Systems Integrators (SIs) are critical to building automation systems. SIs assist in designing, installing, and commissioning building automation systems (BAS) that manage HVAC, fire safety, security, and other building functions. They are also usually the front line for ongoing servicing and maintenance of these systems. For many SIs, this is their core business: managing facility smart operations so clients can avoid the hassle, staffing, and time commitments of manually controlling components through separate networks and platforms.
Today, many SIs work on a “one-and-done basis”, consulting on an initial build, or one-off repairs as needed. This reactive model is unpredictable, time-consuming, and – from a business perspective – not the best way to ensure repeat business from a loyal client base.
In an era of increasing competition and consolidation, the future for many SI businesses lies in shifting away from the more traditional, and less profitable, break/fix model towards one of an ongoing relationship of preventive maintenance with clients. The diagnostic-driven service plan can have a lot of benefits for both you and the clients you service.
Rather than being “the repair guy”, you become a strategic partner, driving long-term value and reducing risk for your clients over time. This is where the adoption of cloud-based BACnet systems monitoring software, like Optigo Visual Networks, can set Systems Integrators up for success.
Let’s look at some ways OptigoVN can help you profit as a Systems Integrator and elevate opportunities by reducing churn, building better relationships, saving time and expenses, and scaling the business by moving to a cloud-based SaaS monitoring system.
Reduce Churn
The key to profit as a systems integrator is by creating lasting relationships with your clients. To do this is to become an indispensable member of their extended team. Not just the on-call fix-it team, but trusted by the facilities management executives. Building collaborative, integrated relationships with your clients will keep them coming back to you year after year.
After all, a client who trusts their SI isn’t going to be shopping for another smart building systems vendor.
SaaS Solutions Help Build Better Relationships
Adoption of a SaaS solution like OptigoVN can help you maximize the benefits of pivoting your client contracts into these kinds of long-term relationships:
- Establish trust and authority. With OptigoVN, it’s easy to build trust and authority with clients in ways they can see and understand. With additional seats (the first one is free!) you can walk clients through findings, demonstrate ROI for your client with root cause analysis, and show them first-hand where issues are being seen.
- Build accountability. Sharing BACnet network health reports from OptigoVN allows you to set a baseline for improvement and establish meaningful milestones for improvement your clients will appreciate. Creating a roadmap allows you to plan for what’s needed to service the client, as well as set realistic expectations on deliverables and timelines.
- Be open and collaborative. Using a SaaS solution like OptigoVN allows you to open access beyond just your team. This can be extended to other collaborators, contractors, and service providers. And with robust user access control, you define which users get access to specific sites.
- Understand your client’s needs. The movement to a relationship with regular check-ins allows you to better understand your client’s priorities, needs, and goals. This in turn gives your client a sense of attention and accountability, two factors that drive contract renewals.
- Punch above your weight class. Match bigger competitors’ level of service with best-in-class solutions.
Some of the industry’s biggest OEMs and Systems Integrators, including Siemens, Honeywell, Automated Logic, and Climatec, already work with OptigoVN.
Saving Time is Saving Money
Nowhere is the adage more true than in the day-to-day for Systems Integrators: your time is money. Profits derive from your ability to minimize costs associated with tasks considered less valuable, or that end up costing you, and maximizing time spent on billable tasks that not only increase your margins but add value to your existing client relationships.
Here’s a simple example. Think about an on-site service call where your testing discovers the need to replace a BACnet device. Unless you know ahead of time what needs replacing, you’re likely going to need one or more additional trips to complete that task. That’s time dedicated to callbacks and admin instead of billable work.
But with tools like OptigoVN’s free diagnostics and the deep insights you gain by adding Site Scopes, your remote testing can pinpoint offline devices and likely issues before you even leave your desk, potentially saving you hours in travel time that could be better spent working on other clients’ needs. No climbing ladders. No Wireshark decoding needed.
And Saving Money… is Also Saving Money
Do more with less, right? Another way to increase your profits as a systems integrator is to scale the number of clients you can work with, and the tasks you work on, without necessarily having to increase headcount. And having a tool like OptigoVN allows you to do just that. Here are a few ways:
- Match the level of the technician to the level of the problem. Lower-level issues can be identified and more junior techs can be dispatched, freeing up more experienced techs for more complex tasks.
- Site surveys with OptigoVN can be done in minutes. Run an initial diagnostic on a client’s network to quickly show them areas of concern and improvement opportunities. Your results are easy to explain and show off. No need to bring in expensive testing equipment to run long, manual diagnostic sessions, or explain issues in rough terms to clients and technicians who may not be networking experts.
- OptigoVN Site Scopes can also be cycled across multiple client networks month-to-month. That means one subscription could service up to 12 client networks annually.
- Regular diagnostic visits with clients also provide you with several opportunities to upsell services with confidence, including hardware refreshes, future network planning, and installation, budget consultations, and more.
New Options for Profit as a Systems Integrator With New Revenue Streams
Beyond simply reducing margins and expenses, there’s opportunities in deploying new service offerings. Network health monitoring as a service is a huge growth market, and your ticket to growing high-margin recurring revenues within your service agreements. Rather than deploying a suite of diagnostic tests at the outset of a service agreement, you can now offer regular monitoring check-ins at set times throughout the year, or even continuous monitoring to catch critical issues before they lead to downtime.
As the experts at Oracle describe it, offering “consultation-like” services is a potential cash cow for Systems Integrators. “Regional and some local SIs are starting to follow suit, but their pace should be much quicker. Not only does consulting get you in deeper with your customers, it also offers a chance to go beyond one-off projects into a longer-lasting, more meaningful engagement. And while you may need to hire specialized industry talent, their knowledge is a resource that can be deployed across all clients in a vertical.”
The Future is in The Cloud
Cloud migration can also bring many ways to profit as a systems integrator and the clients they serve. Moving from a dedicated monitoring system, either on-premise or on one of your technicians’s laptops, to a cloud-based SaaS app has a lot of advantages:
- Remote accessibility. Your data, your software, and your ability to help your clients are available from any computer with an internet connection, 24/7. For example, by pairing OptigoVN with our remote packet capture tool, network packet captures take place in real time. That data is automatically uploaded and available to you within OptigoVN for diagnosis and investigation whenever and wherever you need it. This kind of accessibility also means you can access, assess, and update more clients regularly.
- Backups and failover. Don’t lose all your data with the loss of one laptop. By keeping critical information in the cloud, you can ensure you’re following best practices to keep your data safe from the failure of one particular source.
- Security. Optigo’s cloud provider AWS works to keep its services updated with the latest security measures, ensuring your resources are protected. Should your local devices fall victim to malicious actors, your data and services remain safe off-site.
- Metered costs. With scalable storage and compute resources supplied by an enterprise provider, you only pay for the cloud resources you consume. You no longer have to worry about paying to maintain IT assets that may only be used occasionally.
- Scalable usage. Grow your accounts to fit your needs. Leveraging cloud assets, we can offer users customer benefits like unlimited users, unlimited site size, and unlimited data limits on uploads.
- Availability. SaaS applications, like OptigoVN, are available from any platform that supports a browser, including Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android, and more.
Got a client who wants to keep things on-prem? No problem. Some organizations have specific security requirements that restrict data sharing to their systems. Optigo can be installed and run locally, or data can be routed to ensure compliance.
Ready to find out how OptigoVN can help you scale your business while also cutting expenses and improving relationships with your client base? Sign up for a free account today, or drop us a line and book a demo with one of our experts.
