00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.000
\nThat's we are now 2\u00a0min late, which is the first time so far today.<\/p>\n
00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:13.000
\nYou know, that is 5%. I don't have near as much to talk about as I think everybody else said, so that's just fine and I do know that any kind of a conference just like a tug of work 2 toughest places to be.<\/p>\n
00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:15.000
\nIs the first person and the last person.<\/p>\n
00:00:15.000 --> 00:00:16.000
\nWell, we're almost there, so let me do a couple of things first.<\/p>\n
00:00:16.000 --> 00:00:27.000
\nSo I'm gonna introduce you. But first let me thank Asigra for being our sponsor and for making this conference possible.<\/p>\n
00:00:27.000 --> 00:00:31.000
\nAsigra Is the leader in ultra secure backup and recovery.<\/p>\n
00:00:31.000 --> 00:00:37.000
\nLast month Asigra was named to Crn Magazine's coolest data protection Vendor list for 2023.<\/p>\n
00:00:37.000 --> 00:00:41.000
\nIncrease your profits and your clients security by engaging today at Asigra.com. So, Mr.<\/p>\n
00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:48.000
\nJeffery Ponts we've met, I think, around 2,008.<\/p>\n
00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:50.000
\nYou may know the exact date, but.<\/p>\n
00:00:50.000 --> 00:00:54.000
\nWell, Smb. Basin, we'll just go with that.<\/p>\n
00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:55.000
\nSee ya?<\/p>\n
00:00:55.000 --> 00:01:04.000
\nIt was Sb. Nation for sure. And, Jeff used to live about 1520 miles away from me, and then we met in Seattle in an elevator going down to the the floor at Sme Nation, and then discovered that we were actually neighbors.<\/p>\n
00:01:04.000 --> 00:01:09.000
\nWe actually had booths right next to each other at the vendor floor.<\/p>\n
00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:19.000
\nSo anyway. So Jeff has been in Telco approximately forever, and he's new company.<\/p>\n
00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:28.000
\nIs Clarice. Communications and he is a managing partner for the I guess the Western, like everything on the side of the Mississippi, is that something like that?<\/p>\n
00:01:28.000 --> 00:01:29.000
\nNothing like that.<\/p>\n
00:01:29.000 --> 00:01:36.000
\nYeah, so, and in addition to lots of information about, you know, mergers and acquisitions which he will share with you over a whiskey, he is going to show us how we can.<\/p>\n
00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:45.000
\nMake more money by expanding our operations with Telco the right way.<\/p>\n
00:01:45.000 --> 00:01:50.000
\nSo with that I will turn it over to you.<\/p>\n
00:01:50.000 --> 00:01:56.000
\nYeah, and what I want talk about mostly is, you know, this last discussion we had right.<\/p>\n
00:01:56.000 --> 00:02:11.000
\nHow do you know? Increase your E? But how increased the value of your company is to create more value by going after more customers or bigger customers?<\/p>\n
00:02:11.000 --> 00:02:12.000
\nAshley Recurring Revenue.<\/p>\n
00:02:12.000 --> 00:02:13.000
\nRight. You have to have those things. And yeah, that is pretty much what we're going to discuss.<\/p>\n
00:02:13.000 --> 00:02:17.000
\nBut I want to also start with. I'm the least qualified of anybody that's been been on today.<\/p>\n
00:02:17.000 --> 00:02:28.000
\nRight, so when I was a kid, I was the kid pick to be the the team captain all the time, not because I was the best athlete.<\/p>\n
00:02:28.000 --> 00:02:41.000
\nIt was just because they thought I was a good leader, and then I I remember, kind of by Happensstance coming in to a technical role in telecom.<\/p>\n
00:02:41.000 --> 00:02:45.000
\nAnd I realize this is my spot. I am not a technical guy.<\/p>\n
00:02:45.000 --> 00:02:56.000
\nI the finance major in college. I really like finance, and but quick enough they put me into a leadership position and so I kinda with that route.<\/p>\n
00:02:56.000 --> 00:03:01.000
\nSo I'm not a I don't understand that, but I do understand finance.<\/p>\n
00:03:01.000 --> 00:03:02.000
\nI understand how customers, ecosystems, work, and I actually really love to see the flow of a well.<\/p>\n
00:03:02.000 --> 00:03:11.000
\nRand ecosystems work, and I actually really love to see the flow of a well ran ecosystem inside of.<\/p>\n
00:03:11.000 --> 00:03:18.000
\nBut mostly I really like to support our Msp. Partners and help them grow, and I have found that.<\/p>\n
00:03:18.000 --> 00:03:27.000
\nAnd we've had these discussions, Carl, even in your community, when people say There, it's almost impossible to go up market, you know, you can't do this.<\/p>\n
00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:33.000
\nYou can't do that, and I don't say too much, but the reality is, I've got partners in Montana, Msp.<\/p>\n
00:03:33.000 --> 00:03:36.000
\nPartners in Montana that are probably 3 to 5 million dollar.<\/p>\n
00:03:36.000 --> 00:03:52.000
\nMsp's, and at the same token, I've got partners in New York and City in San Francisco that refused to work with customers any large than 25 seats, because it's just past their comfort zone.<\/p>\n
00:03:52.000 --> 00:03:53.000
\nWow!<\/p>\n
00:03:53.000 --> 00:04:05.000
\nSo it really is a state of mind whether you want to go up market or not, and sometimes sometimes you can't do that with the your exact Msp.<\/p>\n
00:04:05.000 --> 00:04:16.000
\nStack that I think that's the problem. Sometimes that you're swinging for the fence every time that you're putting your contract in your you know, whatever you're charging per seat for for your stack.<\/p>\n
00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:18.000
\nThat's what you're going after, and you're not winning this customer because the customer they get a little bit of show shot.<\/p>\n
00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:29.000
\nBut instead, sometimes they go after products. That may be are a little bit more benign.<\/p>\n
00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:35.000
\nMake them a customer so now you have a reasonably calling them all the time, and so they get to know what you can do on top of what you brought them.<\/p>\n
00:04:35.000 --> 00:04:43.000
\nAnd do the products like mobility. One of the biggest pain points a mid market customer has is mobility.<\/p>\n
00:04:43.000 --> 00:04:47.000
\nThey can't manage it. That's, you know. Employees come, they go.<\/p>\n
00:04:47.000 --> 00:04:48.000
\nThey don't know what they have. Their inventory is a mess.<\/p>\n
00:04:48.000 --> 00:04:56.000
\nTheir bill is a mess they don't know it so so you know, mobility is a huge piece.<\/p>\n
00:04:56.000 --> 00:05:00.000
\nInventory management kind of goes along with what I was just talking about, right?<\/p>\n
00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:06.000
\nThe mid market. They have a spreadsheet. They don't go after a fancy telecom expense management platform and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.<\/p>\n
00:05:06.000 --> 00:05:15.000
\nThey have a spreadsheet. You go ask them about the spreadsheet in at best 75% correct.<\/p>\n
00:05:15.000 --> 00:05:19.000
\nSo, you know, put together something along those lines right? IoT.<\/p>\n
00:05:19.000 --> 00:05:25.000
\nI've had a lot of success in IoT, and it's been a lot of fun.<\/p>\n
00:05:25.000 --> 00:05:26.000
\nBut most issues I talked to kinda they don't.<\/p>\n
00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:35.000
\nThey stay away from it. Right building, notice are great place to go after, for IoT and in buildings guess what?<\/p>\n
00:05:35.000 --> 00:05:38.000
\nThere's also customers in this in those buildings.<\/p>\n
00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:41.000
\nAt the same time, and I'm trying to.<\/p>\n
00:05:41.000 --> 00:05:42.000
\nAnd you know, additionally, you know, find partners whether it's another Msp.<\/p>\n
00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:56.000
\nOr somebody else. They can help. You expand past your local market, you know whether it's install or something along those lines, but just make sure you have the right agreements in place.<\/p>\n
00:05:56.000 --> 00:05:57.000
\nSo did you want to show your slide deck?<\/p>\n
00:05:57.000 --> 00:06:03.000
\nI will, I will. So let me hold on second.<\/p>\n
00:06:03.000 --> 00:06:12.000
\nSo if folks have questions put them in the or if you wanna chat, just throw throw through whatever into the chat.<\/p>\n
