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CHANNEL STRATEGY
Takaaki Hagiwara,
Managing Director
Ian Mitchell,
Operations Director,
Direct-tec
Two and a half years ago the
company launched the Shinrai
Partner Programme, its first pan-
European partner programme.
Shinrai is a Japanese term meaning
trust and loyalty and embodies the
way OKI works with its partners
and customers. The firm says that
its success is dependent on the
success of its partners and that is the
philosophy behind the Shinrai Partner
Programme, which has three tiers –
Business Partner, Premier Partner and
Executive Partner. In addition, OKI
has two specialist partner categories
– Graphic Arts Specialist and Wide
Format Specialist.
Seeber, who is responsible for the
operations and growth of the reseller
channel and the distribution of hardware
and consumables in EMEA, explained that
the programme was launched to enable
OKI to better support all of its customers
and to deliver consistency across all
countries.
According to Hagiwara, who joined
OKI in 1990 and is responsible for building
the company’s position in the business-
to-business printer, document output and
management markets, while growing
relationships with channel and business
partners and core business customers
across the UK, Ireland and Nordic region,
the company’s UK and Ireland channel
base comprises around 100 partners who
are managed by OKI’s field sales division.
Telesales team
Nine months ago the firm also created a
telephone account management structure
(TAM) in fifteen countries. In the UK, there
are between 100 and 200 reseller accounts
who are looked after by TAMs.
As part of its strategy to increase its
share of channel business and appoint new
partners, this team is also charged with
calling dealers to explain OKI’s offer and
how it can help them win new business,
with the end goal of getting them on
board.
“The TAMs are a relatively new
introduction for OKI UK,” Hagiwara said.
“What we are trying to do with this
approach is engage with more channel
partners by telephone and this team has a
brief to recruit new dealers to join us as an
OKI business partner.”
“The important thing here is that we’re
PrintIT Reseller
spoke to Takaaki Hagiwara, Managing Director OKI Systems
UK and Thomas Seeber, Vice President Channel and Distribution EMEA, about
the company’s channel partner programme and plans to increase its share of
channel business
OKI to build channel
partner network
providing local support to resellers, so
when a UK dealer calls, they get to talk
to a specialist in the UK, and if they need
additional support, then one of the team
will go and visit them,” Seeber added.
“We need to provide different levels
of support to resellers, we recognise that
those operating in the traditional printer/
copier space have different needs to IT
resellers for example,” Seeber explained,
adding: “It’s important that we have both
field sales and telephone-based sales teams
in place to serve our channel customers.”
“We want the dealer sales team to
increase our share of channel,” Hagiwara
said. “We need a mix of distributors and
VARs with a broader channel base.”
Multichannel offer
OKI’s range caters to different segments.
“We have a new product range for the
e-commerce market and a subset of
products with different specifications to
enable us to give margin back to the face
to face channel,” Seeber said. At present,
OKI has approximately ten e-commerce
partners. “We cannot ignore the online
channels, but we now need to develop the
classical channel,” he added.
OKI printers are available through
Midwich, Exertis and Northamber and
consumables are sold through Beta, VOW
and Westcoast. Seeber hinted that a new
distribution deal was in the pipeline. “We
also have a yearly promotional planner,
that’s important to have in distribution, and
the offers are available exclusively to OKI
partners,” he said.
Seeber explained that the company has
a bespoke rebate scheme that recognises
hardware and software sales in place
for partners. “Not just within the copier
We need
to provide
different levels
of support
to resellers,
we recognise
that those
operating in
the traditional
printer/copier
space have
different needs
to IT resellers
