Over the next few months, we’ll take an inside look at how the NSCA 2018 Excellence in Business award winners have adapted to our constantly changing industry. The story of Tech Electronics is next on the list. For its ability to stay ahead of the curve, Tech Electronics was named an NSCA 2018 Excellence in Business award winner in the Strategic Transformation category.
Like many integrators, Tech Electronics recognized the need for change in order to continue on its path to success. The difference between Tech Electronics and many other integrators? The company saw the industry moving toward cloud, hosted, and managed services technologies, and took proactive, immediate steps to revamp their business model.
Today, the 55-year-old company has nine locations across several states, and is a complete technology solutions provider and managed services organization.
Instead of convincing customers to acquire traditional solutions, Tech Electronics offers customers acquisition and technology options, such as capital purchase, lease, rental, or managed services, for cloud, hosted, or on-premise systems.
A few years ago, Laura Wasson, director of business development, began evaluating options for hosted solutions. After much research, Wasson and Kurt Canova, Tech Electronics president, decided to build their own solutions. Today, the company has two cloud technologies: telephone and access control. Being released this year are three more: firewall (FaaS), conference room (CaaS), and WiFi (WFaaS).
The company’s TechCloud voice and access control solutions allow clients to forgo upfront equipment purchases and instead bundle services, hardware, and maintenance into one monthly fee. The plan is for TechCloud to expand to mobility, video surveillance, and many other communication and life safety solutions in the future.
“At the end of the day, we don’t care if the customer chooses an on-premise system, hosted system, or cloud system,” says Wasson. “We want to be able to manage those systems for our customers and become their one point of contact for all of their technology needs. That’s where we’re heading.”
Connecting with Customers
Preparing for a complete, company-wide transformation isn’t an easy process – but it’s one Wasson says is worth it.
“We’re a 55-year-old cruise ship trying to turn into a nimble speed boat – within a year,” she explains. “It’s a painful process, but we have to get rid of old ways of servicing, selling, and working with customers. We need to be digital for buyers that want a digital experience while still maintaining paper for buyers that want paper and the face-to-face experiences mirroring the way we bought 20 years ago.”
A Shift in Staff Mindset
The company revamped nearly every corner of its business, making impactful changes like:
- Investing in new ERP, CRM, and marketing automation systems
- Shifting from a sales-led process to a marketing-led process where the marketing department is responsible for creating demand across all markets, products, and channels
- Hiring additional marketing staff members
- Restructuring sales to focus on team-based selling
- Revamping the sales commission structure
- Building a new headquarters with a “Google” feel
- Retooling the HR department
To make sure it properly handles managed services, Tech Electronics hires employees who understand not only technology, but also recurring monthly revenue.
“We’re doing things our company has never done before,” says Wasson. “In order to maintain relevancy, you have to change – and we’ve started doing that.”
Check back soon, as we continue to reveal how the 2018 NSCA Excellence in Business award winners made business changes to adapt to our constantly changing industry. You’ll also read stories from: