How Should You Buy B2B Tech Support for Remote Monitoring Gear in 2020?
Recently, while working through a system upgrade, I needed a little tech support. But when I called them, I had to pull out my credit card first!
All I wanted to ask were some pretty simple questions about the right way to configure the new product that I had already paid for. I couldn't help but wonder, "What is this company doing?"
If you're investing in new equipment for your business, readily available tech support is a big part of your success.
Technical support teams help you to:
- Install new equipment
- Configure and set up your gear
- Train new staff
- Resolve issues with faulty or improperly configured equipment
- Recover after an outage event
For these reasons, the criteria for your success go way beyond the product itself. Before committing to any vendor, you must know what you can expect from their support. Are you going to have a free and easy experience – or will you pay by the minute for know-nothing support reps reading a script? Does your vendor even provide tech support at all?
When choosing a remote monitoring equipment provider, it’s smart to factor in which kind of support suits your requirements. Let's take a look at the major tech support business models that exist in 2020.
Your Tech Support Choices Matter – and Vary Wildly
Technical support for B2B purchases can come from high-quality tech support engineers, less effective call center reps, or may not even be offered at all.
Choosing "No Tech Support" can be Expensively "Inexpensive"
Your budget and the initial purchase price of your remote monitoring system is, of course, a part of your decision. Just remember that, especially in B2B, it isn't the most important part.
Manufacturers that sell very cheap remote monitoring equipment will have to cut costs everywhere they can. This usually means poor product quality and a lack of after-sale support. This is annoying for personal and hobby projects, but it's a recipe for disaster in B2B.
Cheap stuff is great for some projects but be sure to consider the value of the remote sites you're protecting.
Service Level Agreements Give You Defined Support for a Recurring fee
In order to provide tech support for their clients, many vendors offer a paid service level agreement (SLA). SLAs are formal rules that establish what support you can expect.
For tech support, common SLAs involve how quickly a new support ticket will wait for a response or how fast a ticket will be completely resolved. These types of agreements get more expensive in proportion to the level of support you want – having higher priority and faster service means a bigger bill.
Before signing up for this type of tech support, verify that all services you anticipate using are included. Make sure the associated recurring fee is something you can live with for the long term.
Pay for Mandatory Training to "Earn" Access to Tech Support
For manufacturers of complex equipment, requiring training before offering support actually makes a fair amount of sense. This ensures that anyone talking to the support team has at least some basic knowledge of the system. Training is also a great touchpoint to meet your users and learn about their needs. (I love that part of the voluntary training sessions we host at DPS).
Unfortunately for you, you might not be able to leave the office for multiple days, get a budget for training fees, or even get a budget for travel expenses. There are many reasons that training might be inconvenient or impossible for you.
Be sure to research all the details of training, both from the manufacturer and within your own company, before considering this option.
Prepare Your Credit Card for "Pay-As-you-Go" Support
Instead of paying a flat, recurring fee for an SLA or attending mandatory training, you can choose "pay-as-you-go" tech support. This works exactly as the name suggests: you'll pay each time you use your vendor's support service. This can range from charges per incident, per call, or even per minute.
The amounts charged to your credit card will vary from month to month based on how much support you need. The more you need help with your monitoring gear, the higher the bill.
In a nutshell, this model will force you to get your wallet out before your vendor can even start supporting you. That commonly leads to wasted employee time and mistakes in an effort to avoid the dreaded fees.
Tech Support as Part of a Total Client Commitment
Many companies provide tech support as an extra line-item cost on top of your purchase price.
However, there are some companies that back up their products and are committed to your satisfaction. These monitoring providers view the support service as an important part of a two-way relationship. Tech support teams learn a lot by helping you, and that's information that can be piped back into engineering to make better and easier products.
What you gain with this model is access to quality tech support. Your team doesn't need to worry about fees or wasted time for routine system adjustments. As long as you don't abuse support by expecting multi-hour or multi-day training over the phone, it will remain free.
Yes, the initial purchase price will usually be a bit higher if your gear includes total support, but not tremendously so. A 10% - 30% price difference is common, and product quality is usually higher. A company that bundles in tech support has a strong incentive to make gear that just works in the first place.
Remember that your initial investment amount isn't what really matters. Focus heavily on your total cost of ownership. Choose a remote monitoring vendor who will be able to support you without requiring ongoing payments.
That's how an initial investment in quality will positively impact your network operations and, ultimately, your bottom line. When chosen correctly, your monitoring system will pay for itself.
My Recommendation to You
I built DPS around tech support as a commitment to the client because it ends up paying off for both my company and our customers.
Every client that calls our tech support will have an opinion, suggestions, or ideas. These ideas will help us shape our product roadmaps and reveal interesting use cases we hadn't thought of before. Every support question makes our gear a little bit better in terms of usability, features, and bug fixes. Those are improvements that you get to enjoy – whether or not you were the person who made the feature request.
I obviously recommend this support model to most people considering a B2B purchase, but only you can determine which is right for your unique situation. Be sure to consider all of the tech support options I've described here before deciding.