CIOs ready to swap out their IT suppliers

Resellers have been warned to shift focus from product to client, with Gartner research showing 70 percent of CIOs will change their technology relationships in the next two or three years.

The research firm reported that as clients struggle to keep up with technological change, "they are strongly considering changing the providers they work with".

Gartner managing vice president Eric Rocco said: "Market share will shift to service providers able to help clients respond to the business and IT opportunities and challenges. Service providers need to convert this picture into an opportunity rather than a threat."

Bruce Rasmussen, principal at B2B sales consulting firm Carpe Diem, agreed that resellers must provide insight and advice – not just products – to stay competitive.

"It's not what you sell, but how you sell that's important now," Rasmussen told CRN. "With the commoditisation of everything, and products becoming easily replaceable, the ability to add value through insight is the difference."

"Resellers must educate customers on new issues and help them to avoid landmines."

Rasmussen said Carpe Diem's own research indicated 87 percent of resellers in ANZ still stuck to the old "relationship builder" sales model, while just 9 percent were classified as "challengers" – teaching customers new ways of doing things through "provocative insights".

"Most of the channel is unprepared," Rasmussen told CRN. "For those who are 'challengers', there is a gold mine out there."

Kiandra IT, a Melbourne-based MSP that has made multiple appearances in the CRN Fast50, agreed that resellers had to get beyond product.

"Customers want advice on business improvement," Kiandra IT's director of technology infrastructure, Chris Munro said. "As technology becomes redundant, they no longer want purely technical services. They want accountability and transparency."

"We also keep our employees' skills and certifications up to date," added Munro. "We also have a wide range of providers and remain vendor agnostic, so that the solution correctly supports the client."

Munro said the service-focus trend has also seeped into the distributor level. "Distributors are now adding services on top of their base-level delivery. The adding of service value through the channel has led to a better customer experience."