Spectrum Enterprise: Managed Services, High-Data Capacity Products Top of Mind
SMB partners are getting expanded compensation options for coax sales.
![Spectrum Enterprise Michelle Kadlacek Q&A Spectrum Enterprise Michelle Kadlacek Q&A](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt10e444bce2d36aa8/blt0d00ee5d3d5159d6/656a8161a0b03e040a725811/Fiber_optic_server_room.jpg?width=700&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale)
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Channel Futures: Regarding the service level agreements (SLAs), how have those evolved among the MSOs? What historically have partners' expectations for SLAs? How has that evolved in the space?
Michelle Kadlacek: We've always held a very, very competitive service-level agreement. If you ask our partners, they love the service once it's installed. I think increasing it to 100% SLA just shows that we're putting our efforts into delivering that client experience. We're standing behind 100% uptime. In addition to that, we want to award and reward partners for selling those services and bringing their clients into Spectrum Enterprise. For us, there has been a great feedback from the partners. We've heard a lot of good excitement around it. We've won some large deals with the SLA, and especially with our partner incentive that we launched at the same time, so we're really excited about it.
CF: Spectrum Enterprise is offering special incentives on high-capacity data products and managed services. How has traction been with those categories, as far as partners selling them?
MK: When we talk about some of the biggest things that are going on at Spectrum right now and what's hot in the portfolio, managed services is top of that. It has been very, very popular. It only made sense for us to ... enhance that with an incentive. With that managed services product, our partners are really helping [customers] grow their business right. Managed services is a big topic in the industry. It's a way that we can deliver a holistic solution. We can deliver the connectivity on 100% SLA and deliver the managed services layered on top of that. So we're helping partners really expand their business around connectivity.
CF: Spectrum Enterprise has opened up Spectrum's Community Solutions portfolio to the channel. Is this related to multifamily units?
MK: Yes. We introduced Community Solutions last year to partners. They can offer coax and fiber connectivity to businesses like apartments, single-family gated communities, off-campus student housing, senior residence, RV parks, marinas – that sort of vertical. It has really just been a great revenue stream for partners that have been able to tap into that.
CF: Over the years, were partners staying away from that due to a lack of availability from the supplier side? Or did they not have as much interest in those verticals?
MK: There was there was definitely interest, which is why we launched the Spectrum Community Solutions to the partner program. It is, if you think of it, more of a residential play. You're dealing with senior residents and student housing and gated communities. That's not something that most partner programs have the ability to sell into and get compensated for. It has been a great addition to our partner program. Partners have really latched on to it. We've had some significant wins within the Community Solutions team. They're growing and expanding that program, and it's been a great addition to the overarching partner program.
CF: How has compensation for SMB coax changed?
MK: Spectrum Business introduced an upfront-plus-residual last year. A lot of our call center-type agents or even some of our partners that are maybe just getting started in the industry like to have that upfront piece. But they also know that as an agent, you want to have that ongoing residual commission. So having that option in the coax portfolio has been great. It's really been a game-changer for our Spectrum Business team. And the clients and the partners have the option on an order-by-order basis. It's not like, "All right, I'm ABC agent, and I have to do residual." I can choose what I want to do whenever it's entered into [the] buy-flow [system].
CF: You previously shared your goals to digitize your program. Do you have any updates?
MK: One of the things that I'm very proud of about our program is that we really continue to make investments, not just in our network infrastructure, but in our CRM platforms and our partner portal. That's all around improving the partner experience. Or role is really to ensure that it's easy for partners to do business with us. One of those is through Partner Link, which is our partner portal for co-branded marketing assets. We can do lead generation campaigns; we do a lot of those. We work one-on-one with partners who may not have a big marketing team to back them up. They can lean on us and through Partner Link to help them with lead-generation campaigns that really can empower them to sell more.
From a digital standpoint, when it comes to contracts, CableFinder has been fantastic to work with. The CableFinder portal has really streamlined and simplified the process from qualifying to quoting and to contracting. It's a tool that can offer a single solution quoting-to-contract, but it also has the ability to offer multisite look-up, both fiber and coax pricing, DocuSign integration. It has made it a lot easier for our partners to sell Spectrum services. On our SMB front, they have worked on improving various digital tools that will make it easier for partners to place coax orders. There's some integration work that's going on right now. You'll see that announcement later on this year.
CF: It seems like there's a lot of optimism in the space in general about the automation that is going to be helping with a lot of these processes. Do you have a big-picture view of what's happening in the connectivity world in terms of making these things more accessible to partners and customers?
MK: "Connectivity" – you're speaking our language. That's our strong point. We continue to serve clients from all different sizes. We can work with small businesses to large enterprises, to the multifamily residential communities. Those clients have varying connectivity needs, which is why we offer industry-leading product portfolios within that. I think the diversity of our connectivity solutions, from fiber to Ethernet to coax, all support the type of data transport that clients are looking for. We can deliver speeds up to 100 gig per second over our fiber network, and that's for a range of data transport solutions, anywhere from internet to wide area network, over our Ethernet, our Wavelength services. And I think the flexibility for that makes it easier for businesses to meet kind of their changing connectivity needs because they're constantly changing. Clients are constantly modernizing and digitizing their own networks. So we've got to stay flexible and nimble and be able to deliver those connectivity needs. We have over 875,000 miles of network infrastructure. We're constantly investing and growing that network so we can meet the needs of our clients.
