Guide for UCaaS Resellers: How to Grow Your IT Reselling Business in 2023
In today’s ultra-competitive market, business leaders are actively looking for simple, straightforward workplace solutions that keep their companies one step ahead of the competition. One of the newest, most in-demand business communications solutions is UCaaS (unified communications as a service), an increasingly popular option with businesses looking to consolidate their communications applications, and a great opportunity for IT resellers to become UCaaS resellers.
Among other benefits, companies with UCaaS have decision-making capabilities that are 2.6 times faster than those without UCaaS. Businesses with an eye toward the future realize the necessity of that speed and efficiency for their organization.
Savvy UCaaS resellers can offer their clients comprehensive software solutions that include live chat, video conferencing, and automated messaging services, to help their clients keep up with evolving employee and customer expectations.
Far too often, businesses’ initial approach to their communications solutions are not efficient or cost-effective. This creates an opportunity for IT resellers to offer their clients a dynamic yet less-expensive solution with UCaaS.
Whether you’ve been in business for years or you’re just getting your brand off the ground, you’ve likely wondered if adding white-label UCaaS solutions is right for your company. Before you decide, consider some of the advantages of UCaaS, and six steps to succeed as a UCaaS reseller.
What Advantages Do White-Label Platforms Offer UCaaS Resellers?
If you’re an IT reseller, one of the most important things you can do to grow your business is to have a deep understanding of your current and prospective customers’ needs. Many businesses are switching to remote and hybrid work environments, for example, and as a UCaaS reseller, providing a comprehensive solution for your client’s business communications by offering UCaaS would simplify your client’s transition to hybrid and remote work arrangements.
Some of the key advantages white-label UCaaS platforms offer to prospective UCaaS resellers are:
- Relevance in today’s IT market: UCaaS sees an annual market growth of approximately 29% YOY because of its versatility. Modern businesses require a full suite of instant messaging, telephony, video, and other communication options to facilitate internal and customer-facing solutions. IT resellers that lack a convenient UCaaS suite of tools will quickly lose their place in competitive B2B markets. But by adding UCaaS to your catalog of services, you can stay relevant in your niche, and even reach new markets.
- Fast business development: When you’re building a platform from the ground up, it can take years to see a return on your investment. In contrast, when you partner with a white-label provider and become a UCaaS reseller, the work is done for you. With the right partner, you’ll have everything you need to get your services to market with minimal overhead costs in as little as 30 days. You’ll also have the advantage of knowing you have the support of an experienced, knowledgeable team in your corner.
- Easy-to-repackage white-label options: Clients logging into your UCaaS platform will see your company name, your contact information, and your logo. Look for a platform that offers white-label templates that are easy to navigate, completely customizable, and able to be easily changed.
- Pricing control: In a true UCaaS reseller relationship, you retain full control over every aspect of your digital services, including the prices. This means you can set competitive rates for your core niches, offer discounts to key accounts at your discretion, and employ the right pricing strategies for your business model.
- Gain insight into your customers’ needs: UCaaS serves the present needs of modern businesses very well, but what about their future needs? When you offer comprehensive services, personalized solutions, and ongoing relationship management, you gain a unique insight into your customers’ evolving communications needs, allowing you to better forecast how their — and therefore your — business may need to change and adapt in the future.
Related: Promotional Ideas to Sell Cloud Communications During Times of Uncertainty
6 Steps to Becoming a Profitable UCaaS Reseller
Deciding to become a UCaaS reseller or deciding to prioritize your UCaaS solution offerings is the beginning of your journey to becoming a successful IT reseller. Here, we lay out six steps that can make the journey as profitable and streamlined as possible, giving your business a strong foundation for growth.
#1. Choose the Right Reselling Partner
One of the best (and easiest) ways to swing the odds of success in your favor as a UCaaS reseller is to partner with a knowledgeable, experienced service provider that gives you everything you need to serve the clients that support your business.
Of course, you’ll want to choose carefully. Every client subscribing to your service is unique, and their needs may change over time. To help nurture and protect the relationships you worked so hard to establish, the provider you choose should have the ability to adapt as the market evolves.
After you choose a provider with the features, resources, and versatility you need, several other strategies will go a long way toward ensuring continued success.
#2. Know Your Target Audience
Although many successful resellers focus their sales and marketing efforts on a wide range of businesses, many find it far more beneficial to fine-tune their approach.
First, decide what niches you want to focus on. Providing UCaaS solutions to small businesses with remote teams is very different from offering UCaaS services to large businesses with dozens of regional offices, so you need to adopt different marketing and consulting approaches for each niche.
Alternatively, you might focus on a specific industry, like eCommerce stores (who value multichannel customer outreach), legal services providers (who demand constant security), or real estate agents (who may need a guided approach if they’re shifting from in-person communications to a hybrid approach).
To capitalize on this strategy, review your website. Create specific landing pages or solutions pages for each of your target niches that describe the benefits of each element of UCaaS in relation to their specific business needs. For example, a third-party medical billing company will care about how you can secure instant messaging so it complies with HIPAA, while dropshippers will care more about having multichannel communication strategies that engage their shoppers 24/7.
