Skepticism abounds among IT and business decision makers about IP telephony. Yankee Group's Steve Hilton examines the root cause of the concern and offers suggestions for how channel partners can respond in this month's Ask Steve.
Each month, SMB expert Steve Hilton of Yankee Group answers real reader questions about small and midsize business.
In the industry we often joke about small and midsize businesses' inability to deal with technology issues, almost as much as my kids joke at my inability to reset the clock on our microwave oven. This month in Ask Steve, let's discuss ways for channel partners to overcome small companies' technology-related concerns for IP telephony deployment.
Clarence from Schaumberg, Ill., asks: I often find my customers lacking in skills to deal with IP. As an IP PBX dealer in the Chicago suburbs, what skills should I focus on to convince my customers to adopt an IP phone system?
Steve: Good question, Clarence. Smaller companies are notoriously weak on IT (and IP) skills. They focus on their businesses' top business challenges, like making happy customers who spend more. They tend to ignore or repress all that techie stuff that excites us.
IP telephony is still a scary thing for the majority of small and midsize businesses. Based on Yankee Group survey data, no more than 25% feel fully capable of supporting IP telephony.
Like Clarence, we wondered what particular skills gaps were causing these smaller business decision-makers to feel uncomfortable with IP telephony. If we could identify those skill sets, we could advise the channel on areas of concentration -- from both marketing and training/certification perspectives -- to help SMB decision-makers become less reticent about IP telephony.
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Planning and design of the IP telephony network and security-related issues are the top skills lacking in companies with 20 to 499 employees. Security almost always ranks as a top IT-related concern for smaller businesses, but it's rarely a blip on the radar for communications-related services. This focus around security for IP communications makes it very clear that smaller business decision makers view IP telephony as part of their IT, not communications, rubric. Channel partners need to highlight their security credentials/certifications and address these security-related issues up front. Don't minimize the potential decision-making paralysis created by security-related concerns. Planning and design should be one of the core skills possessed by phone system partners, otherwise decision makers wouldn't have turned to you in the first place. Focus on past implementations and sound networking implementation processes to overcome concerns about the planning and design phases of implementation.
Small and midsize businesses that haven't deployed IP telephony also believe they lack the skills for end-user training. After they deploy IP telephony, they seem less concerned about their lack of end-user training skills. Fear of the unknown is often more stress-inducing than the actual unknown. We believe end-user training is something channel partners and vendors must address early in the pre-sales process, but in actuality, use of the voice-related features of an IP phone system are very similar to a TDM phone system. The bigger end-user worries should be related to unified communications (UC) offerings over these new systems. Either way, channel partners should offer simple train-the-trainer programs to address these concerns for voice-related and UC solutions.
Top SMB Skills' Gaps | |
| IPT Deployers | IPT Planners |
| Planning & design | Planning & design |
| Security | Security |
| Network analysis | End user training |
Thanks for the great question, Clarence.
Do you have a question to ask Yankee Group analyst Steve Hilton?
Send your questions to asksteve@yankeegroup.com. Please include your name, city, state (province), and phone number. Only first names and locations will be published.
See more Ask Steve columns
Steve Hilton is VP of Enterprise and SMB research at Yankee Group. Hilton is recognized as a leading, global SMB expert.
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