00:06:12.000 --> 00:06:13.000
\nOkay.<\/p>\n
00:06:13.000 --> 00:06:15.000
\nBe happy to get you.<\/p>\n
00:06:15.000 --> 00:06:18.000
\nOkay, so can you see my stack?<\/p>\n
00:06:18.000 --> 00:06:27.000
\nAlmost double-click to enter full screen mode. It says you have started screen sharing.<\/p>\n
00:06:27.000 --> 00:06:34.000
\nBut it's not here yet.<\/p>\n
00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:35.000
\nNo!<\/p>\n
00:06:35.000 --> 00:06:39.000
\nNot not yet did you share the deck or?<\/p>\n
00:06:39.000 --> 00:06:45.000
\nHi! But I did. I'm not sure what I did wrong. Hey?<\/p>\n
00:06:45.000 --> 00:06:51.000
\nThis train usually says, Oh, I'm stuck now.<\/p>\n
00:06:51.000 --> 00:06:57.000
\nI don't know. It says, Stop! Share! I can't even do that.<\/p>\n
00:06:57.000 --> 00:06:58.000
\nHuh!<\/p>\n
00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:07.000
\nKara, I know you have my deck also.<\/p>\n
00:07:07.000 --> 00:07:08.000
\nReally, okay.<\/p>\n
00:07:08.000 --> 00:07:12.000
\nI am completely frozen. Carl. Yeah. And I think that's on my side.<\/p>\n
00:07:12.000 --> 00:07:13.000
\nSo!<\/p>\n
00:07:13.000 --> 00:07:22.000
\nAlright. Let me find your deck. I'll have it up in just a second.<\/p>\n
00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:23.000
\nThis was my, the emergency thing we talked about right?<\/p>\n
00:07:23.000 --> 00:07:27.000
\nHere. Well, I do that you should do this is this is why we have emergency desk.<\/p>\n
00:07:27.000 --> 00:07:28.000
\nSo!<\/p>\n
00:07:28.000 --> 00:07:34.000
\nYeah. I am completely terrified. Your face in my face is completely frozen on my computer.<\/p>\n
00:07:34.000 --> 00:07:36.000
\nSo I truly apologize. That's the all day long I'm sitting here listening to you.<\/p>\n
00:07:36.000 --> 00:07:41.000
\nThen, when it's finally my turn to go.<\/p>\n
00:07:41.000 --> 00:07:48.000
\nAlright, so I don't know if I can give you control over this, but I will share my screen.<\/p>\n
00:07:48.000 --> 00:07:58.000
\nDo you wanna stop Jeff's share? Yes, and I will do the Powerpoint.<\/p>\n
00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:00.000
\nAlright you telling me when to click.<\/p>\n
00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:05.000
\nOkay, so even look I, this was, I just had to do a little bit of a history piece first.<\/p>\n
00:08:05.000 --> 00:08:11.000
\nSo you know, I kinda told you I was kind of the least qualified person on today's call.<\/p>\n
00:08:11.000 --> 00:08:24.000
\nWell, if you look back a hundred 50 years ago, or whenever good old Abe was elected, you know he might have been good for domestic policy and things along those lines.<\/p>\n
00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:34.000
\nBut our country was on war footing. It was. It was pretty eminent when when he was elected, and he had no military experience whatsoever.<\/p>\n
00:08:34.000 --> 00:08:42.000
\nGoing carl next slide.<\/p>\n
00:08:42.000 --> 00:08:46.000
\nAnd so also he finds himself actually being a commander in chief.<\/p>\n
00:08:46.000 --> 00:09:00.000
\nI mean, he definitely wasn't George Washington, who was already in general and knew how to run a military, so he had to start from scratch on how to actually be a a leader of a war right?<\/p>\n
00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:21.000
\nYou know, Commander-in-chief so. But he was a communicator, and he had a new technology at his side, and and so what the first thing he did was without 15,000 miles of telegraph wire across the country where they thought where you thought battlefields we're<\/p>\n
00:09:21.000 --> 00:09:27.000
\ngoing to go ahead. Carl.<\/p>\n
00:09:27.000 --> 00:09:49.000
\nAnd so he was in constant communication with his generals, and by the way they hated it, they absolutely hated that communication on a daily basis, because they're used to just running their world themselves, and then maybe talking to the present, or whoever else every once in a while go ahead and move, next.<\/p>\n
00:09:49.000 --> 00:09:59.000
\nSo then, moving forward a little bit, we're now Gettysburg, and almost all of his generals, for spying in the same battle.<\/p>\n
00:09:59.000 --> 00:10:05.000
\nBut the problem was that each of those germs were running their own little world in the same battle, and none were.<\/p>\n
00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:10.000
\nWe're communicating with each other, and somehow a good old, A.<\/p>\n
00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:15.000
\nHe got figured out a way to really kind of create the first conference call, and that conference.<\/p>\n
00:10:15.000 --> 00:10:20.000
\nAnd so, you know, digitally, I mean, loosely, digitally.<\/p>\n
00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:21.000
\nYou know they were communicating with each other on troop movements, and where to move their.<\/p>\n
00:10:21.000 --> 00:10:31.000
\nThe troops around the battlefield, and because of that they want right.<\/p>\n
00:10:31.000 --> 00:10:37.000
\nThey started they were losing it first, and then they actually wanted, and that had a lot to do with it.<\/p>\n
00:10:37.000 --> 00:10:40.000
\nNext slide.<\/p>\n
00:10:40.000 --> 00:10:51.000
\nSo when when the battle is over, if you, if you look back, the the politicians at the time, they would usually give like 3\u00a0h speeches, because, you know, there wasn't much else out there, they didn't have 24\u00a0h news cycles.<\/p>\n
00:10:51.000 --> 00:11:10.000
\nSo they would get up there, and they pontificate for hours, and but but the President link he would so describe over what happened in Gettysburg, across all avenues right across the north, the South.<\/p>\n
00:11:10.000 --> 00:11:16.000
\nEverybody that he wrote the address address was not a 3\u00a0h speech.<\/p>\n
00:11:16.000 --> 00:11:19.000
\nIt was only 272 words.<\/p>\n
00:11:19.000 --> 00:11:24.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:11:24.000 --> 00:11:32.000
\nAnd so with, you know. With those 272 words he changed the nation.<\/p>\n
00:11:32.000 --> 00:11:36.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:40.000
\nSo what happened next after he would, you know he gave that speech because it was only 272 words.<\/p>\n
00:11:40.000 --> 00:11:48.000
\nIt was also communicated to all the newspapers in the North, which, so it was almost immediately put in the newspapers.<\/p>\n
00:11:48.000 --> 00:11:56.000
\nBut on top of that it was sent to the south, and it actually started to change the minds.<\/p>\n
00:11:56.000 --> 00:12:09.000
\nA lot of the people on the street, and they're very worrying anyways, and there's a lot that I've seen the documentaries on that actually kind of shirts to change the mind that people and maybe even help the end of war.<\/p>\n
00:12:09.000 --> 00:12:20.000
\nSo our first digital President saved the country and and launched a revolution very loosely.<\/p>\n
00:12:20.000 --> 00:12:27.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:12:27.000 --> 00:12:30.000
\nSo I'm gonna be a little bit contrary.<\/p>\n
00:12:30.000 --> 00:12:35.000
\nHere, Carl, and please sit with me if you will, on this with I.<\/p>\n
00:12:35.000 --> 00:12:42.000
\nYou know, I know that. You know. Our last panel was kind of in the middle on private equity.<\/p>\n
00:12:42.000 --> 00:12:43.000
\nI'm I don't like private equity.<\/p>\n
00:12:43.000 --> 00:12:52.000
\nI think they've done a very big disservice to our industry, and for a lot of reasons.<\/p>\n
00:12:52.000 --> 00:12:59.000
\nOne? Is it bigger's not always better, right? We tend to think that we put big companies together.<\/p>\n
00:12:59.000 --> 00:13:00.000
\nAnd Carl like, of course I hear. See, you're on mute.<\/p>\n
00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:07.000
\nWhat's one of the things you like to say that if you have a customer Service Department you've already lost.<\/p>\n
00:13:07.000 --> 00:13:13.000
\nYeah, yeah, it's it's basically when you get to the point, you have to have a customer service department.<\/p>\n
00:13:13.000 --> 00:13:14.000
\nIt means that you have really horrible service. So.<\/p>\n
00:13:14.000 --> 00:13:17.000
\nYeah, and one thing I can tell you about money.<\/p>\n
00:13:17.000 --> 00:13:27.000
\nMoney doesn't like a fight right? And so so I would equity the one of the biggest reasons why I don't like it.<\/p>\n
00:13:27.000 --> 00:13:37.000
\nIt is financial engineering. Hi would it be? It depends on a return on investment somewhere between 30 and 50% a year.<\/p>\n
