Tech Data Enhances E-Commerce Tools
The Clearwater, Fla.-based distributor added software license renewal notification and hardware warranty add-on suggestion capabilities to its MyOpportunityTracker e-commerce tool. Tech Data launched MyOpportunityTracker last summer to help customers keep track of warranty and license renewal opportunities.
Resellers can get information on products they've sold to their end user customers from Adtran, ACP, Apple, CA, Enterasys, Fujitsu, HP, IBM, Lexmark, Microsoft, Nortel, Red Hat, Tripp Lite, WatchGuard and Xerox.
"Thousands and thousands of opportunities are being created," said Doug Riccardi, director of e-business at Tech Data.
So far, the tool has generated a higher rate of renewals on warranties, Riccardi said. "For resellers in our industry, we see a range of renewals, typically from low 20s up through high 60s Some people of course are very expert at it but that's generally their sweet spot," he said. "For those achieving less than 50 percent of their renewals, we found that even a single reminder can almost double that."
Tech Data also launched MyLicenseTracker, a tool that allows VARs to retrieve lost software license keys from an online system. Resellers can look up license keys in the system and have them emailed to themselves or directly to their customers.
"We found that almost 1,000 customers of ours a week were losing their license keys," said Riccardi. "We were the first in the channel to find this pattern and to fix it for our resellers."
Angela O'Donnell, managing director of W. O'Donnell Consulting in New York, said she has contacted Tech Data to retrieve lost license keys on more than one occasion and that she thinks the tool will be useful.
"They provide a lot of services for what is essentially a warehousing and shipping company, and they provide a lot of services along with it that other distributors don't," said O'Donnell.