that means building and designing call flow, initiating port requests and compiling user data.

We recently compiled a list of 20 top UCaaS providers offering products and services via channel partners.

“You’re talking about the broad range of everything that a supplier should be doing and should be getting done for a customer, because the customers are paying good money for this stuff,” he said.