00:13:37.000 --> 00:13:45.000
\nAnd they plan to be out of that mark out of that move within 3 to 5 years, maybe 7 at the absolute, most.<\/p>\n
00:13:45.000 --> 00:13:50.000
\nSo in that there's no consideration for the partner.<\/p>\n
00:13:50.000 --> 00:14:01.000
\nThere's no consideration for your customer. There isn't any so yes, an owner can make some money on that upfront, so you know, and I believe very if you can talk to that.<\/p>\n
00:14:01.000 --> 00:14:02.000
\nSo it depends on where you're sitting in that play.<\/p>\n
00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:11.000
\nSo, yet owner can make some money, and they can make that upfront money, and maybe even earn out something along those lines.<\/p>\n
00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:12.000
\nBut in general it's not good for the partner, not good for not good for the end.<\/p>\n
00:14:12.000 --> 00:14:30.000
\nCustomer, which is why I don't like it, and it's also not good for usually for the employees, because there's also a lot of lot of layoffs that happen in mergers.<\/p>\n
00:14:30.000 --> 00:14:35.000
\nLastly, on this slide is the owner's contract language, which we did not talk or did not talk about.<\/p>\n
00:14:35.000 --> 00:14:42.000
\nOn the last conversation is that I've seen many of these, so I've had.<\/p>\n
00:14:42.000 --> 00:14:45.000
\nHow many about 5 different companies make a run? A desk?<\/p>\n
00:14:45.000 --> 00:14:47.000
\nPrivate equity, firm, make a run at us and when I looked at their contract language it was terrible.<\/p>\n
00:14:47.000 --> 00:14:55.000
\nIt was onerous. It was vague and it wasn't one of those.<\/p>\n
00:14:55.000 --> 00:15:03.000
\nThey weren't those kind of contracts that you were just going to go in with your own lawyer, make a few changes and come to a nice agreement.<\/p>\n
00:15:03.000 --> 00:15:17.000
\nThere were so many ambiguities in that contract that down the road it'd be very easy to lose a lot of money, so I just did not like going that that distance.<\/p>\n
00:15:17.000 --> 00:15:18.000
\nSo yeah, are, are there a few private equity companies?<\/p>\n
00:15:18.000 --> 00:15:37.000
\nThat could be a little bit altruistic. I doubt it, but there's always some nice people in every industry, but my opinion is, I like to stay away, and I also not a big fan of what's happened also in in the vendor space as far as private equity goes, to<\/p>\n
00:15:37.000 --> 00:15:46.000
\nbecause it that upins our customers. And, Carl, you just wrote a pretty good article on this not too long ago.<\/p>\n
00:15:46.000 --> 00:15:47.000
\nThank you.<\/p>\n
00:15:47.000 --> 00:15:50.000
\nBy the way, next.<\/p>\n
00:15:50.000 --> 00:16:06.000
\nAnd I only wrote this, put this slide together because there's a lot of people on this call that I know pretty well, and you know, why did we merge our company and part of it was scalability, much for a much bigger company?<\/p>\n
00:16:06.000 --> 00:16:13.000
\nNow I'm probably 4 times bigger than I than I was just a month ago.<\/p>\n
00:16:13.000 --> 00:16:29.000
\nDiversity of products, you know, significant back office. Not only is there about 50 employees, but there's a very significant group of project coordinators on in this company which I find that very very important to have.<\/p>\n
00:16:29.000 --> 00:16:34.000
\nI mean, we're not implementing our own products per se.<\/p>\n
00:16:34.000 --> 00:16:41.000
\nBut we're probably fortunate. The project 4 years of the vendors, to make sure that we've got a good outcome for the for the customers, and also from a national national presence standpoint.<\/p>\n
00:16:41.000 --> 00:16:51.000
\nI was, you know, even though I was national in scale. 70% of my business was in California.<\/p>\n
00:16:51.000 --> 00:17:00.000
\nBut now we truly are national. Next.<\/p>\n
00:17:00.000 --> 00:17:05.000
\nSo these slides going forward look very selfie, because I have a new marketing department, and well, they're not mine.<\/p>\n
00:17:05.000 --> 00:17:10.000
\nThey're they come from the company that just.<\/p>\n
00:17:10.000 --> 00:17:14.000
\nI just merged with. So you you can take the top part out.<\/p>\n
00:17:14.000 --> 00:17:38.000
\nBut if you're gonna deal with a master agent, Slash, Tsd, what you want is you want them to have a strong project management team, a good engineering team, because again, they've someone's got to be able to do the prod that' be able to do the discovery design analogy of products that you're not gonna<\/p>\n
00:17:38.000 --> 00:17:39.000
\ntouch, so Pennsylvania. Internal product development marketing is key mark.<\/p>\n
00:17:39.000 --> 00:17:49.000
\nWhat was your comment? There was a if you don't, if you do no marketing, what happens?<\/p>\n
00:17:49.000 --> 00:17:50.000
\nOh, yeah. Yeah. Nothing.<\/p>\n
00:17:50.000 --> 00:17:59.000
\nNothing. Yeah. So we actually have a marketing team of 4 people that will actually help our partners do the marketing.<\/p>\n
00:17:59.000 --> 00:18:02.000
\nMost people don't have that, but I encourage you.<\/p>\n
00:18:02.000 --> 00:18:12.000
\nIf you're not gonna work with the company, has a marketing department's gonna help, you go find somebody, whether it's Robin Robins or somebody, but hit some marketing support and don't.<\/p>\n
00:18:12.000 --> 00:18:14.000
\nIt's not a one time thing consistent marketing support, and it costs money.<\/p>\n
00:18:14.000 --> 00:18:20.000
\nBut if you want to grow, that's what you need to do.<\/p>\n
00:18:20.000 --> 00:18:27.000
\nSecurity skills. But mostly this bottom one should have been on the top contract friendliness.<\/p>\n
00:18:27.000 --> 00:18:36.000
\nAnybody you're gonna work with needs to be contract friendly, and they need to be there to complement you not compete with you right?<\/p>\n
00:18:36.000 --> 00:18:47.000
\nSo you don't want anybody in the their contract to be able to do work directly with your your own customers against you, and that happens all the time.<\/p>\n
00:18:47.000 --> 00:18:52.000
\nIt happens mostly with vendors, but it can also help in in our space, also because a lot of the people the Tsds are transitioning over to being a Msp.<\/p>\n
00:18:52.000 --> 00:19:04.000
\nThemselves, next.<\/p>\n
00:19:04.000 --> 00:19:08.000
\nThis is kind of a slide, just who we are, what we do.<\/p>\n
00:19:08.000 --> 00:19:14.000
\nThis should have been 2 slides ahead. My apologies, but this slide doesn't include my company.<\/p>\n
00:19:14.000 --> 00:19:18.000
\nSo it's probably at least a third bigger than this.<\/p>\n
00:19:18.000 --> 00:19:28.000
\nSo pretty, significant! Pretty! Significant company. Next.<\/p>\n
00:19:28.000 --> 00:19:34.000
\nHey? I patched on this a little bit ago. Inventory database as as a service.<\/p>\n
00:19:34.000 --> 00:19:35.000
\nIf you wanna go up market. This is a key product. We built this ourselves.<\/p>\n
00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:42.000
\nThere's other products on, I believe you can go buy.<\/p>\n
00:19:42.000 --> 00:19:47.000
\nYou can probably build one in excel. If you're if you're an excel, is yourself.<\/p>\n
00:19:47.000 --> 00:20:01.000
\nBut if you want to go to the Mid-market and what I'll call the Mid market customers, that bill between 10 grand and 100 grand a month, so they don't, and I every total spin telecom it.<\/p>\n
00:20:01.000 --> 00:20:08.000
\nThey're just not very good at managing this piece themselves, and they need that support.<\/p>\n
00:20:08.000 --> 00:20:09.000
\nSo this is a very benign thing. This wouldn't cost very much to do.<\/p>\n
00:20:09.000 --> 00:20:16.000
\nWe've already done it again, built in salesforce.<\/p>\n
00:20:16.000 --> 00:20:21.000
\nBut it's not. This is nothing you could do yourself in house or hire.<\/p>\n
00:20:21.000 --> 00:20:29.000
\nThere's probably a generic, you know, spreadsheets that you could buy to do this.<\/p>\n
00:20:29.000 --> 00:20:39.000
\nBut if you do this well for a customer across, you know all products, you're gonna have a friend for sure.<\/p>\n
00:20:39.000 --> 00:20:46.000
\nAnd but if you do end up with an enterprise session, we can go telecom expense management based on those like companies like Pango, who do that.<\/p>\n
00:20:46.000 --> 00:20:50.000
\nBut you're talking multi 1 million dollar customers at that point.<\/p>\n
00:20:50.000 --> 00:20:55.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:56.000
\nAnd this there, this site didn't really need to be there.<\/p>\n
00:20:56.000 --> 00:21:04.000
\nHowever, part of the ownership of this company is isn't an Msp. By name?<\/p>\n
