Are Integrators Overlooking Total Cost to Serve?
Summary
The SAS Institute (short for Statistical Analysis System) has an excellent article describing the three classes of data driven businesses, in which it defines a “data-informed business” – the category achievable by most security integrators. “While the trouble and expense of tracking TCS may be onerous and a bit too theoretical to some, adopting a long-term service attitude is not,” says Ed Meltzer, founder and CEO of Security Cloud & Mobile Partners. In an earlier era, most customers conceded that they would rip and replace their access control or video system somewhere between five and ten years, because the products lasted that long and because there was not enough technology change to warrant any other approach. COTS high-performance IT servers can reduce an integrator’s the total cost to serve – not only because today such products have a high reliability factor, but also because they have same-day or next-business-day on-site service available for a reasonable vendor subscription fee. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) A few years ago, research by the PSA Security Network discovered “First Time Fix Percentage” as a highly effective KPI that strongly influences integrator profitability.