Partners

What Can You Expect from the AppDirect TBI Acquisition?

By Ideas @ AppDirect / March 27, 2023

The convergence of TBI and AppDirect further provides the scale for AppDirect to become the number one destination to sell and buy technology. And, for AppDirect advisors that means you are part of the single largest technology provider in the industry.

In this February’s State of the Union webinar, we sat down with Geoff Shepstone, President and Founder of TBI, and a panel of AppDirect and TBI experts to hear more about how TBI complements AppDirect and how expected platform enhancements may impact you.

Watch the full webinar recording and jump to minute 1:50, or keep reading for some top takeaways:

A full-service technology stack

During the webinar, panelists quickly pointed out many synergies between AppDirect and TBI. They also outlined how bringing TBI and AppDirect together will deliver the best each company offers giving you the ability to maximize growth, scale operations, and diversify revenue streams.

To start, legacy AppDirect advisors will experience massive opportunities for learning and development through the University of TBI and even more back office and engineering support to drive operations and sales.

Legacy TBI advisors will be able to supercharge growth with AppDirect's B2B platform, which includes a digital marketplace to find, buy and manage customers' solutions and back office and self-service sales tools. And, with access to AppDirect's industry-leading catalog of over 1000 solutions, the elite advisor community will undoubtedly maximize up-sell and cross-sell opportunities, ultimately unlocking more significant monthly revenue from customers.

AppDirect and TBI experts break down the top improvements you can expect to see at minute 30:00 of the webinar.

1. A robust technology catalog

Today it’s more important than ever to be a strategic partner to clients. Not only do you need to quickly augment the solutions you offer, you need to ensure they can help buyers maximize their ROI from the technology they purchase. That’s particularly true for sellers focused on telco and connectivity solutions. For this group it means expanding into selling SaaS and other value-added services to remain viable and competitive.

By combining technology catalogs from TBI and AppDirect, you are in the best position possible to succeed. Legacy TBI advisors can complement existing portfolios with a cloud infrastructure portfolio, SaaS, managed services, and energy solutions that weren’t previously available. This will help you diversify your revenue streams and stand out from the competition. AppDirect advisors will also have access to TBI’s mobility practice which includes in-depth enablement resources and operational support, which are both critical for selling mobility.

2. Back-office services

When thinking about the future, Phil Keenan, Vice President and GM of Telecom Services at AppDirect, is most excited about AppDirect and TBI’s shared vision for delivering exceptional support to the advisor community. He believes strongly that these values are embedded in our people, processes, and systems.

Phil emphasized AppDirect is committed to delivering an exceptional advisor experience. He stressed that our teams are working diligently to ensure the advisor community is empowered to continue ‘business as usual,' receiving best-in-class operational support, timely and accurate commissions, and increased access to innovative training, engineering specialists, resources, and tools. In a nutshell, Phil is confident that the integration will be seamless because AppDirect is integrating a company that already has validated systems and data in place.

3. Expert sales engineers and support

While the size and scale of the AppDirect catalog is a significant differentiator, as Elliott Baretz, Senior Director, Cloud Services at AppDirect, explains, it’s all about complementing the catalog with an exceptional support team and best-in-class experts. Bringing these elements together seamlessly is how AppDirect will continue to enhance the advisor experience.

Along with a coast-to-coast advisor community, AppDirect’s pre-sales organization, and coverage, spans the nation. So, whether customer conversations are focused on telecom, network, SaaS, or energy, this pre-sales organization is designed to help you architect and deliver success. And as the integration journey continues, you will have access to extended resources to streamline sales processes. What can you expect from the sales engineering team? Here are a few examples:

• Assistance managing and growing existing partner relationships to drive incremental revenue

• Provide technical oversight on new sales opportunities

• Participate in scoping calls with sales reps and agents to determine the best provider solutions for clients based on current workflows and existing client network infrastructures

4. Customer management

AppDirect’s customer management strategy and services, including account-based management, is another offering that gives Invest partners and strategic advisors the flexibility to focus on their customers.

During the webinar, the panel also highlighted an innovative referral program, developed and offered by the legacy TBI team, known as an inbound-as-a-service solution. This go-to-market sales motion is focused on helping you acquire more customers at scale at both a lower cost of acquisition as well as a higher ROI.

With this solution the inside sales team takes leads and calls on the advisor's behalf. Any deals closed by the inside sales team are credited back to you and remain the advisor's customers. The team uses unique webforms and chat options, and 1-800 numbers to reach out to prospects.

5. Access to the AppDirect platform

As the B2B buyer continues to evolve, you will need to augment the solutions you provide quickly and support how buyers are looking to buy - online. The AppDirect platform and catalog deliver these capabilities, ultimately empowering you to increase wallet share with current customers and expand into customer segments.

Pierre-Luc Bisaillon, Chief Information Officer at AppDirect, likens the AppDirect platform and catalog to placing a digital vending machine in your customers’ environment. Every time they want more, better, or different solutions, you can increase the number of solutions in the catalog – which then increases customer loyalty. By having an extensive catalog embedded in the platform, it’s simpler and more convenient for you and and for your customers to find, buy and manage all technology services.

6. AppDirect Capital

To wrap up the webinar, the team talked about the unique characteristics and benefits of AppDirect Capital, as a mechanism to accelerate advisor growth.

AppDirect Capital helps advisors and organizations raise the capital they need to scale or pursue other opportunities, without giving up control of the business and taking on debt. By opening up this fund to a greater pool of advisors, AppDirect is committed to delivering innovative and flexible funding options to the advisor community.

To learn more about AppDirect’s acquisition of TBI, you can read about it here or watch the full webinar for more insights. Please also register for our State of the Union webinar series.