CF: Avant's Chip Hoisington in a recent article about low-Earth satellites said he envisioned these various access types coexisting at various locations, be it fiber, satellite or cellular. Does that resonate with you?
MK: I think that's an interesting point of view. I know Chip well and I respect his comments. For us, it's really about investing in our network and delivering that layer of connectivity, so clients can feel secure with their services that they layer on top of our connectivity.
CF: Looking inside the channel, particularly the tech services distributor/technology advisor (agent) side, what are you seeing?
MK: In the channel, the thing that you can count on is change. Change and evolution. I feel that we're always trying to anticipate what's around the corner, and be sure that we stay relevant to our partners and to our clients. I think some of the buzz words that we heard at the Channel Partners [Conference & Expo] were around artificial intelligence. AI platforms and applications and how they are driving the need for even higher bandwidth and speeds. It's a rapidly evolving space that the channel is going to be a huge part of. And I see opportunities as companies are going to going to need flexibility. They're going to need scalable and digital infrastructure in place to support their growing needs of emerging technology. It's an opportunity for our TSDs and our selling partners to really lean in on that, to learn more about it and understand it. I see that as a huge opportunity for the program and for the channel in general.
MK: We do see a convergence of IT and telecom. We've talked about that kind of coming together. I spoke at an event recently about how the lines are blurring and they're becoming one. How do you even staff a channel team to understand that and make sure that you've got the right folks in place? When you're building a program, and you're looking at the channel account manager, someone who has that experience in both IT and telecom, or has the capability and the ability to learn both, is a huge asset to helping our partners and helping our clients understand their needs.
CF: Would that be reflective of the folks that have been joining Spectrum?
MK: Yes. We've brought on a couple of new folks recently. And that's what we look for when we look for talent. It's going outside the box and maybe not hitting the easy button and going to somebody that we know is in our backyard. [It's] really understanding where the channel is going and how we ensure that we put the right folks in place to help our partners lean in on some of these new products, to understand digitizing and modernizing their network and making sure that we're there to support them.
MK: We do see a convergence of IT and telecom. We've talked about that kind of coming together. I spoke at an event recently about how the lines are blurring and they're becoming one. How do you even staff a channel team to understand that and make sure that you've got the right folks in place? When you're building a program, and you're looking at the channel account manager, someone who has that experience in both IT and telecom, or has the capability and the ability to learn both, is a huge asset to helping our partners and helping our clients understand their needs.
CF: Would that be reflective of the folks that have been joining Spectrum?
MK: Yes. We've brought on a couple of new folks recently. And that's what we look for when we look for talent. It's going outside the box and maybe not hitting the easy button and going to somebody that we know is in our backyard. [It's] really understanding where the channel is going and how we ensure that we put the right folks in place to help our partners lean in on some of these new products, to understand digitizing and modernizing their network and making sure that we're there to support them.
More stringent service-level agreements and newly opened verticals are helping Charter Communications' Spectrum Enterprise and its partners win new customers.
So says Michelle Kadlacek, vice president of Spectrum Enterprise's channel, who shared numerous updates with Channel Futures on channel efforts at Spectrum Enterprise. The multservice operator (MSO) in February announced that it was guaranteeing 100% uptime on all fiber internet and Ethernet services across its network. That comes after a $40 billion infrastructure investment its parent company Charter completed from 2018-2022.
![Spectrum Enterprise's Michelle Kadlacek Spectrum Enterprise's Michelle Kadlacek](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt10e444bce2d36aa8/blt581a0ba3b38d524c/66394039a119821a8d7320cc/Kadlacek_Michelle_Spectrum_Enterprise_2024.jpg?width=700&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale)
Spectrum Enterprise's Michelle Kadlacek
Kadlacek said connectivity services that Spectrum and its channel partners provide are helping underlay the various AI-powered solutions that are proliferating in the IT world.
"I see opportunities as companies are going to need flexibility, and they're going to need scalable and digital infrastructure in place to support their growing needs of emerging technology," Kadlacek told Channel Futures.
New at Spectrum Enterprise
To that point, Kadlacek said Spectrum Enterprise has rolled out new incentives for partners selling high-data products. The company has similarly incented agents to sell the cableco's managed services.
"When we talk about some of the biggest things that are going on at Spectrum right now and what's hot in the portfolio, managed services is top of that," she said. "It has been very, very popular. It only made sense for us to kind of enhance that with with an incentive."
In addition, Kadlacek said partners last year gained entrance into Spectrum Community Solutions, which cater to resident-focused customers like apartments and RV parks.
SMB Updates
The down-market business group at Charter/Spectrum has similarly been making enhancements to its channel efforts.
Recently SMB-focused Spectrum Business launched its One for Business Package: a bundle of internet, wireless and Wi-Fi services. In addition, Spectrum Business partners selling coaxial cable (coax) services can now pair an upfront commission with a residual commission.
"A lot of our call center-type agents or even some of our partners that are maybe just getting started in the industry like to have that upfront piece," Kadlacek told Channel Futures. "But they also know that as an agent, you want to have that ongoing residual commission. So having that option in the coax portfolio has been great."
In the slideshow above, Kadlacek discusses new incentives and initiatives at Spectrum Enterprise and her insights on the state of the technology advisor channel.
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