Channel Strategies Archives

Branding / Channel Strategies / Contractors / Customer Segments / Growth Strategies / Marketing / More Insights / Sales Channel

Customers are People Too – Know Their Demographics

David Gordon Posted On January 11, 2015

I know, it should obvious. Are your customers people or are they businesses? What differentiates one company from another is a mix of services, product availability, prize, credit, ease of doing business and yes, possibly relationships. But relationships are personal. […]

Channel Strategies / Customer Segments / Distributors / eBusiness / eMarketing / Growth Strategies / Industry Consolidation / Industry News / Lighting / Lighting2 / Manufacturers / Marketing / More Insights / People in the News / Research Reports / Sales Channel / Supplier / Products

10 Issues that May Be Keeping You Up at Night

David Gordon Posted On December 18, 2014

This posting is adapted from a recent article in Channel Marketing Group‘s newsletter. The thoughts in italics are added commentary. “As we close out the year we thought we’d share observations from conversations we’ve had with manufacturers and distributors recently. […]

Channel Strategies / Contractors / Growth Strategies / Marketing / More Insights

Manufacturer and Distributor Promotional Ideas

David Gordon Posted On December 15, 2014

As the year begins to wind down, many in marketing departments are giving consideration to promotional / marketing ideas for 2015. To help provide some fodder for idea generation, we thought we’d share some promotions / marketing items that have […]

Channel Strategies / Customer Service / Logistics / Marketing / More Insights / Productivity / Profitability

CSI study can lead to process improvement (hub delivery)

David Gordon Posted On December 3, 2014

The other day I was writing a customer satisfaction report we had just conducted for a client. The report asks customers what is important to them and how the client performs on each of the attributes. It covers all aspects of […]

Channel Strategies / Customer Service / Distributors / eBusiness / eMarketing / Growth Strategies / More Insights / Technology

Border States and Reynolds – Customer Service, Omni-Channel or Reacting to Amazon Supply

David Gordon Posted On November 23, 2014

Earlier this month both Border States and Reynolds Electric launched new online sites with robust eCommerce systems. While neither is currently a national distributor, their size, financial resources, access to capital (financial and human) and, in the size of Border States […]

Channel Strategies / Contractors / Customer Segments / Customer Service / eBusiness / Growth Strategies / More Insights / Pricing / Sales Channel

Is Amazon Supply ready for Contractors?

David Gordon Posted On November 2, 2014

In the October issue of Electrical Wholesaling magazine we asked the question of whether Amazon Supply could compete with traditional distributors by using the traditional distributors inventory as a source of supply for MRO type of sales. Some have asked if […]

Branding / Channel Strategies / Growth Strategies / Industry Consolidation / Lighting / Lighting2 / Manufacturers / Marketing Groups / More Insights / Supplier / Products

Eaton … a formidable platform?

David Gordon Posted On October 29, 2014

This morning I was listening to the Eaton quarterly analyst call and I was reminded of conversations from the recent AD meeting as well as discussions with some IMARK distributors after the recent IMARK meeting. And there appears to be […]

Channel Strategies / Distributors / Growth Strategies / Lighting / Lighting2 / Manufacturers / More Insights / Sales Channel / Supplier / Products

Comments and Insights re LED Suppliers

David Gordon Posted On October 23, 2014

A couple of weeks ago we had a posting that related to Cree’s significant share drop based upon a pre-announcement of “missing” on analyst projections (and not really by a lot to us lay people) and mentioning that the LED […]

Channel Strategies / Customer Segments / Distributors / Growth Strategies / Industry News / Lighting / Lighting2 / Manufacturers / More Insights / Research Reports / Supplier / Products

LEDs … Declining or Growing?

David Gordon Posted On October 2, 2014

Over the past few weeks I’ve been working with clients on their 2015 strategies. As an element we review much data, inquire about what has driven business in 2014 and discuss areas of focus for 2015. We’ve seen a correlation, […]