The Next Best Thing To Being There - ScanSource/Vigilix
The Next Best Thing To Being There
By Heather Clancy, CRN
11:31 AM EST Fri. Feb. 03, 2006
I promised to check in late this week with tidbits out of my trip down to Greenville, S.C., to visit ScanSource. First of all: Thanks for a great visit, and for the southern hospitality. I’ve never had chicken with dumplings, and lunch fueled me through the evening, which was a good thing, because my flight home was delayed for longer than my actual fly time.
Kudos to you also for some of the great work you’re doing. I think one thing I carried home was the sense that ScanSource is really earnest about earning its keep as a value-added distributor.
One of the coolest things I saw during my whirlwind briefing day (more than 20 new faces!) was a nifty piece of technology called Virtual Technician, which ScanSource has been piloting with some of its POS resellers.
The software, developed by local Greenville ISV Vigilix, is a hosted offering that lets a reseller keep tabs on customers’ POS systems from afar, letting them check on store processes (such as credit-card settlement), basic system configuration, software issues and peripherals problems. The reseller can install an agent on the POS solution, and then charge a monthly fee. Or not.
ScanSource is planning to use the remote monitoring tool, now being rolled out by several VARs, as a way to differentiate its POS offerings. Even if a reseller doesn’t choose to charge for Virtual Technician, it can save a VAR an onsite visit for simple problems – such as someone forgetting to close a printer lid or someone unwittingly downloading software that will conflict with senstive POS settings.
Kudos to ScanSource for figuring out a way it can help its resellers slowly work into a type of managed service.
What’s new by you? E-mail me with the channel buzz at hclancy@cmp.com.