“In the cloud you are handing over your data and relying on them to care for it as much as you would care for your own data. I think it’s a big leap for SMBs because many have been burnt and they don’t want to be left with someone wrecking their data.”
Beesley gives as an example a close and trusted friend who had mentored him over 10 years who was also a customer. Beesley quoted him $270 a month to supply all Microsoft applications to his friend’s four employees, almost $4000 a year.
“I argued with him for over a month. At one point we asked him if he wanted his DNS hosted with us as well for $10, and he said here it is, the start of all these additional costs and it’s going to go up and up. I said, it’s not.”
Finally Beesley sent over one of his technicians who quoted a $25,000 server and network for five people, including terminal server, Small Business Server and a backup system. The friend bought it.
“He could have been on SLAM for six years and never paid another dollar for his entire IT infrastructure. For someone who I’ve known for 10 years it just blew my mind, and that day I said let’s just go back to selling equipment and the consulting that goes with it.
“We’ve got the cloud and if 80 percent of customers read that it’s a good thing, because they’ve read an article in the Sunday Tele, then we’re ready for them.”
Premier Network has developed expertise in VPNs and terminal services, which form the core of many solutions. Its speciality is getting multiple sites to run efficiently.
“That’s where we win the business nearly every time,”Beesley says. “We’ve spent so many years now doing these solutions where they have a head office and five branches around Australia and the branch offices can’t get their data in real time or the sales force can’t get their emails.”
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