Top 5 features customers are looking for in a Microsoft CSP Partner

Every business need customer to survive and drive business growth. When looking for a Microsoft CSP Partner, customers have a lot of options to choose from. The customers have an abundance of choices in terms of features, services, and products. This intense competition coupled with high customer expectations makes it difficult for CSPs to grow.

Today’s customers have become knowledgeable, understand what they need, and demand high-quality, innovative products, and perfect solutions for their business.  Most businesses will have a checklist to ascertain whether they have found the perfect Microsoft CSP partner. There are certain key features customers are looking for in a Microsoft CSP partner. If you are keen on customers partnering with you for their cloud needs, you need to make sure that you offer the features that the customers need.

Answer the following 5 questions to know if you are the Microsoft CSP Partner customers are looking for

When customers are selecting a suitable Microsoft CSP partner there are a few key features that are part of the decision-making process. Answering the following questions can bring more clarity and help you assess how relevant your offerings as a CSP are.

Do you have industry expertise?

Customers are not just looking for partners who can explain the features and benefits of assorted products and subscriptions. They are looking for partners with industry- expertise who can understand and address the problems that are specific to their business vertical. Providing solutions that are tailored to specific industry needs and incorporating the industry best practices in your solutions will help solidify your position in the market.

As a Microsoft CSP partner, you should aim to attain certifications in various competencies available in the CSP program. These certifications will increase the trust and confidence of the customers by highlighting that you have the required expertise and skills to meet their organization’s needs.

Can you help customers with license optimization?

When managing the end-to-end customer relationship as a Microsoft CSP partner, you should be able to identify the licensing needs of your customers. You should be able to assess if the current licensing is sub-optimal and help the customer take corrective steps. This can be done by tracking the license usage of each customer over time by using software and tools. By tracking the actual usage, you can help the customers choose the subscription plans that are right for them and pay for only those services that they need.

The license requirements of customers can differ from month to month. Some can have seasonal spikes where they require an extra number of licenses for only a few months in the year. In such cases, you can guide the customers to choose between monthly subscriptions for the licenses needed for a brief time and annual subscriptions for the rest. This will help your customers curtail unnecessary spending and achieve cost savings.

How good is your customer self-service experience?

In an intensely competitive business, giving your customers a positive customer experience is crucial. Giving your customers the option of exploring the products themselves, learning more about the features at their own pace, and choosing the products without interacting with the customer support team helps improve the customer experience. A customer self-service portal can be a differentiator for your CSP business.  Using a customer self-service portal saves time for both the customer as well as you.

As per Microsoft’s State of Global Customer Service report, 2018, 66% of the respondents would prefer to use self-service before engaging with an agent. A self-service portal will give your customers better control in managing their subscriptions and licenses. It will provide a complete view of their consumption and usage data, billing and payment-related information, upcoming renewal dates, etc.

Do you offer competitive pricing and discounts?

Customers are price-sensitive and are always on the lookout for a good deal to save costs. Customers will compare the prices and discounts offered by multiple vendors before selecting a Microsoft CSP partner. To make a sale you must make sure that your products are competitively priced. Time-bound promotions and discounts can be useful in attracting new customers. Similarly, offering special pricing, and account-based promotions to specific customers helps with customer loyalty and retention.

Tracking and analyzing the usage data of customers can help create customized bundles of products and services that can be sold at a discount. This level of personalization makes the customer feel that you are deeply committed to making their lives simpler and provides the opportunity for cross-selling. Creating and managing the special pricing structure, promotions, and bundling offers manually is not viable. Using a billing automation tool can simplify this process and help you effortlessly manage multiple offers and promotions without any error.

Can you provide seamless customer support?

As a Microsoft CSP partner, you are the point of contact for all the customer queries and are responsible for diagnosing and resolving the incoming support requests. You have the option of outsourcing whole or part of the support services or can provide the support directly yourself. Customers look for seamless technical support to manage their cloud subscriptions. To attract and retain customers, you need to provide best-in-class support with timely complaint resolution.

You can improve the customer support experience by allowing customers to raise support tickets digitally and manage the complaint resolution status using software and tools. Apart from technical support, as you are the point of contact for all billing and subscription-related support, using billing automation software will reduce billing-related queries and make resolving issues related to invoicing and other subscription services much easier and quicker.

Become more attractive to customers by partnering with C3

Partnering with C3 will allow you to explore and leverage the power of technology to grow your CSP business. CSP control center offers multiple features such as a self-service marketplace, accurate and automated billing with customizable promotions, and availability of integration with many common business software. These features, resources and 24/7 support can help you become a preferred partner for your customers as you will be able to check all the requirements they have. Book a demo and find out how C3 can help your business become what the customers want.