Reselling business as a whole in the Information Technology sector in India is in urgent need for a completely new frontage, and of course an underlying timely momentum is making it happen too – but unfortunately at a low pace in limited directions.
Some of the major upcoming trends in this field are – shifting focus towards volume based deals dropping the traditional idea of concentrating on profit derived from unit product sale, strategic focus towards adding value for the targeted market segments and concentration on the small businesses, SOHOs as well as home users’ needs – wherein the concept of convergence of IT, Telecom and Electronics has a big influence.
My recent visit to a few electronics retail stores made me understand two things clearly that those are not the places to bargain and buy, which is a common characteristic found among the Indian small buyers. Moreover, in most of these places the focus is on brand selling (pushing) and not on providing the right solution to the common man in search of a satisfactory answer (product) to his requirements.
There are plenty of brands to compare and buy, however, a common buyer needs an assurance that his IT requirements will be fulfilled by a particular product, he will get service assurance on 24X7 basis, he will find the desired software too just a phone call away, he will obtain security & networking assistance as and when needed – which are not possible through most of the retail stores.
All these things are in favour of the resellers. Our community members have to capitalise on these shortcomings of the retailing sector. Literally, the time has come, when they have to play the role of the next-door-good-neighbour to the customer – wherein the service assistance has to continue throughout the product lifecycle.
Contextually, what I mean by service capability is not only the ability for crisis management – but also the capacity to provide ideas of latest potentials and possibilities. A major section of this extended service capability comes from sound knowledge of the latest developments – which help in creating needs. Also, while I say product lifecycle – it includes a long span of time – starting from the event of generating an idea in a common man’s mind that he needs a PC to the time when he feels the need for a next generation product by discarding the existing one.