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Channel Reaches Consensus on ‘Master Agent’ Rebrand
Some of the channel’s largest partners have joined the movement to shutter the term “master agent” and embrace the term “technology solutions brokerage.”
Multiple firms have told the Xposure Inclusion & Diversity Council that they are officially retiring “master agent” from their branding. Other companies have begun plans to rebrand themselves as a technology solutions brokerage, according to Xposure co-founder Brandon Knight.
The Controversy
Telarus’ Brandon Knight
A debate has raged in the IT/telecom brokerage channel in 2021 about deciding on a new name for the companies previously referred to as master agents. These firms, which provide supplier contracts and sales enablement resources to channel partners, have gone by the moniker for decades, but partners and vendors have spoken out about their discomfort with the term. Some are calling it racially insensitive; others call it a misnomer.
But despite several public expressions of support from executives at leading channel companies, the movement stalled when it came to agreeing on a replacement term. Partners called on suppliers to make the change, but the suppliers themselves had already developed a myriad of different terms on their own.
That’s when Xposure Inclusion & Diversity Council took the initiative.
The business resource group started drafting a letter that called on these brokerage and sourcing firms to lead by example and adopt new terminology. Specifically, Xposure was calling on them to use the term technology services distributor to describe themselves.
“I think we want a collaborative effort,” Knight said in an interview with Channel Futures last month. “But the suppliers and the agents are saying, ‘You guys are the ones that are called master agents. So we shouldn’t change your name; you should change your name.’”
The Ultimatum Succeeds
The promise of an open letter caught the attention of the industry. Knight, who helped draft the letter, said several brokerages reached out to Xposure.
“It seems like nobody wanted to be on the bad side of that letter,” said Knight, who also leads Telarus’ contact center practice.
However, Knight said their feedback wasn’t entirely positive.
“Not everyone was 100% on-board. Not everybody thought this was a task worth taking up,” he said.
One critique was the term technology services distributor. Some firms noted how distributors already exist in the IT industry. Richard Murray, a colleague of Knight’s at Telarus, gathered together the largest tech solutions brokers for a conversation.
“His communication was, ‘There needs to be a change. We don’t like the term distributor because there are distributors out there already.'”
That crew, which included TBI, AppSmart, Intelisys, Avant and TCG, decided to go with “technology solutions brokerage,” according to Knight. Some of those companies will be putting their own spin on the wording in their branding, but they have reached an understanding.
Knight saw this consensus as a huge win.
“I was really impressed that actively competing companies talked about it openly. To me, that’s also a nod to how important the subject is,” he said. “I was really appreciative that they respected the topic enough to have an honest conversation about it and come up with a solution.”
Knight said the dominoes continued to fall when several suppliers, including Comcast, T-Mobile, Five9 and Nice InContact, told Xposure they would support the change.
The initiative would also refer to “subagents” as …
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