Is your tech vendor a strategic partner… or just a vendor?

Natalie Alesi at iManage explains how to detect whether a technology vendor really does deserve to be considered a strategic partner

 

Every technology vendor likes to position themselves as not just someone who sells you a product or service, but a strategic partner: someone who walks side by side with you on your journey, helping you reach new heights.

 

Talk is cheap, however. Just because someone says they’re a strategic partner doesn’t mean they actually are one.

 

If you’re a customer, how can you figure out where your vendor really stands? Homing in on a few key areas can let customers quickly determine who walks the walk when it comes to being a strategic partner – and who’s just looking to make a sale or collect a monthly fee.

 

Do they truly understand what you’re trying to achieve?

Long before a sale has taken place or a product has been deployed, one of the first things customers should examine is what kind of effort the vendor has put into truly understanding the customer’s business challenges and desired business outcomes.

 

What is the customer looking to achieve? What matters to them? What will drive value for them? If a vendor is spending time during the pre-sales phase focusing on all the bells and whistles that their solution offers rather than trying to understand the problems the customer is facing, that’s a red flag that they’re not a strategic partner.

 

Meanwhile, there are a variety of personas within the organisation – ranging from the project champion who might have initiated the search for a new solution, to the end users who will be using it on a daily basis, to the decision makers who cut the checks – all of whom have their own needs and priorities as relates to any new technological project.

 

Has the vendor taken the time to cultivate a deep, granular understanding across personas and figure out what success looks like for each of them? Beware the solutions provider who views “the customer” as a single, monolithic entity.

 

Are they willing to say “No” if there Isn’t a fit?

A strategic partner has a vested interest in making sure that the customers they engage with are a good match for their solution rather than indiscriminately taking on customers for customers sake, just to juice their revenue numbers.

 

Does the vendor have the confidence to ask whether or not the solution that they’re selling is really, truly solving the problem that the customer is looking to solve – and then acknowledge if it isn’t a good fit?

 

Likewise, if the customer is excited about the solution but doesn’t have the resources internally to properly launch it, is the vendor willing to say, “Let’s revisit this in another quarter or two, when we know that you can dedicate the resources that we’ve historically seen are necessary for success.”

 

Simply put, while a vendor is only interested in making a sale, a strategic partner isn’t afraid to say “no”.

 

Are they focused on continued success throughout the customer lifecycle?

Once a sale has been made, customers can quickly discern the “strategic partner” bona fides of their tech vendor based on the way that they approach the customer lifecycle and incorporate the customer perspective alongside their own.

 

For example, what the vendor might refer to as the “onboarding” phase could just as easily be referred to as the “realise value” phase by the customer, because there are people in the organisation who have put their neck on the line to bring this solution onboard, and they’re keen to demonstrate value.

 

Does the vendor provide the right amount of resources – employing not only include digital communications, but also a certain level of human touch – to facilitate success during this critical phase and help speed time to value?

 

Likewise, what the vendor typically views as the “adoption” phase could be viewed by the customer as the “expand knowledge” phase. Beyond adoption, customers want to expand their knowledge of how to support their end users in optimising workflows and achieving greater efficiencies and timesavings.

 

Does the vendor proactively offer strategic advice here – or do they leave it up to the customer to figure things out on their own?

 

After adoption, the “loyalty” portion of the customer lifecycle comes next – but the customer will likely view this phase as the “evolve outcomes” phase. An organisation’s desired outcomes are naturally going to evolve over time, and having a deeply ingrained strategic partnership with a technology vendor will help them to successfully tackle new challenges.

 

Does the vendor provide guidance on next steps for rolling out features and functionality that can help the organisation reach a new level of maturity?

 

The more that a vendor has this “dual perspective” that allows them to simultaneously see things from their own perspective as well as the customer’s, the more of a strategic partner they will be – and the more success they will be able to deliver throughout the customer lifecycle.

 

Ultimately, the customer decides

As long as the sun continues to rise and set, there will continue to be technology vendors that label themselves as “strategic partners.” Customers, however, are the ones in the best position to determine who deserves that label.

 

By asking some of the above questions, customers can decide for themselves just how much of a strategic partner their tech vendor really is – and set themselves up for success in the process.

 

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Natalie Alesi is Global Senior Director of Customer Success at iManage

 

Main image courtesy of iStockPhoto.com