00:21:04.000 --> 00:21:09.000
\nWill house in there they specialize in dealing with enterprise, mid market enterprise customers only and but what they do help where they do work with Ms.<\/p>\n
00:21:09.000 --> 00:21:12.000
\nFebruary, if they want to go out of their market with specific products, they may not have right.<\/p>\n
00:21:12.000 --> 00:21:22.000
\nSo if you need insulation, cross country, if you need not have right.<\/p>\n
00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:27.000
\nSo if you need installation, cross country, if if there's a product need, if if there's a help desk needs things along those and that you don't, that you don't do yourself, we can help with.<\/p>\n
00:21:27.000 --> 00:21:33.000
\nWe're not trying to tell you to stop being an Msp.<\/p>\n
00:21:33.000 --> 00:21:40.000
\nSell, sell our products. We're saying, if we have something that's not in your stack, and you need some help.<\/p>\n
00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:50.000
\nWe'll help you, and I think that should be with any vendor you work with in our space next.<\/p>\n
00:21:50.000 --> 00:21:55.000
\nYou can go next. Hey, I told you it's a little bit too selfie.<\/p>\n
00:21:55.000 --> 00:21:56.000
\nI apologize. So what's the technology service distributor?<\/p>\n
00:21:56.000 --> 00:21:58.000
\nSlash, master, agent, you know, for a lot for telecom agents.<\/p>\n
00:21:58.000 --> 00:22:05.000
\nSo one stock shop, but mostly what we do for Msps is we are, we compliment?<\/p>\n
00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:09.000
\nRight. You know we do the things that you don't wanna do you know, I would say of our Msp.<\/p>\n
00:22:09.000 --> 00:22:20.000
\nPartners which you know prior to the merger, was about 400.<\/p>\n
00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:24.000
\nI'd say 50% of them sell you cast under their own flag.<\/p>\n
00:22:24.000 --> 00:22:29.000
\nThey want. They wanna capture and manage that business themselves.<\/p>\n
00:22:29.000 --> 00:22:39.000
\nThe other 50% assets to do it, or sometimes they walk into a customer saying, Yeah, but we like all this except we have to have ringcentral.<\/p>\n
00:22:39.000 --> 00:22:51.000
\nAs for you, cast well, we can help with that. So we're not trying to be everything and trying to take all your business from the way you're doing business today to the way we do it.<\/p>\n
00:22:51.000 --> 00:23:00.000
\nWe're just trying to say, let's help you with what you don't do, and that should be again with any I'm not talking about mic. Come this, any technology service distributor.<\/p>\n
00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:07.000
\nTsd. Masteration, whatever you want to call us next.<\/p>\n
00:23:07.000 --> 00:23:18.000
\nSo you know, this is this part. Almost every single Tsd will tell you that they represent over 300 400 500 vendors.<\/p>\n
00:23:18.000 --> 00:23:24.000
\nIt seems crazy, but it's actually true. Go and move to the next slide.<\/p>\n
00:23:24.000 --> 00:23:30.000
\nCarl, and take the next one, too.<\/p>\n
00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:32.000
\nThis is why, you know, if you geographically, this is kind of a crazy side.<\/p>\n
00:23:32.000 --> 00:23:40.000
\nBut you know, when we think of cable companies, we think it costs the spectrum.<\/p>\n
00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:45.000
\nBut the reality is there's 455 of them across the country.<\/p>\n
00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:50.000
\nThere's 1,769 fixed wireless providers, and why is that a big thing?<\/p>\n
00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:59.000
\nBy the way, fixed wireless. If you are anywhere rural, if you're working with farms, we have a lot of winners because I'm in Northern California.<\/p>\n
00:23:59.000 --> 00:24:19.000
\nWe have a lot of winery customers, you do. You'd be amazed on how little network there is out there in the farms where the grapes are being produced, and so these fixed wireless producers have become key places of connectivity because there's a lot of IoT that's happening in the<\/p>\n
00:24:19.000 --> 00:24:23.000
\npharm Space, Carl being in Sacramento area, knows this in particular.<\/p>\n
00:24:23.000 --> 00:24:37.000
\nAnd I'll give you a good example of that. So if you flew into Sacramento to visit Carl, you'd look you'd be flying in, and you would see ring Fields as long as you can see it.<\/p>\n
00:24:37.000 --> 00:24:41.000
\nYou think that's all like it looks like sod to be honest with you, like maybe they're raising side for sporting stadiums.<\/p>\n
00:24:41.000 --> 00:24:55.000
\nIt's not that. It's rice. And I went to an IoT conference a few years ago, and I learned when it was fascinating things about that industry, and I didn't know.<\/p>\n
00:24:55.000 --> 00:25:11.000
\nAnd I live. I used to live like he said that it the way rice is planted is, it's if they've got a GPS to the tractor, and they've got laser going at the side.<\/p>\n
00:25:11.000 --> 00:25:14.000
\nSo they stay exactly in their lane, where they're supposed to be on their farm.<\/p>\n
00:25:14.000 --> 00:25:29.000
\nThey go 4 inches deep. Exactly the person in the tracker is not driving just fully autonomous, so there is there, just like, you know, they have to buylaw.<\/p>\n
00:25:29.000 --> 00:25:33.000
\nHave somebody sitting inside the tractor, when that is, when that's done.<\/p>\n
00:25:33.000 --> 00:25:46.000
\nThey filled the those fields exactly for inches deep, and then, when they when they seed those films, it's done by crop dusters after the crop.<\/p>\n
00:25:46.000 --> 00:25:56.000
\nAfter that happens they run drones over the field to look for any spots where where the scene wasn't big enough.<\/p>\n
00:25:56.000 --> 00:26:01.000
\nI think that's pretty impressive, that and that's technology, right?<\/p>\n
00:26:01.000 --> 00:26:08.000
\nAnd then when that's and then when they do their harvest, they had those huge silos net and everything there is.<\/p>\n
00:26:08.000 --> 00:26:16.000
\nIs climate controlled, and they have a little robots that run through their checking to make sure are their mice in there?<\/p>\n
00:26:16.000 --> 00:26:17.000
\nYou know. Is there any germination happening things along those lines?<\/p>\n
00:26:17.000 --> 00:26:23.000
\nSo it's a fascinating business.<\/p>\n
00:26:23.000 --> 00:26:29.000
\nSo this technology need to be in the in the ag areas, absolutely.<\/p>\n
00:26:29.000 --> 00:26:35.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:26:35.000 --> 00:26:41.000
\nGo and go to the next one.<\/p>\n
00:26:41.000 --> 00:26:45.000
\nSo this is just an example of what a Tsd should be able to do for you.<\/p>\n
00:26:45.000 --> 00:27:02.000
\nObviously on the unified communication side. You got some big names there, but there's like there's there's 50 60 different companies that you could end up working with same on the the Ccast space which is kind of the bigger piece right now.<\/p>\n
00:27:02.000 --> 00:27:08.000
\nMobility, as I told you, is the place I think you can help most of those Mid-market customers.<\/p>\n
00:27:08.000 --> 00:27:12.000
\nThe best.<\/p>\n
00:27:12.000 --> 00:27:15.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:27:15.000 --> 00:27:16.000
\nSame thing right? Typical here. That's that was fine.<\/p>\n
00:27:16.000 --> 00:27:21.000
\nOh, sorry!<\/p>\n
00:27:21.000 --> 00:27:29.000
\nBut that. But this is again. These are the big players but there's a lot of different companies.<\/p>\n
00:27:29.000 --> 00:27:31.000
\nThere's aggregators out there that I like to use them for bandwidth.<\/p>\n
00:27:31.000 --> 00:27:35.000
\nWorse so than these players right here, because they have better. Sla's for the customer data center is a big one. Also.<\/p>\n
00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:45.000
\nSo on on the data center side it's not just selling racks.<\/p>\n
00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:51.000
\nSpace and power. We actually have a a group that will actually do design and do the build out of data centers.<\/p>\n
00:27:51.000 --> 00:28:00.000
\nFor us when the customer needs it also.<\/p>\n
00:28:00.000 --> 00:28:04.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:28:04.000 --> 00:28:14.000
\nSo here's a interesting one on the IoT side that we kind of ran into in a indirect way led replacement lights.<\/p>\n
00:28:14.000 --> 00:28:21.000
\nSo it start just as as a project we got into on one to to with one customer.<\/p>\n
00:28:21.000 --> 00:28:31.000
\nIt was a our dealership of a group of cart dealerships to help them save money with their energy, and we were bringing an IoT company.<\/p>\n
00:28:31.000 --> 00:28:43.000
\nBut we didn't realize there were led replacement companies where you can actually sell the lighting and take a piece of the savings on that.<\/p>\n
00:28:43.000 --> 00:28:44.000
\nAnd it turns out there's more money in that than there is a it the IoT side by far.<\/p>\n
00:28:44.000 --> 00:28:56.000
\nCouple. I asked for a couple examples of a couple of deals close recently.<\/p>\n
00:28:56.000 --> 00:29:08.000
\nOne time, commissions, 75,001.3,000,005.4,035,000.<\/p>\n
00:29:08.000 --> 00:29:12.000
\nSo, and who are the customers and customers are like?<\/p>\n
00:29:12.000 --> 00:29:13.000
\nIs it our dealerships, office buildings, hospitals, organizations like that?<\/p>\n
00:29:13.000 --> 00:29:34.000
\nThe savings is massive, and I thought that that would be a completely saturated market at this point turns out it's only a third. It been penetrated. So there's there's a lot of money there.<\/p>\n
00:29:34.000 --> 00:29:39.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:29:39.000 --> 00:29:50.000
\nSo so on the marketing side of this, if you've got an idea, and obviously the a victor has to be able to make money with this.<\/p>\n
00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:57.000
\nIf it's one of our vendors, let's put together an idea, and we'll run through them and get MDF.<\/p>\n
00:29:57.000 --> 00:30:01.000
\nFunds, cause if you wanna close once again, you gotta market alright.<\/p>\n
00:30:01.000 --> 00:30:06.000
\nIf you wanna grow, you gotta market.<\/p>\n
00:30:06.000 --> 00:30:12.000
\nAnd that's that. So next slide.<\/p>\n
00:30:12.000 --> 00:30:16.000
\nSo here's how, not just us most people pay off.<\/p>\n
00:30:16.000 --> 00:30:21.000
\nThis is just an example from us right here. So the average.<\/p>\n
00:30:21.000 --> 00:30:26.000
\nHey? Out is about seventy- percent of what gross revenue is that?<\/p>\n
00:30:26.000 --> 00:30:36.000
\nCome, that walks in the door. So if the so, if the if the Tsd is making, you know, gross fillings.<\/p>\n
00:30:36.000 --> 00:30:39.000
\nSo you know a thousand dollars they're making.<\/p>\n
00:30:39.000 --> 00:30:46.000
\nThey're making, say, 20% of that $200 you're making 140 of that.<\/p>\n
00:30:46.000 --> 00:30:47.000
\nAnd and so that's kind of the normal.<\/p>\n
00:30:47.000 --> 00:30:51.000
\nWhat we do, though, once you get past 10,000 billing, I don't mean 10,000 commissions, 10,000 in actual Mrc.<\/p>\n
00:30:51.000 --> 00:31:03.000
\nWhich isn't very much. We pay out 85% of gross filling.<\/p>\n
00:31:03.000 --> 00:31:09.000
\nAnd that's retroactive. Back to dollar one next slide.<\/p>\n
00:31:09.000 --> 00:31:23.000
\nAnd then one thing we have changed in the marketplace, which I'm pretty excited about is what we call the 100% Club, that if someone's billing over 35,000 a month in gross billing, we actually had a hundred percent of the revenue and we turn it more into a<\/p>\n
00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:30.000
\nsubscription model. That point, then, did a commission product which I which I'm very excited about.<\/p>\n
00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:38.000
\nSo that way the partners don't. All the heavy lifting it's their customer is to keep a hundred percent of the revenue.<\/p>\n
00:31:38.000 --> 00:31:42.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:31:42.000 --> 00:31:44.000
\nThese are just examples of, you know, there's hundreds of vendors.<\/p>\n
00:31:44.000 --> 00:31:45.000
\nBut these are just examples of what we're getting paid.<\/p>\n
00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:58.000
\nAnd so you can imagine that of the 25% of the customers, Bill, on you cast your getting 70 to 85% of that, we're more.<\/p>\n
00:31:58.000 --> 00:32:09.000
\nAnd that goes across all products, including software integration. Software integration is a little different that pays 10% of gross I'll give you an example of software integration.<\/p>\n
00:32:09.000 --> 00:32:16.000
\nMy company that that I just sold one of our specialties was doing dynamics, integration.<\/p>\n
00:32:16.000 --> 00:32:18.000
\nNot a lot of Microsoft partners do dynamics.<\/p>\n
00:32:18.000 --> 00:32:26.000
\nIntegration matter of fact, I believe it's only one to one to 3% of the of all the partners.<\/p>\n
00:32:26.000 --> 00:32:29.000
\nAnd and so because most customers, when they use dynamics, they don't use the whole thing right.<\/p>\n
00:32:29.000 --> 00:32:39.000
\nThey just use pieces of it somehow. Just the Crm. They need the rest of their ecosystem that we bolted together to. It.<\/p>\n
00:32:39.000 --> 00:32:40.000
\nThat's what we do. So we do that integration.<\/p>\n
00:32:40.000 --> 00:32:46.000
\nWe pay 10% of the gross.<\/p>\n
00:32:46.000 --> 00:32:50.000
\nNext!<\/p>\n
00:32:50.000 --> 00:32:54.000
\nNext. This is.<\/p>\n
00:32:54.000 --> 00:32:57.000
\nAnd that's me.<\/p>\n
00:32:57.000 --> 00:32:58.000
\nHow do they do, Carl? I that's pretty short.<\/p>\n
00:32:58.000 --> 00:33:04.000
\nNo, it's very good, but you know one of the things is that I think I would love to have people put into the comments.<\/p>\n
00:33:04.000 --> 00:33:12.000
\nWhy have you not gotten into Telco? And some people have, you know, on a Thursday morning calls.<\/p>\n
00:33:12.000 --> 00:33:13.000
\nLots of times it gets into the conversation of Telco and what's going on?<\/p>\n
00:33:13.000 --> 00:33:31.000
\nAnd so forth. And so, you know, at some point folks need to figure out whether or not this is something that they can use to add value to their company, because, you know, there's so many opportunities.<\/p>\n
00:33:31.000 --> 00:33:36.000
\nAnd and I've said before, there's only a handful of things I would change if I could roll back the clock of time and start my business over.<\/p>\n
00:33:36.000 --> 00:33:45.000
\nI made a decision early on to not so Internet and telephones.<\/p>\n
00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:52.000
\nAnd later we dabbled a little bit and we did a few things, but I would totally redo that decision, and I would.<\/p>\n
00:33:52.000 --> 00:33:58.000
\nI would own the Internet connectivity of every client I've ever had.<\/p>\n
00:33:58.000 --> 00:34:03.000
\nSo do do you know, Trisha, work? She was one of the architects of a plus certification I don't know, so she's a consultant now.<\/p>\n
00:34:03.000 --> 00:34:06.000
\nI do not.<\/p>\n
00:34:06.000 --> 00:34:20.000
\nShe's a friend of mine, and one of the things she taught me 15 years ago was for 2, she said, are you asking your Msp.<\/p>\n
00:34:20.000 --> 00:34:25.000
\nPartners, what their blended margins are, I said, no cause.<\/p>\n
00:34:25.000 --> 00:34:30.000
\nI never really thought about what this would do to a margin cause.<\/p>\n
00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:33.000
\nI mean, think about this we're the ones going.<\/p>\n
00:34:33.000 --> 00:34:34.000
\nThe discovery, design, the implementation stuff. We're not adding our partners to do that.<\/p>\n
00:34:34.000 --> 00:34:43.000
\nSo you're not paying those salaries. What is your roi on their product?<\/p>\n
00:34:43.000 --> 00:34:50.000
\nProduct. Right? And remember, we've got customers. I mean, I'm a 20 year old company, or it was a 20 year old company.<\/p>\n
00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:57.000
\nI've got customers been with us almost 20 years, because it's really, you know you call, you know, those contracts or 3 year contracts.<\/p>\n
00:34:57.000 --> 00:35:02.000
\nI know that you know you hate 3 year contracts, I know to say it once.<\/p>\n
00:35:02.000 --> 00:35:06.000
\nYou all do that, do, though. But you guys hate those 3 insurance.<\/p>\n
00:35:06.000 --> 00:35:16.000
\nThat's been natural for us for long as time goes on, and but when those contracts come up it we 3 years you know, over 2 and a half years, call the customer.<\/p>\n
00:35:16.000 --> 00:35:23.000
\nWe signed them, add to it, if they, you know things have changed, add to it you know, over the course of time, you know.<\/p>\n
00:35:23.000 --> 00:35:24.000
\nYou know, prices and Internet obviously drop.<\/p>\n
00:35:24.000 --> 00:35:30.000
\nHey! Susan? In 3 years you might be increasing their speed and decreasing their bill.<\/p>\n
00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:31.000
\n80%, 80% of the time. By the way, that's the case, it.<\/p>\n