When you understand the industry-specific needs and pain points of niche customers, it’s easier to convey the benefits of choosing your UCaaS platform over your competitors. Plus, you’ll find it simpler to highlight specific features and benefits of your various services, and overcome potential objections.
Second, take stock of what your existing companies need. Many may benefit from an immediate transition to UCaaS services, while others may be reluctant to change. Develop an in-depth SWOT analysis for each of your existing clients so you can use the right approach to offer them new options, or assuring them their service will remain uninterrupted.
#3. Train Your Team on the Specific Features and Benefits of UCaaS
The best way to stand out in a crowded IT reseller market is to know what you’re talking about. That means:
- Having a clear understanding of your audience’s communication needs and pain points
- Providing clear, actionable recommendations that show the link between each feature of UCaaS and your customer’s work ecosystem
- Developing consistent messaging around features, pricing, and support
Many of your prospective clients will be nervous about adopting new technologies, even if they know they need a change. You can structure your offerings for success by working on the marketing and messaging across all of your revenue teams.
When your marketers, salespeople, key account managers, and support staff all use the same terminology (and have concise, helpful answers), that can go a long way to convincing prospects to sign a multi-year contract or renewal with your business, and assuring existing clients that their favorite features and services won’t be lost.
#4. Avoid Getting Locked In
As a UCaaS reseller, your business is ultimately responsible for every aspect of the customer experience. You won’t need to worry about maintaining the infrastructure, but what about pricing? There are numerous companies offering white-label platforms for rebranding, each offering different pricing schemes for reseller programs.
In some reseller situations, the platform provider sets the prices for communications bundles, requiring that the reseller offer only those set bundled options to their clients, which severely limits what solutions resellers can offer to their clients. Without the flexibility to scale prices, it’s more difficult to stay competitive or ensure profitability.
You don’t want to get locked into sketchy agreements or long-term contracts that could undermine your reputation, profit margins, business goals, or future earning potential. Instead, choose a provider that gives you the flexibility to create pricing tiers, offer exceptional value to your customers, and generate revenue on your terms.
#5. Take Advantage of Educational Opportunities and Reseller Support
It’s in the best interest of any white-label provider to support the ongoing success of their retail partners. But having top-tier technology at your fingertips won’t help you succeed in business if you’re not able to provide the level of support your clients expect.
Although most providers claim to offer UCaaS reseller support, many fall short of partner expectations. The best white-label UCaaS platform providers offer comprehensive platform training, billing service training, learning management systems, informative videos, and more. Although UCaaS platforms are remarkably user-friendly, your customers will rave about your commitment to providing exemplary service when you also have access to 24/7 reseller support.
#6. Don’t Shy Away From Talking About Security
Many businesses in your customer base will benefit from a streamlined communication system — a digital platform scaled to support remote and hybrid work. Although numerous business owners are feeling the strain of trying to get by using separate services for calls, video conferencing, messaging services, and file sharing, there’s still hesitancy to switch to an all-in-one provider due to security concerns. Your clients will need clear answers about data encryption, HIPAA and PCI-DSS compliance, and protocols for securing information on the cloud.
They will want assurances that their calls are private, documents are protected, and sensitive information is stored safely. For UCaaS resellers, transparency goes a long way to ensure consumer confidence. Don’t shy away from discussing data encryption, security protocols, and the level of security customers receive by trusting their business to your brand.
Pro Tip: Don’t Wait for Clients to Ask — Provide the Information Up Front
Many of your clients may have questions about security, but may not know what questions to ask. Give them peace of mind and advertise your expertise by discussing security on your web pages, across your business blog, and on your social media posts.
If you freely discuss security and prompt your audiences to prioritize it, you can help them realize the value of your services. You might even get them asking questions about their current service providers before they make the switch to you.
Could Reselling UCaaS Enhance the Profitability of Your Business?
Partnering with a fully-managed UCaaS platform empowers resellers in multiple tech industries to increase their profits by providing the services today’s business owners need for phone services, video collaboration, call center services, file sharing, and more.
Related: Partnering with the Best Provider for Selling UCaaS
Whether you’re interested in expanding on your brand or building a business from square one, reselling white-label UCaaS can be far more profitable than you might expect. The features and benefits of unified communication as a service practically sell themselves. Currently, the market growth rate for UCaaS stands at nearly 15.1% per year. Market analysts predict the industry will generate $87.2 billion by 2031.
Those numbers suggest that tech companies not moving forward with unified communication risk falling behind. What’s driving those projections? The rapidly evolving enterprise communication sector, consumer expectations, and the number of companies looking for reliable services that help reduce overhead costs and maximize productivity.
Of course, you’re sure to find numerous companies offering white-label UCaaS platforms, but not every platform makes it easy to maximize the return on your investment.
Find the Best White-Label UCaaS Platform for Your Brand
With SkySwitch, you’ll get all the benefits of a premium white-label business model. You’ll also have access to real-time support, hundreds of app and system integrations, and a UCaaS platform you can deploy and learn in as little as 30 days.
To see what a fully-managed brandable UCaaS platform could do for you and those who rely on your services, visit SkySwitch to schedule a demo and see how adding UCaaS to your catalog can strengthen your business.