An interview with Sam Taylor, Senior Vice President and COO, Almo Professional A/V
With 2020 in the rearview mirror, we are settling in and setting our sites on new goals in 2021. And yes, while 2021 is already starting with its share of challenges, there is a bright glimmer of expectation for the future, especially in Pro AV!
With recent AVIXA reports showing 7-8 percent growth this year, the Pro AV market continues to march ahead. In fact, according to AXIXA’s 2020 Industry Outlook and Trends Analysis, North American Pro AV revenue is expected to grow to $78.5 billion in 2021, up from $74.3 billion in 2020.
There are other glimmers available to small businesses in our industry. The latest COVID-19 Relief Package signed into law on Dec. 27, 2020 provides a second round of assistance to companies in need. See the see the full article from NSCA for complete details.
Sam Taylor Senior Vice President & COO, Almo Professional A/V
Many lessons were learned in 2020. Like most companies, the Almo Pro A/V crew was also challenged with cancelled events, the work-from-home learning curve, and moving quickly to offer new ways to keep reseller and integrator partners learning, working and relevant.
We sat down with Sam Taylor, Vice President and COO for Almo Pro A/V to get his perspective on the highs and lows of 2020 and what to expect from Almo in 2021. Here’s what he had to say:
Q: What was the single greatest challenge for Almo in 2020?
Sam: The most difficult part was the inability to begin or complete installations due to facility closures. We’ve experienced a “W-shaped” business cycle with projects at a hard stop in the spring, only to come roaring back in the summer, then closing down again in the late fall with re-opening starting to happen again now.
Q: How has Almo responded to this challenge?
Sam: Two primary ways, by keeping our partners educated on new trends and opportunities in the industry and providing them with relevant products/services/support they need to keep their business moving forward – either with existing opportunities or with new ones. While many markets like hospitality and onsite events were paused, others like distance learning for education and working from home for corporate businesses had urgent new AV needs.
Q: How is Almo keeping partners educated?
Sam: For the first time in 11 years, and after announcing and preparing for our regional E4 Experience education and networking program to travel to Washington, D.C. and CA last spring, we cancelled our live events and introduced a new virtual platform called E4 Evolution (E4v). E4v was met with such success that it has become a permanent part of the E4 program. With fully curated live and interactive AVIXA-certified sessions led by all-star educators on relevant topics to help attendees thrive, E4v has become the next evolution in live education experiences.
We are soon announcing the next E4v, which will take place in March! Stay tuned for details!
Q: What other measures has Almo taken to support integrators since COVID changed our world?
Sam: We are constantly evaluating and changing direction based on the industry and the needs of our partners. We now offer PPE, disinfectant fogging kits, hand sanitizing kiosks and other point-of-entry products. We supply work-from-home bundles and lecture-capture devices for educators and business professionals. We’ve even entered an exclusive relationship with ARHT Media to offer holographic telepresence technology, which is the next best thing to being live!
At the same time, we’ve expanded our managed services offering, particularly for labor and installation to include drafting and engineering options. So many spaces have to be reworked to accommodate COVID restrictions, like restaurant build-outs and restructured office and educational facilities and most of these changes must be made quickly. Almo provides these services so integrators can use them without having to worry about hiring the experts or managing the overhead. We are ready for you now.
Q: How have you handled shipping and manufacturing delays due to COVID?
Sam: The most common delays we have seen are with cameras and USB audio products due to high demand, particularly for education. We offer multiple manufacturing lines so that if one is delayed, there is usually another to access. We help our partners lock down on product allocations early and build flexible options into their P.O.’s to provide the best possible outcome. Offering managed services to help get those products installed quickly and effectively has also helped our partners complete their projects.
Q: Looking on the bright side, what are some of the positives that emerged as a result of all the challenges in 2020?
Sam: It’s been interesting to see how some of the changes we’ve been forced to make have actually been beneficial. We have the technology to make working from home a professional, productive experience. Our E4v has enabled partners to participate in more educational sessions worth AVIXA CTS renewal units from the comfort and safety of their remote workspace. New projects and new ways of conducting business have created exciting new opportunities for our industry that we have been able to immediately embrace.
What are you looking forward to the most in 2021?
Sam: I cannot wait until I am seeing our customers and our vendor partners in person, and getting back to the business of being together as an industry face to face for business and pleasure. While some things may permanently change, many will stay in a “hybrid” mode for some. As COVID vaccines and treatments become more widely available, public spaces will continue to open, making way for existing projects to continue and new projects to begin. The future is bright!
DO YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS FOR SAM? IF SO, TYPE THEM IN THE COMMENTS SECTION BELOW!