00:35:31.000 --> 00:35:42.000
\nYeah. But so the few times when we when when we first started doing Telco, I signed a few deals and I you know I always talk about my client, Debbie.<\/p>\n
00:35:42.000 --> 00:35:49.000
\nI know Debbie still pays, her bill because I get a check every month.<\/p>\n
00:35:49.000 --> 00:35:50.000
\nHmm! Well!<\/p>\n
00:35:50.000 --> 00:35:51.000
\nYou know, and sometimes you have a line or takes off a line, or whatever.<\/p>\n
00:35:51.000 --> 00:35:55.000
\nBut I know her business is still going. I haven't talked to her in years.<\/p>\n
00:35:55.000 --> 00:36:01.000
\nYeah, if you know the whole term. Mailbox money is kind of cliche, but honey is right. We're we're not multi-level marketing company, or anything like that.<\/p>\n
00:36:01.000 --> 00:36:08.000
\nBut it but it but it's a check that keeps coming every month as long as you're calling your customer.<\/p>\n
00:36:08.000 --> 00:36:21.000
\nAnd, by the way, when we do lose a customer that bills over 2,000 a month, I do post mortem on it, and ninety- percent of the time this neglect, no one's no one's calling the customer.<\/p>\n
00:36:21.000 --> 00:36:23.000
\nThey didn't. They weren't telling the customers.<\/p>\n
00:36:23.000 --> 00:36:27.000
\nCause not every Msp. Is equal. By the way, not everyone is calling to customer on every product all the time.<\/p>\n
00:36:27.000 --> 00:36:28.000
\nRight.<\/p>\n
00:36:28.000 --> 00:36:29.000
\nSame engage. So that's why Ms win business from others.<\/p>\n
00:36:29.000 --> 00:36:32.000
\nRight and and.<\/p>\n
00:36:32.000 --> 00:36:33.000
\nSo some of this, you know. I always look at the acronyms.<\/p>\n
00:36:33.000 --> 00:36:43.000
\nA lot of us can't spell sd WAN, and you know unified communications.<\/p>\n
00:36:43.000 --> 00:36:54.000
\nI understand those words, but I don't necessarily know like, what are my opportunities for that.<\/p>\n
00:36:54.000 --> 00:36:55.000
\nThat's right.<\/p>\n
00:36:55.000 --> 00:36:57.000
\nSo I think part of this is the education of look at the kinds of things that I could be doing, and does it fundamentally change the nature of my it?<\/p>\n
00:36:57.000 --> 00:37:03.000
\nBusiness because I got into this because I like computers. And I I want to put stuff in the cloud.<\/p>\n
00:37:03.000 --> 00:37:06.000
\nYeah, it's good question. And we and we do this trainings right?<\/p>\n
00:37:06.000 --> 00:37:14.000
\nBecause, you know, we're not trying to make so so far in the weeds that you're putting your engine up near.<\/p>\n
00:37:14.000 --> 00:37:15.000
\nYou know that you're paying great sums of money to on the phone for long periods of time.<\/p>\n
00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:18.000
\nBut we're trying to give you the information.<\/p>\n
00:37:18.000 --> 00:37:23.000
\nSo you actually understand how to position that for the customer it is value, I mean, do they?<\/p>\n
00:37:23.000 --> 00:37:27.000
\nDo they just need a manage router? Do they need right?<\/p>\n
00:37:27.000 --> 00:37:35.000
\nDo they need a simple VoIP solution because they're so small.<\/p>\n
00:37:35.000 --> 00:37:43.000
\nOr do they need? You know, unified communications, or even a call center type of an application inside of unified communications?<\/p>\n
00:37:43.000 --> 00:37:52.000
\nI mean, there's so many different ways we can go with this, but it starts with that discovery that we will do so yeah, that's what I'm saying.<\/p>\n
00:37:52.000 --> 00:38:00.000
\nSo you can win, and you can help create a more sticky customer with these products that are benign to you.<\/p>\n
00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:03.000
\nBut you have money coming in now. The question is, what are you doing with that money?<\/p>\n
00:38:03.000 --> 00:38:08.000
\nIs this just you're putting this in your pocket, and it's awesome that you're just living on it.<\/p>\n
00:38:08.000 --> 00:38:09.000
\nThere's we have partners using it for different in different ways.<\/p>\n
00:38:09.000 --> 00:38:14.000
\nThey're using it for golden handcuffs for key people in their organization.<\/p>\n
00:38:14.000 --> 00:38:18.000
\nThey're given some of that revenue to these key people.<\/p>\n
00:38:18.000 --> 00:38:24.000
\nSo if they stay to keep getting that revenue and revenue keeps going up, they, you know, they're they're making more money.<\/p>\n
00:38:24.000 --> 00:38:30.000
\nThat's probably one of the key ways that people do. This.<\/p>\n
00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:31.000
\nSome people and you and I talked about this. They do it out.<\/p>\n
00:38:31.000 --> 00:38:36.000
\nSuch? Why I ask that question by the way, of Rayan, earlier?<\/p>\n
00:38:36.000 --> 00:38:42.000
\nSome do run this outside of their corporation, so that when they sell their Ms.<\/p>\n
00:38:42.000 --> 00:38:43.000
\nYeah.<\/p>\n
00:38:43.000 --> 00:38:46.000
\nFee. They just keep that revenue stream and that road and that revenue shift could late for go for a decade.<\/p>\n
00:38:46.000 --> 00:38:49.000
\nYeah, I do like the revenue stream where I do 0 work and the money just gets deposited on a regular basis.<\/p>\n
00:38:49.000 --> 00:38:56.000
\nI'm okay with that. Yeah.<\/p>\n
00:38:56.000 --> 00:39:00.000
\nYeah, and that's kind of what happens as long as someone's calling that customer.<\/p>\n
00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:02.000
\nAnd you know that's what we do.<\/p>\n
00:39:02.000 --> 00:39:03.000
\nYou know we help. With that we let you know. Hey? 3 year contract?<\/p>\n
00:39:03.000 --> 00:39:10.000
\nThere's 2 and a half years left. Are you up to and half to 6 months left?<\/p>\n
00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:14.000
\nWe better start calling that customer if they need us to call the customer, we'll call the customer if there's a way to help upsell the customer.<\/p>\n
00:39:14.000 --> 00:39:17.000
\nIf there's a way to help up, sell them and do other products will help with that.<\/p>\n
00:39:17.000 --> 00:39:27.000
\nSo you know, it's impractical for us to have, and you know, talking about contracts and the the mergers and acquisition panel, and you all at the same time.<\/p>\n
00:39:27.000 --> 00:39:40.000
\nBut you know you brought up several things. I mean, one is the friendliness of the contract goes along ways, and you're not in a no win situation where it's either sign or leave, you know.<\/p>\n
00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:50.000
\nBut it is hard sometimes to get a contract that looks friendly without just saying, look, I'm just gonna go to another company, you know.<\/p>\n
00:39:50.000 --> 00:39:54.000
\nLook what, and I'll give you a great example of that.<\/p>\n
00:39:54.000 --> 00:40:04.000
\nSo my remember the scenarios that came in after, you know 96 in the end, they and we're going to do a better job in the end. We're going to do better job than the bells right because the bells were terrible.<\/p>\n
00:40:04.000 --> 00:40:07.000
\nAlright!<\/p>\n
00:40:07.000 --> 00:40:09.000
\nYou know, a customer service, and you know this is the cle right?<\/p>\n
00:40:09.000 --> 00:40:12.000
\nYeah. Yeah. The office works back together.<\/p>\n
00:40:12.000 --> 00:40:19.000
\nSo there was a Yeah, there are a few but that believe it are the few that survived.<\/p>\n
00:40:19.000 --> 00:40:21.000
\nBecame Msps. What am I supposed to do with that right?<\/p>\n
00:40:21.000 --> 00:40:28.000
\nOne in particular. I've got 700 customers web.<\/p>\n
00:40:28.000 --> 00:40:30.000
\nThey're basically they're selling. You cast.<\/p>\n
00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:38.000
\nThey're still unified communications. But everything else if you look at their product, mix, they're in Msp.<\/p>\n
00:40:38.000 --> 00:40:40.000
\nMatter of fact, their data's biggest. Msp, bye, bye.<\/p>\n
00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:47.000
\nRight, so Vince says I wanted to sell mobility and Internet to my best customers.<\/p>\n
00:40:47.000 --> 00:40:50.000
\nThat is the customers we have the tightest relationship with.<\/p>\n
00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:53.000
\nWhere do I start? Specifically, how do I sell the service?<\/p>\n
00:40:53.000 --> 00:41:01.000
\nWhere am I purchasing those services, or am I just bringing that opportunity to a master agent?<\/p>\n
00:41:01.000 --> 00:41:04.000
\nYeah, the you gotta look for the pain right?<\/p>\n
00:41:04.000 --> 00:41:05.000
\nWhere's the pain and mobility?<\/p>\n
00:41:05.000 --> 00:41:12.000
