The Next Generation Of Point Of Sale VARs

By Jim Roddy, VP of Marketing, RSPA

LavuCon 2016, the annual partner conference for iPad POS vendor Lavu, included a few surprises for me. Most notably, of the several dozen VARs who attended, about half were under 40 years of age – a much younger group than the typical point of sale show. Vendors such as Lavu have attracted a younger, iEverything generation to our channel.

That was just one of my takeaways from LavuCon 2016. Here are some others:

• In my talk titled Surefire Growth Strategies For POS Resellers, I listed four keys to reseller growth which resonated with the crowd: grow your sales force, add products/services (recurring revenue services preferred), break into new markets, and invest your resources in marketing.
• Speaking of recurring revenue, I attended a talk on financing as-a-Service deals. It was great to see every VAR there embracing the as-a-Service model, at least conceptually.
• Featured speaker Robert Stevenson discussed How To Close The Sale with a room full of VARs. Stevenson listed four actions that would help VARs with their sales execution. First, memorize your company story and product information. Next, list of the common objections you encounter and then memorize your responses. Third, always be prospecting because you never know when someone will have a need. Finally, have prepared questions you will ask to prospects.

That was just my brief overview of LavuCon 2016. For a complete recap of the event, see my blog post at the Vantiv PaymentsEdge Advisory Services resource center On the Edge with Jim Roddy.