The year is 2020 and by now the word is out that ALMO Professional A/V offers Business Communication Services as a value-add to our partners and their customers. What is rapidly evolving are the specific services that fall under the “business communications” category and just how they can impact our daily routines.
Whenever a discussion about Business Communication Services begins, most think of Internet, Voice, and TV services as the traditional “triple play bundle” and stop the conversation there. Do not get me wrong, Internet connectivity is still an absolute essential and with the number of home-based workers drastically increasing; that will not change any time soon. In fact, in the past 3 months alone, ALMO has assisted two top-10 integrators save between $11,000 and $54,000 a year on their internet connectivity, all because they wanted an analysis on their current spend and found that their current service was not nearly as efficient as it could be.
I am here to tell you that there is so much more value to be gained by analyzing the other essential communication services and not to be scared by outside the box thinking and questioning. With that in mind, I present to you my new bundle: Mobility and Marketing.
Mobility might be the easier of the two to comprehend to the
average customer. Gone are the days
where you have to drive to the local phone store, pick out a device and stand
there for over an hour waiting for the process to be completed. Through ALMO, our customers can source
wireless phone service, devices, and accessories for the same cost as if they
were to walk into a store directly. The
difference is that ALMO has partnered with AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, and
T-Mobile so we are able to provide you full transparency on the best pricing,
calling service, and terms for your needs.
Competitive information, in the wireless world, is a very powerful
commodity. Our customers can expect the same device lineups, same pricing, and
same service…just more information at their fingertips!
Marketing, while some feel is not a form of communication, is actually one of my favorites. Without necessities like SEO (search engine optimization) and social media our customers would be in a black hole while trying to find new opportunities and thus not able to “communicate” with their customers. ALMO has recently begun working with one of the top providers in the country, Vivial, to provide that benefit. Vivial specializes in offering a fully integrated online+social+mobile solution to customers. The foundation of what they offer through ALMO is Vivial’s award-winning Marketing Platform which helps customers with tactics such as Facebook Advertising, Content Marketing, Directory Optimization, Review Generation, and Improving Google Rankings. Consider all of this PLUS our customers have a dedicated account manager to hold their hands through the entire process. Use the information I provided to help your own business flourish this year. My challenge to each of you is to take at least ONE of your current services and contact ALMO Professional A/V for a FREE analysis and quote on how we can pass on the same savings to you as we have for so many others.
As we enter the new decade the landscape for labor continues to evolve for AV integrators.
The challenges remain the same; how many technicians do I need to both maintain and grow my business? How can I compete if I am smaller in size but actually have the “smarts and parts” to otherwise compete?
The answer to both is outsource!
In the (20)20’s, we are clearly in the throes of the gig economy, and the field of AV labor is no exception. Many technicians have chosen to freelance as opposed to work full-time on the staff of an integrator, which presents great opportunities for all involved.
The techs can be self-employed, and the business owners don’t have to deal with hiring, vetting, managing, and carry technicians on payroll.
A primary focus for the industry now is commonly referred to as AVaaS, or AV as a service. Leveraging outsourced labor is a great way to support these solutions, along with SLAs. If you are not building an annual recurring revenue stream for your business – please begin to now!
Again, regardless of the size of your company, could you not benefit from having access to a nationwide footprint of technicians to allow you to service your clients, and support these contracts? In most instances you can outsource technicians to respond within 48 hours, and in some instances 24 hours, or even same day.
If you are a smaller integrator, you can now see how you can grow and create annual recurring revenue without managing your employees. If you are a larger integrator, you now have the ability to extend your support to an even wider client base, without losing a great lead who is onsite at a project – to a service call.What if you send a team out to install a project, but 6 months later that client requires a service call? What is the cost to send a tech on a plane, or extended drive – losing that tech as a resource for primary projects? Could you not benefit from a local tech – that effectively becomes “your tech” to provide consistent support to your client?
What if an existing local client is opening, or renovating an office 1,000 miles away? What you require is a site survey. Compare the cost of sending a tech of your own versus having access to a local tech who can not only provide that survey on an hourly basis (no travel/per diem), and then serve as a resource if needed on the install/upgrade? The benefit seems clear.
As summer approaches (being based in the Northeast – we think summer is coming in February), school projects become both an opportunity and a challenge. You are presented with a local school district looking to install a few hundred projectors or smartboards across several schools in a tight time frame. Your existing labor force cannot complete it. Do you pass, or do you call a partner who can provide you day rate AV techs to augment your team.
These are just a few examples of how important outsourcing labor is to both maintaining and growing your business.
There are many obvious concerns you have. Will the techs maintain the level of excellence you expect? How will they represent themselves? What are their skills? Do they have the required licensing, background/drug checks? Have they done this work before? Where do they come from?
