Modern Office Methods in Cincinnati, OH, has been selling power protection products from ESP for more than 10 years. In fact, virtually no machine goes to a customer without some sort of power protection included.
Years ago MOM’s service team came to a powerful conclusion about power protection thanks to their own research along with BEI Services data. “We tracked the number of service calls, the number of issues we had when we put on surge suppressors,” explains Rod Randall, vice president sales, major accounts, for MOM. “We actually ended up with a lot less problems so we mandated that every device that leaves our office has a surge suppressor on it.”
MOM also bundles other power protection products into deals, such as ESP’s eCommandCenter (ECC) plug-level energy management and power protection solution, which is an upgrade from a traditional surge suppressor and can be used to reduce business energy costs. “Obviously, green is a big thing right now, at least in our market,” says Randall. “When we go after Fortune 500 companies we use the ECC to show what we are reducing and roll that into our RFPs so we could be more aggressive in positioning ourselves and sell for more margin. That’s what separates ourselves in these RFPs because we’re able to bring something to the table that our competitors are overlooking.”
With so many power protection options on the market to choose from, why did MOM choose ESP?
“They understood our business,” replies Randall. “They’re open to help us grow our business. When you’re a $40-$50 million dealer you’re always looking for ways to grow your business. Most vendors don’t want to help you with that unless they’re can sell you something. ESP is more about ‘How can we help you grow your business?’”
He acknowledges that ESP’s products are not the cheapest on the market. “At this point I might be paying a little more and that’s okay because I know what I get from ESP,” states Randall. “We have no interest in buying from anybody else.”
What he likes about partnering with ESP is the company’s willingness to help MOM sell. MOM does an event every year for its top Fortune 500 clients, taking them to the Masters. At a recent Masters in Raleigh, ESP was gracious enough to set up a lunch and learn for MOM’s top clients to discuss their entire breadth of products and the benefits of selling them. ESP also took MOM’s clients out to dinner afterwards. “Not many vendors will do that for you,” says Randall. “ESP is extremely easy to work with,” adds Randall, “they’ll go out of their way to help you get the business.”
ESP has also been helpful in training MOM’s sales reps about how to best sell power protection through lunch and learns and Webinars. Plus strategies such as sales promos and blitzes to get the word out in the market about power protection have also been instrumental in raising awareness internally and externally. “I just gave away a $1,000 gift card to [the sales rep] that brought in the most leads for the quarter,” notes Randall.
Adding power protection has been a boon to MOM’s business, especially in the current office technology sales environment.
“A box is a box is a box and we’ve all sold them, and everybody knows the margins are going away, and everybody knows it down to .0028 on a big deal,” acknowledges Randall. “We structure our sales presentations for major accounts around the consultative approach and how can we help them in other areas of their business so it doesn’t come down to just a box sale. We make more money on [power protection products] than we do on the copiers.”
