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Hello, everyone. I’m Richard Murray, chief commercial officer at Telarus. And today, I am joined by Tim Acker, the channel chief, VP of channel sales from Lumen. Tim, welcome to, Telarus, and, thanks for being here.
Richard, good to see you. Thanks for having me.
Absolutely. Well, look. I’d I’d like to start out with, talking about some of the the recent, changes in your organization and where where you guys are and some of the exciting things that you’re starting to see.
Yeah. We’re incredibly focused and refocused on the channel and the team that supports that. So we have more investments in the field, than we’ve ever had. You know, we’ve got a sixty person team in the field, a big inside team that supports them
for and supports advisors from a transactional perspective, and then our advanced solutions team, which is helping partners with, the new technologies that we’re building, things like NAS, which I know we’ll talk about in a little bit.
But all of the other things that we’re doing from a cloud and and connectivity and and security perspective, which I think are all important. But I think the biggest thing, Richard, that we’re really refocused on is our adviser community and our partners like you. It’s getting in the field more, and I’m spending more time with advisers with our broader partner ecosystem and thinking about and really asking them, what do you need from us to be more successful? And then we’ll talk a little bit later about some unique programs that we’ve put together and how that’s impacted a specific partner, but that’s really the conversation shift that we’re starting to have is how do we accelerate, how do we advance, and how do we help our advisors sell more with Lumen, and what are the resources they need from us to do that?
Yeah.
And, yeah, look. As big as the the Lumen channel is and has been for so long, you guys are seeing, you know, still great growth and great, opportunity within the channel.
That’s exciting to see because not all, suppliers can claim that.
That’s right. That’s right.
The the interesting thing is you guys have so many different products and a lot of different things that our advisers can talk to their customers about. Certainly networks or, you know, these you’ve got the the ability for security conversations and all that. Today, I’d like to maybe see if we can focus on one because I think it is such a unique play for you guys and a great opportunity for advisers. It’s a great intersection, and that’s the network as a service conversation and product.
That’s right.
That’s a very broad acronym. Can you kinda get us deeper into what does that actually mean from a business standpoint?
Yeah. So so NAS as we refer to it as network as a service is is a collection of pieces really on Lumen’s digital platforms. We built this new underlying fabric based platform to really think about how do we layer multiple services for customers obviously available through our channel. So it it’s a conglomeration of Internet on demand, so the ability to take and scale up, scale down actual connectivity.
Right? So, our classic connectivity product. But it also allows us to put things over the top of that. So our security product.
Right?
Our SaaSy offers that we have, cloud connections, interconnect with cloud. And and finally, you know, things like DDoS, which is really, again, part of that security profile that, you know, helps us keep traffic secure and and and, networks running smoothly. So it’s really a collection of those things, but the way that we think about it, for our partners and for our customers is the ability to, on a consumption basis, turn up the type of connectivity that they need that may go up or down depending on seasonality, cyclicality of their business. They may be running special events, as we’ve articulated in some of the case studies that we’ve put out about NAS.
But we just crossed a major milestone with NAS itself. We we’ve signed our thousandth customer has gone on all that. Yeah. Yeah.
It’s been very exciting. We’re we’re investing more in that space and, and investing more on how partners can use it and how to think about that. It it’s really a great opportunity for partners to sell a classic connectivity product, but then be able to stack services on top of it. And we’re gonna continue to introduce new services that can ride over that single port.
So we’re really excited about it, and future of of what we’ll call on demand, basic, connectivity.
Well, and they’re able to do it on on a really cool looking platform. Right? Like, you guys it is it is a good looking opportunity for them to show you guys as a technology vendor more than just a a network vendor.
It really is.
And and each one of those elements that you talked about, the DDoS, the the other elements that they can order through, each one of those is a, what I would say, a unique product that allows advisers to engage customers in a in a more relevant conversation. Right? Sometimes our advisors don’t want to or it’s hard to get an appointment to go say, hey. How do I sell you more bandwidth?
It’s easier to get the the appointment if, hey. How do I help you secure your environment? You get that appointment. Now you wrapped it all up into one conversation using that as a door opener.
And so with that, I’d I’d love for you to walk us through, a a what I know is a success story of an adviser that came to us and and and with Lumen and said, help me open more doors. What product do you guys have that’s unique? And I know you guys suggested NAS, and and they were able to walk through it. But let’s walk through for the adviser that maybe hasn’t sold NAS before, which this adviser hadn’t.
Yep. Kind of let’s walk through what that process looks like and then what the success can be at the end. Yeah. Where do they start?