All of the above are a part of the vetting process that must be in place when you seek a partner to help you with your outsourced labor needs. All must be addressed in advance to guarantee that the expectations of both you, and your client are met.
ALMO Labor services offer integrators skilled technicians to support they businesses in all aspects inlacing full project completions, nationwide rollouts, temporary labor, site surveys, and service calls. With a nationwide footprint, this enables dealers to take on more projects, reduce travel costs, support their service contracts, and more.
Jay Saret – ALMO Services Development Manager – East
The bottom line is – outsourced labor is a resource to consider to help grow and maintain your business. If you’ve not yet tried it – do so. Start small, and make sure you are vetting the partner that you choose to insure your success.
Here’s to a great 2020 (and beyond)!
To learn more about ALMO’s outsourced labor options, you can catch this on-demand webinar for more information.
OK y’all, this is my first time as an Almo Blogger. Or is it Bloggist? Filipino by birth, East Tennessean by the grace of God, this Filbilly sometimes doesn’t rightly know what term to use.
However, I do know the difference between these two terms: Pro AV Pharmacist vs. Pro AV Physician.
I was at Walgreens one evening to stock up on a few vitamins, and I overheard a man ask the pharmacist if he could give him something for hiccups. The pharmacist promptly reached out and slapped the man’s face!
The man exclaimed, “What’d you do that for?”
“Well, you don’t have the hiccups anymore, do you?” said the pharmacist.
The man said, “No, but my wife out in the car still does!”
Questions are the answers.
To me, a pharmacist is someone who fills a prescription … someone who dispenses a medication or a fix. A Pro AV pharmacist would be a reseller whom, for example, when asked by his/her end user for a quote on a 5000 lumen WUXGA projector, simply provides the prices of a few projectors fitting that description.
A physician is someone who asks diagnostic questions to uncover every symptom/point of pain/challenge and provides the necessary treatment to remove the issue, address other situations which may affect the patient, and avoid future reoccurrences. Compare that to a Pro AV physician, a reseller whom, when asked by his/her end user for a quote on that 5000 lumen WUXGA projector, would ask questions such as:
What’s the application? How many hours per day will the projector be in use?
What type of lighting is in the room?
What kind of content is being presented?
Is there a projector screen already installed? What’s the gain on that screen?
What size is the screen? What’s the aspect ratio?
At what distance will the projector be installed?
What are you connecting?
How far away is your source?
What’s the budget?
How are you mounting the unit?
Who’s doing the installation?
When you ask the questions necessary to present a solution, you might find that the product your customer originally asked for doesn’t fit the project requirements.
Here’s a situation to keep in mind when your end user tells you that he/she wants a quote on a solution he/she saw online. One day, a reseller asked me for a quote on a TV by specific part number. I started by asking him, “What’s the application?”
He quickly dismissed my questioning by saying that the end user has a small budget and that’s what he asked for. I asked him again, “What’s the TV being used for?” He said it’s being used for surveillance. I said, “Surveillance, as in 24 hours a day?” He quickly realized that the TV he asked for wasn’t designed for 24/7 operation and thanked me for saving his petooty. Remember, don’t just fill the prescription!
You can also be a hero when a customer asks for a quote on a consumer TV to be installed in a commercial setting.
After asking questions about the project requirements and—if you determine that the consumer TV will fit the commercial application in terms of brightness, hours of operation, and budget—educate him/her by saying, “The 1-year manufacturer’s warranty reduces to 90 days when the TV is for commercial use. Do you want to upgrade your service coverage to a 2-, 3-, 4- or 5-year extended warranty?” Asking the right questions and educating your customer on consumer warranties could avoid a costly situation if the displays were to go funky after 90 days.
Almo Services: your partner to deliver the full package.
It’s absolutely critical to ask a lot of questions so you can provide a total solution. Always add the mounts and extended warranties (when it applies) onto the quote. Ask what other essentials are needed—cables, signal flow, control systems, audio. Ask who’s installing the job. (If you’re not able to provide that service, let Almo Install be an arm to your team!) Ask who’s creating the content on the digital signage project. (Not your area of expertise? Almo Content will do it for you!) Ask who’s programming the control systems. (You don’t have a programmer to do it? Almo Control is your resource!) Ask about their current phone, internet and TV service. (You can earn a monthly revenue stream as a provider through Almo Connect!) If you’re not familiar with these accompanying products and services to complete the project, your Almo account manager can help you!
Learn the latest for FREE!
Whether you’re already calling yourself Doctor AV, or if you’re still developing your expertise in the Pro AV space and want to become a better Pro AV physician, attend one of our FREE 2018 E4 Pro AV Tour stops to learn about the hottest technology and trends:
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