With 18 years of experience in the technology industry, Alicia Arana, current Territory Manager of Guatemala and El Salvador for Ingram Micro, has always worked for partners that provided technological solutions, working for government and corporate clients. At the moment of joining the distributor, she knew what the partner needed and the values that the company could add. She has currently been working at Ingram Micro for 5 years now.
“In these five years, the company has transformed into a valuable distributor. I ask the partners who have worked with us for a long time if they remember Ingram Micro from 20 years ago, which sold inks and printers that no longer existed. We added a lot of resources, strategies and engineering. Today, Ingram Micro is positioned as the global distributor that it is, with all the top technology brands,” explained Arana.
The distributor’s team is based in Miami. Ingram Micro has a structured organization, they have different specialized vendors to serve partners and the majority of the team are BDMs divided into business units focused on trends in datacenter, cybersecurity, networking, specialty (point of sale, UCC, physical security), each of them with pre-sales specialists available.
In addition to this, the distributor recently opened a center of experience (COE) in Mexico, which has 20 brands with free engineering for partners. “This was created from the trend that we are a value distributor, and the idea is that the COE grows with certified engineers and can provide pre-sales and implementation services to partners remotely,” said the executive.
“THE END MARKET CUSTOMERS ARE VERY DEMANDING. IT IS DIFFICULT FOR A PARTNER WITHOUT TECHNICAL EXPERIENCE TO GENERATE A BUSINESS. THE PARTNERS KNOW THAT WE HAVE ENGINEERS WHO ASSIST THEM, ACCOMPANY THEM WITH THE END CUSTOMER, provide certifications AND GIVE SPECIALIZED TALKS. THIS PRE-SALE HAS DELIVERED them A LOT OF VALUE”
The development of Ingram Micro in the region
The Territory Manager of Guatemala and El Salvador assured that IT trends have changed in recent years, and clients are willing to adopt new solutions. The wholesaler has had success stories in the region, such as having proprietary brands with which they can manufacture different products, based on what the client demands.
“I think the strategy is correct, the partners are realizing this change we have. This year we have been doing a lot of marketing to show them trends and our projects. The Engage event, for example, began in Guatemala, where we had more than 70 partners listening to Ingram Micro’s offer from the voice of directors. The meeting was held in the Dominican Republic, and will soon be held in Jamaica and Costa Rica,” Arana commented.
“OUR GOAL IS TO BE THE N°1 DISTRIBUTOR. WE HAVE GROWN A LOT IN EL SALVADOR AND GUATEMALA, 200% YEAR OVER YEAR, AND IF YOU THINK ABOUT IT 5 YEARS BACK IT IS 1000%. CUSTOMERS HAVE CHANGED THE IDEA THEY HAD OF INGRAM MICRO”
Segment the partner in each business
About the work of cloud channels, the interviewee distinguishes 3 types of partners: first of all, those who were born in the cloud and know how to handle themselves, so they only need financial support. Then there are the partners that have hybrid cloud solutions, which integrated technology from Azure, Google and AWS. Finally, there are traditional channels, accustomed to selling infrastructure, who never thought they should migrate to the cloud, but who today approach Ingram to ask for support in the transition to the Cloud.
“We have internal training on how to sell cloud to the end customer. Additionally, when they start using the marketplace, we give them 60 days of support with someone who explains how the platform works, how the client will see the information, provision the services, how they will see their invoices. We also have a pre-sales engineer to help review charges and costs,” said Arana. And he added: “The idea is that everything that is cloud is signed and brought to Central America to have the entire ecosystem.”
“WITH THE MARKETPLACE TO MANAGE THE CLOUD AND THE PRE-SALES THAT WE HAVE, PARTNERS CAN START TO CREATE A CLOUD STRATEGY THAT WILL BE FUNCTIONAL FOR THEM IN THE COMING YEARS”
From the wholesaler, they focus on segmenting their partners and offering the necessary tools to boost each one’s business. For example, those partners that manage unified communications have a comprehensive solution, not a specific brand, they work with brands such as Logitech, Barco, Microsoft, HP Poly, Jabra, ScreenBeam and Cisco among others, and carry out training aimed at the channels.
“We help the partner with all the requirements they have in different brands and be able to integrate different solutions. At the COE, for example, we have an engineer specialized in rooms, whom we put in contact with the client to resolve their concerns, and in the same way we can do it for each business unit of the company,” said the executive.
“WE BECOME A CUSTOMER ADVISOR THAT EXPLAINS TO THEM HOW THEY CAN BE MORE PROFITABLE AND ALL THE OPPORTUNITIES THEY CAN DEVELOP”
The Territory Manager of Guatemala and El Salvador also spoke about the concern of some partners about import problems, but pointed out that Ingram Micro has everything necessary to facilitate this process.
“We have platforms so that customers can buy online without having to interact with anyone. As long as they are a technology company, they can opt for a code with Ingram, they go to the page and they can buy the 100 brands that we have today, focused on Miami, and they have a thousand more brands that they can buy from all over the US. The agility they could have for their clients is enormous,” she explained.
Looking to the future, the executive stated that they seek to develop and attract clients for the latest trends such as unified communications, hybrid work, cybersecurity, physical security and cloud. “We have the engineers, we have the structure, we have the financial resources, I think Ingram is going to grow a lot in the future, because the partners have given us the openness to jointly develop new businesses and will continue to choose to adopt the brands that we incorporate into the market. portfolio”, Arana concluded.