\nPain is usually in the management of the bill and the services where's the phones?<\/p>\n
00:41:12.000 --> 00:41:24.000
\nWho's got what it? Because I don't know if you've looked at a corporate level built for a mobile, you know, Verizon team mobile work.<\/p>\n
00:41:24.000 --> 00:41:25.000
\nIt is a nightmare, but you can't really figure out what's going on.<\/p>\n
00:41:25.000 --> 00:41:26.000
\nYeah.<\/p>\n
00:41:26.000 --> 00:41:39.000
\nSo some a company has got a really good platform, and I can think of a couple that have amazing platforms to take that will aggregate that manage and aggregate all of that business.<\/p>\n
00:41:39.000 --> 00:41:43.000
\nFor instance, let's see, you have a customer's cost country. They're not just.<\/p>\n
00:41:43.000 --> 00:41:46.000
\nThey have verizon phones. They get t mobile.<\/p>\n
00:41:46.000 --> 00:41:50.000
\nThey've got. They've got a sprint or not. Sprint.<\/p>\n
00:41:50.000 --> 00:41:54.000
\nYeah, that is, that's key mobile down, really. For Icqt, well, those are kind of the only guys out there right now, right?<\/p>\n
00:41:54.000 --> 00:41:58.000
\nSo they they have a little bit of that all the way across the country that is hard to manage.<\/p>\n
00:41:58.000 --> 00:42:19.000
\nCan imagine, if you could find a vendor that I can aggregate that entire thing under one bill and actually get like a minute bundles or bandwidth bundles that' costs all 3 of those makes it very easy to manage so on the<\/p>\n
00:42:19.000 --> 00:42:23.000
\nmobile site, look for the pain, and you can get. You know I have got Vince.<\/p>\n
00:42:23.000 --> 00:42:32.000
\nI can help you. Set up Demos so you can just look at what the platforms do before you get you get into it.<\/p>\n
00:42:32.000 --> 00:42:36.000
\nYeah. When tell me if this is still the case today?<\/p>\n
00:42:36.000 --> 00:42:37.000
\nBut when I was selling the telephones I would just call people and say, Send me your last 3 months phone bills.<\/p>\n
00:42:37.000 --> 00:42:42.000
\nBut sometimes it's selling the not the bacon is the same goes.<\/p>\n
00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:53.000
\nAnd I literally could guarantee that I would save the money, because there was always at least one phone line that they were paying for, that they weren't using.<\/p>\n
00:42:53.000 --> 00:42:54.000
\nYeah, that's not so much like that anymore. Yeah, that's that does. But there's a lot of efficiencies right?<\/p>\n
00:42:54.000 --> 00:43:03.000
\nThat you know, lot of people are paying for things they're not using right.<\/p>\n
00:43:03.000 --> 00:43:06.000
\nAnd sometimes they're paying for a lot of seats.<\/p>\n
00:43:06.000 --> 00:43:21.000
\nBut we ran into one not too long ago, they had a had a massive one, and they were still paying for like a hundred seats that they weren't even using because of a mass layoff I know that's such a simplistic one but that's kind of where you see the scenes but<\/p>\n
00:43:21.000 --> 00:43:22.000
\nlike, there's some companies for the neighborhood.<\/p>\n
00:43:22.000 --> 00:43:23.000
\nThey want a ringcentral. They want an 8 by 8.<\/p>\n
00:43:23.000 --> 00:43:27.000
\nYou want that? You know the big guys, some guys don't care.<\/p>\n
00:43:27.000 --> 00:43:33.000
\nAnd usually the customers don't care. Usually, you know, I would tell an Msp.<\/p>\n
00:43:33.000 --> 00:43:38.000
\nThey really should be looking at bringing on that solution themselves, and manage themselves because it helps create a sticky customer.<\/p>\n
00:43:38.000 --> 00:43:43.000
\nAnd on top of that everybody's point. You get on the last panel.<\/p>\n
00:43:43.000 --> 00:43:44.000
\nIt helps to create value, for when you go to sell your company.<\/p>\n
00:43:44.000 --> 00:43:48.000
\nShould should I? White label it? Should I tell people that's mine?<\/p>\n
00:43:48.000 --> 00:43:54.000
\nYeah, 50 50% of our partners. White label, and for their smaller customers.<\/p>\n
00:43:54.000 --> 00:43:57.000
\nBut for the bigger customers they won't touch anyone.<\/p>\n
00:43:57.000 --> 00:43:58.000
\nThey want that professionally manage.<\/p>\n
00:43:58.000 --> 00:44:05.000
\nRight? Yeah, I mean, cause. Clearly, people know I don't run a phone company and.<\/p>\n
00:44:05.000 --> 00:44:10.000
\nYeah, yeah. But if you get a smaller company, you know, it's unified communications.<\/p>\n
00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:14.000
\nCommunication. Right? It's gonna work with it, with with the right platform.<\/p>\n
00:44:14.000 --> 00:44:17.000
\nAnd honestly, you know, I think in the end of the day Microsoft wins this battle anyways.<\/p>\n
00:44:17.000 --> 00:44:25.000
\nWell, that might be. They seem to win all the battles they get into eventually.<\/p>\n
00:44:25.000 --> 00:44:28.000
\nWell, this one, they're going. I think they're going to.<\/p>\n
00:44:28.000 --> 00:44:29.000
\nThey're gonna win. Unfortunately for the world.<\/p>\n
00:44:29.000 --> 00:44:35.000
\nSo so to what degree are we already there? Because we sell and install teams?<\/p>\n
00:44:35.000 --> 00:44:46.000
\nAnd, you know, manage all the phone systems through. You know all of the emerging Microsoft infrastructure already.<\/p>\n
00:44:46.000 --> 00:44:51.000
\nWell it are they making? It all comes down to outbound calls.<\/p>\n
00:44:51.000 --> 00:44:54.000
\nAre they making outbound calls, or are they not? If they're making outbound calls, it's a phone system.<\/p>\n
00:44:54.000 --> 00:45:08.000
\nIf if it's all you know inbound, you know you can manage that via teams, but if you make an outbound, go to the you know the public telephone network that's 's the partners.<\/p>\n
00:45:08.000 --> 00:45:10.000
\nOnce the Microsoft partners all start selling that inside of teams. That's where they win.<\/p>\n
00:45:10.000 --> 00:45:11.000
\nAlright, so, for folks like Vince. Where do you get started?<\/p>\n
00:45:11.000 --> 00:45:19.000
\nLike. If you say I wanna learn about this. But you know I'm busy.<\/p>\n
00:45:19.000 --> 00:45:23.000
\nMy brain is full.<\/p>\n
00:45:23.000 --> 00:45:30.000
\nYou. You gotta call me guess sort some place I mean, you know, you know what's the old thing right?<\/p>\n
00:45:30.000 --> 00:45:32.000
\nThis is a football he used to start a receiving with it, but the thing is, it's just finding a small, you know.<\/p>\n
00:45:32.000 --> 00:45:41.000
\nStack of products, that that you don't want to touch.<\/p>\n
00:45:41.000 --> 00:45:47.000
\nYou want someone else to manage the day to day on that, and you want them to do the implementation and call the customer.<\/p>\n
00:45:47.000 --> 00:45:52.000
\nMake sure it's installed. Do all the project management stuff, so you don't have to hire that.<\/p>\n
00:45:52.000 --> 00:46:03.000
\nIt's not our customer. It's your customer so we're not out there calling in customers, and in order to bring them on, those are your customers we're not going to heavy lifting.<\/p>\n
00:46:03.000 --> 00:46:04.000
\nWe're just going that piece that you're not, that's all.<\/p>\n
00:46:04.000 --> 00:46:10.000
\nRight. So you're never gonna steal my customer.<\/p>\n
00:46:10.000 --> 00:46:14.000
\nEither that or in contractually. By the way, that's what I'm saying, whether it's me or somebody else.<\/p>\n
00:46:14.000 --> 00:46:22.000
\nMake sure it's not in their contract where they can turn around and sell, you know.<\/p>\n
00:46:22.000 --> 00:46:27.000
\nSend direct mail to your customers. So market directly to your customers.<\/p>\n
00:46:27.000 --> 00:46:28.000
\nIf it is run, or someone you want to work with, tell me to change it right.<\/p>\n
00:46:28.000 --> 00:46:37.000
\nBut make sure that's in the contract, and I have to tell you we've signed a lot of partners, you know.<\/p>\n
00:46:37.000 --> 00:46:40.000
\nVery few try to come to me and negotiate a contract.<\/p>\n
00:46:40.000 --> 00:46:54.000
\nThey just sign I go. You have any questions. None. Now, so then I don't get it right, because eventually, because look, I just sold my account right to somebody, and if that clause wasn't there, these guys were, you know, turned out they had that their contract already.<\/p>\n
00:46:54.000 --> 00:47:01.000
\nToo, which is one of the reasons why I like them, and that was in my contract.<\/p>\n
00:47:01.000 --> 00:47:02.000
\nBut I'm not. Don't think that's in most.<\/p>\n
00:47:02.000 --> 00:47:09.000
\nRight? Well that gets to the the merger has to be from people who have a like mindset.<\/p>\n
00:47:09.000 --> 00:47:14.000
\nWell, for me was really important. It was really important that they weren't private equity, you know.<\/p>\n
