Partner Channel: Focal Fashionably Late to Agent Party
Posted: 2/2002
Partner Channel
Focal Fashionably Late to Agent Party
By Khali Henderson
After six months in development, Focal Communications Inc. rolled out its agent program in January. Company executives say the channel strategy’s time has come for the five-year-old integrated communications provider.
While it may seem a little late in the game for the carrier, the company is banking on being able to meet the needs of previously underserved channel partners looking for stable carriers in an uncertain climate.
Unlike other competitive providers, Focal closed its $430 million recapitalization transaction in October, which is expected to fully fund the business until it becomes free cash flow positive during the second half of 2003.
Rick Knight, vice president of Focal’s Network Solutions Group, told PHONE+ the company has had a reseller program since day one, but it waited until the company was more mature — with network, systems and processes in place — to launch its agent program, a decision the company made at the urging of telecom agents, he says.
Agents wanted a program that provided them with available services and timely status and billing information about their accounts, Knight says. Focal spent the last half of 2001 working on the back-office component of the program to meet this requirement.
Focal has established a dedicated commission organization that Knight says will ensure sales agents are paid accurately and on time. At year end the company, was putting the final touches on an agent website, Inside Focal, which will give agents access to order tracking commission tracking, forms and online training modules.
A few agents, the company did not identify, beta tested the systems.
In addition to updating its IT systems, the company hired a national manager and five other managers to provide sales and marketing support and training to the channel.
Zane Long will lead the team as its national director of the agents sales group reporting to Knight. Long has worked at Focal in the data group for the past two years. Other staff members have been recruited from within the company and outside organizations.
Knight says agents will be able to sell the gamut of the company’s voice and data products, available in the top 22 U.S. markets. The program has a tiered monthly commission structure based on volume and also will include bonus offers on lines sold through first quarter.
