All trials are undertaken at your discretion and on standard terms with us. If you want to build a campaign, or offer trials for your customers, free or paid, do so following these guidelines.
Customer trial checklist
A customer technology trial should be a late-stage step in your sales process. To maximise the conversion of trials into contracts, here are some ideas to consider.
- Change your mindset – if you believe a technical trial, a few dashboards and graphs, will excite your customer into buying you are likely going to be disappointed. In the world of buyers, an old-fashioned test drive used by car salesmen rarely works.
- Focus on the benefits of remote over traditional monitoring – Prior to offering each customer a technical trial you should identify the problems that remote monitoring will solve for them specifically (for example, ease of access, customer/staff disruption, shared logbook, better accuracy of readings or other key benefits). Why will the use of remote monitoring be better than an engineer and a van?
- Commercials – Take time to discuss and agree on your commercial offer. After all, if the numbers don’t stack up a technology-focused trial is irrelevant. Reach an agreement, “if the trial objectives are met successfully, will you agree to deploy this across your organisation?”
- Clear objectives – what are the specific success criteria for the trial in the mind of your end customer? Agree on these upfront, and then monitor their achievement throughout your trial.
- Scope and term of trial – focus on smaller and shorter trials – rather than lengthy trials or large scope installations. A one or two-month trial is often enough to achieve your objectives.
- Order your trial pack(s) – finalise the equipment scope required for this/multiple trials. Order this from your account manager following the standard ordering process. Please note this is order is subject to a 12-month minimum term, during which time you can uninstall, decommission and reuse for multiple customers.
DON’T JUST HOPE THAT SHOWING A DASHBOARD WILL CONVERT A SALE.
Trial Ordering
- Determine the scope of equipment required to support your customer trial(s)
- Do you have equipment from prior trial orders available? If yes, re-use this.
- If not, place an order on Remote Tech for the equipment required, using the standard Remote Tech ordering process.
- Undertake the installation and monitor objectives and success criteria.
Trial Closure
On completion of the trial it will either be a success, or you will fail to convince the customer to proceed.
If the customer trial is successful, you simply leave the equipment on site and extend the project for this specific customer. Then, if you want to do additional trials, order new customer trial equipment from Remote Tech to use in your business.
On completion of a trial, when a customer is not willing to commit to wider deployment, you should arrange for the equipment to be uninstalled.
Hardware should be cleaned and returned to its original state, ready for use in another trial location. This applies particularly if you are within a contract term for the equipment.
If you have completed the 12-month term of your agreement for this equipment, you can return it to Remote Tech and not extend your agreement for these services.
Please use the decommissioning process for the hardware, to release this equipment for use with another triallist.
Pricing and Commercial Terms
- Trial equipment can be provided as many times as required for each partner. Order as many customer trial “packs” (scope defined by the partner) as required. You are responsible for paying for this equipment for the period of usage, whether installed in a customer site or not.
- Trial equipment should be ordered in the name of the partner, and the partner is responsible for the equipment at all times.
- Equipment used in customer trials will be supplied to you under the standard pricing and terms agreed in your partnering agreement. This involves a 12-month minimum term for each piece of hardware, with annual renewals. Pricing is updated quarterly and the current pricing is visible in the partner portal or made available on request.
- The partner agrees to make a suitable iOS device available to their engineer in support of the installation and commissioning process. You as a partner are responsible for the field services associated with the installation and servicing of the agreement.
- The equipment is provided to you as a partner for a minimum period of twelve months, during this time you can install/uninstall this as many times as you wish, using the decommissioning process (provided on request).
- The postage/packing/shipping for equipment is payable in full by the partner and this will be provided with the quote.
- At the end of the agreement, equipment not returned within thirty days will be invoiced as a renewal at the annual rate, whether currently installed or not. Lost or damaged equipment will be invoiced at 60 times the standard monthly payment for that hardware.
- On receipt of our invoice, payment must be made within 30 days NET of this date
- A product warranty is provided for the contract’s lifetime.
- You are responsible for determining the solution design and surveying suitable installation locations. We are happy to discuss this with you during our support calls.
- Remote Tech will provide access to online training materials to support the trial – relevant parties involved in the installation and operation of the trial must undertake this in a timely manner to ensure high-quality implementation.
- As a certified partner, you will complete the installation, commissioning and field service needs of each customer’s trial, supported by Remote Tech for Hardware and software support as second-line support to your team.