00:47:14.000 --> 00:47:23.000
\nYou know. Pdm. Who is the main company 24 years old, specialized enterprise companies we'll have 22 year old companies.<\/p>\n
00:47:23.000 --> 00:47:24.000
\nI thought I was 20 years, I thought well, I've been around a long time.<\/p>\n
00:47:24.000 --> 00:47:25.000
\nWell, turns out I'm the baby.<\/p>\n
00:47:25.000 --> 00:47:40.000
\nRight. So all he says from Germany that he seconds your emotion, that we're selling ISP Internet lines to our customers for more than 10 years now.<\/p>\n
00:47:40.000 --> 00:47:41.000
\nGood.<\/p>\n
00:47:41.000 --> 00:47:48.000
\nBut most, Smb. Managed service provid colleagues seemed to not really find ways to do this, and he says, my major argument is that at the end of the all of this you, as an Msp.<\/p>\n
00:47:48.000 --> 00:47:52.000
\nHave to manage that line anyway. So why not profit from the line?<\/p>\n
00:47:52.000 --> 00:48:03.000
\nAnd and they usually have 20% on lines. They just sold one of for $70 a month, and just to billing it to the customer.<\/p>\n
00:48:03.000 --> 00:48:04.000
\nIt's.<\/p>\n
00:48:04.000 --> 00:48:12.000
\nYeah, so in your punch or channel, a lot different than we do in America, like, you know, we pay on a monthly basis.<\/p>\n
00:48:12.000 --> 00:48:17.000
\nSo when I say 2025% of the customers build, that's not a one time payment.<\/p>\n
00:48:17.000 --> 00:48:21.000
\nThat's every single month where Europe tends to do things a little bit different.<\/p>\n
00:48:21.000 --> 00:48:25.000
\nSo ours for the life of the customer customer pays bill.<\/p>\n
00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:26.000
\nYou get paid. That's how that works.<\/p>\n
00:48:26.000 --> 00:48:32.000
\nEurope has a different model. So there's a lot we're finding now that a lot of partners in Europe want to sign up with us to do business in Europe.<\/p>\n
00:48:32.000 --> 00:48:40.000
\nWell, he said, he's getting $70 a month for that lines.<\/p>\n
00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:41.000
\nOkay, that's awesome. That's awesome.<\/p>\n
00:48:41.000 --> 00:48:45.000
\nYeah, so are there still, like layers that used to be that if you just sold it and walked away, you got a very small commissions, and if you are the first phone call you got a big commission right?<\/p>\n
00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:55.000
\nSo it depends on how we want to be.<\/p>\n
00:48:55.000 --> 00:49:00.000
\nYeah, look, if somebody wants it. Just referred, doesn't want to be a partner and sign a contract.<\/p>\n
00:49:00.000 --> 00:49:05.000
\nYeah, we'll do referral business and we'll figure out a way to pay you.<\/p>\n
00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:07.000
\nBut I like relationships right? I've done this for a long time.<\/p>\n
00:49:07.000 --> 00:49:11.000
\nI like the people like we've become. We've been friends for years now.<\/p>\n
00:49:11.000 --> 00:49:18.000
\nI like my partners who I chose to sell my company was really really important, because people have been with me for 20 years.<\/p>\n
00:49:18.000 --> 00:49:24.000
\nSome of them have been with 20 years. I couldn't even imagine risking their revenue, you know, with a private equity firm.<\/p>\n
00:49:24.000 --> 00:49:27.000
\nRight.<\/p>\n
00:49:27.000 --> 00:49:30.000
\nYeah, matter of fact, I didn't take that upfront check.<\/p>\n
00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:31.000
\nI did not get paid a a dime upfront due to for this merger, so there was.<\/p>\n
00:49:31.000 --> 00:49:42.000
\nNo, there's no out. I don't have a clock of my contract that I have to stay a certain amount of time.<\/p>\n
00:49:42.000 --> 00:49:47.000
\nI told my sick around for at least 18 months, but if I'm having fun I'm going to stick around forever. Yeah.<\/p>\n
00:49:47.000 --> 00:49:48.000
\nSo and right now.<\/p>\n
00:49:48.000 --> 00:49:51.000
\nAnother speaker doesn't own yacht.<\/p>\n
00:49:51.000 --> 00:49:53.000
\nYeah, I know. I I don't even go to boat.<\/p>\n
00:49:53.000 --> 00:49:55.000
\nI have a little farm, I mean, but I see I know about.<\/p>\n
00:49:55.000 --> 00:49:59.000
\nYou got the IoT farm?<\/p>\n
00:49:59.000 --> 00:50:08.000
\nYeah, IoT. I got a IoT in one of those places that I still don't see a lot of Msps touching. And they should. It's a big space, and you get into bigger customers that way.<\/p>\n
00:50:08.000 --> 00:50:13.000
\nWell, then, you sell devices by the thousands instead of the dozens.<\/p>\n
00:50:13.000 --> 00:50:22.000
\nYeah. So I guess my biggest thing. If you wanna go market to the to mid market, the Enterprise level customers give me a call.<\/p>\n
00:50:22.000 --> 00:50:26.000
\nWe specialize in that? That's one of the things that the folks that I just merge with.<\/p>\n
00:50:26.000 --> 00:50:33.000
\nThat's what they do that's what they've done forever. They've got name brands with 4 or 500 location coming.<\/p>\n
00:50:33.000 --> 00:50:36.000
\nIf you want to go baby down after that size customer.<\/p>\n
00:50:36.000 --> 00:50:39.000
\nBut you want to go. How do I go after a hundred $1,000 month customer?<\/p>\n
00:50:39.000 --> 00:50:42.000
\nWe train people on how to do that.<\/p>\n
00:50:42.000 --> 00:50:44.000
\nWe've taken folks from that scares me to death to know just you know.<\/p>\n
00:50:44.000 --> 00:50:49.000
\nGet on. Get on the phone talking because everybody knows somebody right, and they don't even talk to them.<\/p>\n
00:50:49.000 --> 00:50:58.000
\nYou know somebody knows a advanced manager at in a good size bank, not a bank of America, but a good size regional bank.<\/p>\n
00:50:58.000 --> 00:51:06.000
\nThey don't talk to them, because they know that they've got 3, you know, 3 technicians, you know.<\/p>\n
00:51:06.000 --> 00:51:10.000
\nThere's no way they could service that customer.<\/p>\n
00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:14.000
\nLet us help you with that right? Maybe we can help you, and we can still pay a lot.<\/p>\n
00:51:14.000 --> 00:51:19.000
\nYou can still make a lot of money a month. You manage the piece that you you want to manage. You don't wanna manage.<\/p>\n
00:51:19.000 --> 00:51:28.000
\nVery good. Well, thank you for being here, and I'm happy to open this up to anybody who's got other questions or comments, and you want to throw your 2 cents in there.<\/p>\n
00:51:28.000 --> 00:51:34.000
\nWe're happy to have it, and Jeff is the small business technology community community leader of the year.<\/p>\n
00:51:34.000 --> 00:51:42.000
\nSo he's frequently on our Thursday call.<\/p>\n
00:51:42.000 --> 00:51:46.000
\nSo if you're in the community and you haven't been joining us every Thursday.<\/p>\n
00:51:46.000 --> 00:51:51.000
\nThis is a great time to start, not tomorrow. Cause we're having a conference.<\/p>\n
00:51:51.000 --> 00:51:54.000
\nBut next Thursday.<\/p>\n
00:51:54.000 --> 00:51:56.000
\nI have to say it is a highlight of my week.<\/p>\n
00:51:56.000 --> 00:52:01.000
\nI enjoy it. I learned so much. By the way, you know I like.<\/p>\n
00:52:01.000 --> 00:52:04.000
\nIt's a beginning. I'm not technical, but this is but I learned a lot just by listening.<\/p>\n
00:52:04.000 --> 00:52:07.000
\nYou know. You know from Vince, you know Vince is one of my favorite people in the world.<\/p>\n
00:52:07.000 --> 00:52:16.000
\nBecause I listen to you know how we grow this business and the different things he tried.<\/p>\n
00:52:16.000 --> 00:52:25.000
\nHe's always trying something new, and it's fascinating to me.<\/p>\n
00:52:25.000 --> 00:52:26.000
\nYeah, absolutely.<\/p>\n
00:52:26.000 --> 00:52:28.000
\nWell, and he's also got interesting projects, too, and he variety of stuff, besides just installing servers in the cloud.<\/p>\n
00:52:28.000 --> 00:52:34.000
\nYeah, yeah, no, absolutely. But even to how it is is day-to-day business. Right?<\/p>\n
00:52:34.000 --> 00:52:36.000
\nI mean it does. It's fascinating, and I applaud him because he tries new things.<\/p>\n
00:52:36.000 --> 00:52:43.000
\nRight, and Travis throws in here that he loves the Thursday morning calls as well.<\/p>\n
00:52:43.000 --> 00:52:44.000
\nYeah.<\/p>\n
00:52:44.000 --> 00:52:45.000
\nSo very good. Alright, I'm gonna put the I'm gonna stop the recording.<\/p>\n
00:52:45.000 --> 00:52:47.000
\nBut we're still gonna hang out here and just chat.<\/p>\n
00:52:47.000 --> 00:52:57.000
\nSo thank you very much. I appreciate it, and encourage folks to get in touch with you.<\/p>\n
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