[February 22, 2005]

Tehrani to Offer Unplugged Session Wednesday

By David Sims, TMCnet CRM Alert Columnist

It is, as TMC President Rich Tehrani says on his blog, "the Holy Grail in any business” – making money at it. Anyone care to argue?

How can you make money selling VoIP? “The last few years at Internet Telephony Conference & Expo have seem me field this question dozens of times from people worldwide trying to get in on what may be the most lucrative and important technology of this century – possible exaggeration alert – would you believe at least the decade?” Tehrani says.

It’s getting so Tehrani can hardly ride an elevator without someone buttonholing him and asking Rich, how do I make money reselling VoIP?

”Rather than deal with these questions on a case by case basis,” Tehrani says, “I decided to address it on a larger scale by inviting resellers and industry experts for a healthy discussion on how to make money in this business.”

It’s a timely answer. Interconnects made a healthy living selling phone systems for years, but now a new game is in town and one needs to understand it to excel in it, and as Tehrani correctly points out, “you need to know what to sell, how to sell, how to position it and who else is selling it.”

Oh, and the session tomorrow, Wednesday the 23rd at 10:15 in the Keynote ballroom is, blessedly, a PowerPoint-free presentation – VoIP Unplugged. It’s “just a healthy dialogue on how to profit from selling voice over IP products and services.” Live people, live questions, live answers, nothing canned, no PowerPoint Rangers here.

Participating with Tehrani will be Robert Messer, President and CEO of ABP Technology Inc. and Chris Nein of Go2Call.

ABP Technology specializes in the distribution of "Best of Breed" Voice over IP (VoIP) technology products from companies in the U.S. and around the world. Key product lines distributed by ABP include AudioCodes, Allworx, Citel, Digium, Epygi, Ingate, Intertex, Mediatrix, Red Hawk, Sipura, and snom.

Founded in 1998, Go2Call provides high quality VoIP calling services to customers around the world. Their hosted internet telephony solutions are flexible and scalable enough to serve customers ranging from international carriers to the individual consumer. Chris Nein is responsible for leading the company's global sales team, managing customer and channel relationships and developing strategy to continue Go 2 Call's growth. He also manages the regional sales teams located around the globe and provides extensive experience in working with US and International carriers.

David Sims is contributing editor and CRM Alert columnist for TMCnet.