Simms launches "Mac in Business" road show

Simms International has launched the Mac in Business initiative, an Australia-wide road show that highlights the growing number of opportunities that exist for Apple resellers to sell into the small business space.

Over the next 12 to 18 months, Dennis Shepard, business development manager for Mac in Business at Simms, will visit reseller after reseller with his briefcase full of knowledge in the hope of ‘getting them to differentiate, quit moving boxes and provide solutions to end users".

"And get them to realise the solutions are there," he said.

"For resellers, the initiative is about increasing the attach rate per machine and differentiating their business to add additional revenue streams. For end-users it is about the exciting message that small business owners can now "run business better on a Mac"," Shepard said.

During his visits, Shepard will present "carefully crafted" presentations that summarise and highlight each of the solutions that are available for resellers.  After seeing it, Apple has approved the program and supported it with a "bunch of collateral".

"There's this perception that the apps haven't been there - until the numbers are there - in so many machines. But that's not the case, the apps are there, you can use it against any solution on the Windows platform and it would probably outperform it," said Shepard.

"That's the perception that I'm focused on changing," he said.

Apple's focus is clearly in the consumer space, but last month it unveiled its "consultant network" a certified professionals program of which members provide services, from basic set-up and configuration for home users to advanced enterprise deployments, signalling an interest in the business space. 

"I think recently the foundation for growth was laid out by a few things. Apple installed Intel, and then they have virtualisation so they can run any operating system. Then the cloud is coming too with software-as-a-service (SaaS) and because of that the operating system has become less critical," Shepard said.

Furthermore, Shepard said, Apple's release of the Mac Mini Server with unlimited licences for OS X Server is one of those opportunities, as well as its range of extensible/interoperable applications.

"With that Simms is able to offer a strong business case to allow a small business to successfully manage and run their business on a Mac -- the development of what is really cost effective, scalable ERP," said Shepard.

Key vendors and applications that the road show supports include Apple, Money Works, Daylite, Billings, Filemaker and Microsoft Mac Office.

According to Shepard, the applications address key pain points for small business working on Mac:

• Accounting, inventory management, reporting (MoneyWorks)
• Share calendars, meetings, appointments, events (Mac OSX Server and Daylite)
• Keep track of your customers and communicate to them (Daylite)
• Generate, track and forecast new business opportunities (Daylite)
• Professional time billing, integrated back to accounting package (Billings and MoneyWorks)
• Capture and manage databases (Filemaker)
• Business productivity tools (Microsoft Mac Office)

Simms has a structured development and marketing plan that it intends to execute in the coming year around the "Mac in Business Initiative". This includes plans to run training events on how to identify opportunities and sell the solutions; marketing campaigns to the Apple small business database and developing local testimonials.

Simms will run reseller seminars/presentations in every state and the end goal is to have at least one event per quarter in each state. The end result is to develop a network of resellers capable of promoting, implementing and supporting the solution. 

Simms will also run end user seminars/presentations for reseller small business customers in conjunction with Resellers.

Simms has visited several premium platinum resellers already. Stay tuned next week, to hear their thoughts.