Where do they start? So so the the door opener, by the way, is exactly what you talked about was the platform. And when we demo it, we actually have a seventy percent close rate with customers.
Which is Seventy percent of it.
Like, I you know,
that’s that’s phenomenal for a sales guy. It really tells a great story. Customers eat up the story, and they really understand how relevant it is to them. But to answer your question, that that demo with a partner then opened up new thinking with that partner around selling exactly what he said beyond connectivity.
So they they really had a challenge. They said, hey. Where can we go to customers with a differentiated offer, a new story, a whole new conversation? And so to your point, that’s why we suggested NAS.
And it wasn’t just about, hey. Let me give you some product sheets, and let me have you go out and and sell. We really got intimate with both Telarus, as as their TSD and the partner themselves and really create a full enablement plan. We help them with leads, help them sourcing, we help them with the materials, that advanced solutions team that we talked about earlier.
But when went in and really trained their people and got deep with them on the the value prop, the, the positioning, and the technical side of that. And so, we we had a tremendous amount of success. We’ve had at least a dozen opportunities, many of those closing around those close rates. It’s really been phenomenal, and it’s changed that partner’s perspective.
It’s changed their approach in the way that they’re selling. They’re showing up talking about exactly what you said, connectivity plus security plus a growth play. They’re targeting high growth, high value customers that really have big opportunities, and they’re showing up around a we’re a partner with you. We’ve got Lumen and Telarus behind the scenes that are really gonna help you as a customer deliver something different to your customers.
And that that’s what was so unique is the the partnership.
You guys leaning into them, them leaning into you, you helping with marketing, and there there were cadence calls and follow-up to make sure they had everything they needed, and we’re removing roadblocks. And it was just one of those those things that you don’t often
get to see in large channel organizations that truly lean in and partnership that that drove a lot of success.
And and so from your side, how did you see that, and what success did did you see the adviser have, and how did that reflect in your side of the organization?
Yeah. It it’s it’s become a case study of how to do partnerships differently for us. Right? So we we made public statements about the importance of partners to to Lumen, our growth, and sort of our next, you know, our journey and where we’re going, as an organization.
And and and, actually, all the way to our CEO who asked specifically about this partner and wanted wants to have a call specifically with this partner to understand, hey. What worked here? What did Lumen do well? Where can we continue to innovate?
Clearly, you’ve hit a vein of demand, and it I think it really speaks to both we saw success, the partners having great success. But our executive teams are really curious around how can we do more of it and talking with partners about it. Clearly, we talk to customers in advisory board sessions and, obviously, when we’re face to face with customers. But to see members of our leadership team getting intimate with partners and saying, how can we do more?
What worked here? Talk to us about what we can do differently. That’s incredible. And I think it shows both we’re backing up what we’re saying about the channel, but then also that, being really thoughtful about product and how we bring products that are, available and an advantage to advisers, is is a key part of that story.
That’s great. So for the advisers that are watching this that that hear that somebody else had this great success and they wanna replicate it, what would be your invitation to them?
Yeah. We’re we’re open for business. Right? We have, big opportunities both in products like NAS, which we’re super excited about making big investments and a number of other things that you’ll see us announce over the coming weeks and months.
But, it it’s really you know, it’s formed around a relationship like we have here, Richard. Right? Your team was instrumental in helping us both get the customer excuse me, the partner convinced. Right?
Get the partner ready using your resources. And so, yeah, my my call to action to advisers is, you know, reach out, talk to your team. They know how to to get to us. Clearly, I’ve got assets in the field also that are willing and ready to have those conversations, but that case study is something we wanna replicate.
We’re working with other advisors on very similar projects. It’s all about we’d love to make an investment in them. We’re hoping they’re gonna make an investment in us. But that’s the type of partnerships and the way that we wanna partner going forward.
Far beyond transactional, far beyond connectivity is let’s have a real conversation around how we can go advance the ball with your customers. And so, yeah, open for business, but I can’t thank you and your team enough for that example and the examples you’re setting for the channel and for us every day.
Well, it’s it’s a great success story and one that I I believe is repeatable.
And, we just need advisers to hear that it is a refreshed Lumen. There are these opportunities, and we can all go after it together. And that’s really how I view it. So it’s been great to be able to do that with you guys as well. So thank you.
Thanks for your support. Absolutely.
Well, that’s all we have. It’s a great place for us to wrap up. Again, for those of you that want to figure out new conversations that you can have, Lumen is a pathway to do that through NAS and other product sets. Thank you for joining us here today. We’ll see you later.