By David Alessandrini
As more and more businesses grow outside their local footprint, many are finding it is critical to forge relationships with business partners who can serve them across multiple geographic locations. This can be a simple as wanting to use the same internet provider for 10 offices located in multiple states to contracting with a single shipping company to deliver goods to customers.
For businesses, being able to work with a single supplier of goods or services enables them to streamline processes and standardize on equipment. It’s easier to troubleshoot a problem or upgrade a system company-wide when the company office in Topeka, Kan., is using and has deployed the same access control system as the office in Pensacola, Fla.
So, why should standardizing on your security systems integrator be viewed any differently?
The security industry has experienced significant changes in recent years, where the national market was once dominated by super-giant security systems integrators with hundreds of locations across the country. While united under a single name, many of these companies still lacked the ability, processes and the project management systems for a location on the West Coast to seamlessly communicate information for a project on the East Coast.
Today, more regional security systems integrators, like members of Security-Net, are coming together to provide national account level fulfillment capabilities with all the benefits of working with a small, local security systems integrator but on a larger scale. Those benefits including working with a company that intimately knows your business, its unique needs and challenges, along with understanding the importance of standardizing on equipment across multiple locations.
In addition, unlike hiring five different integrators for five different geographic locations, a national account integrator will handle all aspects of the project, from systems design to installation and then service, meaning there is consistency throughout and one point of contact.
Without a doubt project management skills and expertise in the security market are just a few of the important qualities required of a security systems integrator who will successfully support their multi-location end user customer.
Partnering with reliable security systems integrators nationally eliminates the guesswork and alleviates the risk that comes with partnering with someone new. As you evaluate your relationship with your security systems integrator it is important to recognize where your company is currently, how you expect it to grow, and who you want by your side through it all. A trusted partnership goes a long way, especially as it relates to security.