Wowing With Brand Power

It is a known fact that branding and marketing help a company promote its
products and create awareness about their offerings in the market. Vendors have
already been active on this front. But the question is, how important is it for
solution providers to promote their own brand, especially since they are often
promoting vendor brands to end customers.

The issue was raised during a panel discussion on 'How important is branding
during contemporary times' at the fourth DQ Channels SP Summit. The panelists
included Girish Krishnamurthy, MD of Kaseya; Saket Kapur of Green Vision, Sunil
Kakkad of Sai Infosystems and the session was moderated by Ibrahim Ahmed, Group
Editor, DQ Channels.

The discussion highlighted the myths and perceptions of branding that prevail
amongst small and medium business enterprises. Sharing his views on the factors
that a principal has to entail while reaching out to solution providers and
customers, Mehul Doshi, GM-Sun Microsystems mentioned that in the current
scenario, it is necessary to invest in branding as it helps customers and
solution providers know about the strategies of a company, their focus on
various verticals and their new business avenues.

Defining branding

For Kakkad of Sai Infosystems branding signified a promise and commitment to
customers and he defined it as an identification and recognition of a company
based on the value it added to its product portfolio.

Defining branding as a way to reach out to customers and solution providers,
Krishnamurthy of Kaseya said, “According to me, branding defines what business
you are in and what your area of focus is. For Kaseya, our predominant market is
SPs and nurturing them becomes branding for us, and we keep on doing that
through seminars and workshops.”

(L-R) Saket Kapur of Green Vision, Girish Krishnamurthy, of Kaseya, Mehul Doshi of Sun, Sunil Kakkad of Sai Infosystems and Ibrahim Ahmad of DQ Channels were part of a panel discussion on the importance of having your own brand. The session saw a lot of delegates sharing their stories about the struggle that they have to go through to get their brand name registered

When it comes to branding, most solution providers think

it is applicable to principal companies alone. Sharing his thoughts on the
channel perspective, Kapur of Green Vision pointed out that though everybody is
aware of the advantages of branding, partners do not lay much emphasize on this
exercise.

“Channel partners try to piggyback on the brand name of vendors. We all are
aware of the importance of branding but we are not able to devote time to this
particular area, to promote our own brands,” Kapur shared.

Branding service

A vendor indulges in branding exercises through advertise­ments. But for
solution providers it might not be feasible to invest time, energy and money on
this activity. For them, branding can be done through 'services' as this is what
differentiates one solution provider from another and also leads to word of
mouth publicity.

Expressing his views on branding through distinguished services, Devendra
Taneja of PC Solutions said, “A differentiating factor has to be there. You have
to justify how different you are, and a solution provider can do this through
promoting his expertise and the solutions in which they excel.” Channel partners
from the audience agreed that one has to find a USP and build their niche areas
that can act as a brand to promote their solution in the market.

Adding to the note, Krishnamurthy said that bran­ding services could be
skill-based and it could be variable in nature as one has to transform
them­selves according to the market scenario. On the issue of how critical
branding is going to be in 2009, keeping the slowdown in mind, he highlighted
that from channel and Kaseya perspective, customers are going to reduce their
budget. This would open up an opportunity for all vendors to promote low-cost
products that meet the requirements of customers.

Hitting the nail

Branding is critical for the vendors to let their customers and channel know
about their market focus. But one has to be conscious about doing more focused
branding and not generic branding. The discussion further steered towards
whether the period of economic slowdown was the right time for promoting a brand
for solution providers.

Kakkad mentioned that this is the right time when a solution provider should
start building his own brand as it leaves a strong impression on the market
about the potentials of a company.

Taneja emphasized on a serious note that before indulging in self branding, a
solution provider has to strengthen his own USP and differentiating factors and
all other home work.

Pradeep Gupta, Publisher, DQ Channels highlighted that despite the current
downtime, executives acknowledge the importance of keeping abreast with new
technologies, products and services in the industry. Advertising at a time when
the economy is down creates a competitive advantage as it make the industry
realize the potentials of company.

As a concluding remark, Gupta told solution providers that when times are
good, one should advertise and when times are bad one must advertise a lot more.

Amrita Tejasvi

amritat@cybermedia.co.in