If the Covid-19 pandemic has a lesson, it’s that nothing is certain. Around the world, economies, healthcare systems, and lives have been rocked. For businesses, the virus has restructured work, forcing many employees to work from home and forcing businesses to adapt to this new model.
As a result, the term “agility” has transitioned from a buzzword into an operational requirement for businesses hoping to emerge unscathed from these pandemic times.
But what exactly does agility mean?
By definition, agility refers to the ability to move quickly and easily. And in today’s digital world, there are few business models more synonymous with quick and easy moves than SaaS.
With much of the world forced into isolation, SaaS companies and their platforms are becoming more valuable than ever in enabling teams to continue operations and support office and home-based employees.
For SD-WAN vendors or businesses contemplating SD-WAN, the move to SaaS cannot be ignored. Or as McKinsey writes, “vendors that have not yet begun their SaaS transformation must do so now.”
Seamless Customer Experience a Key to Survival
McKinsey urges vendors to do more than just adopt the basic tenets of a SaaS offering (like subscription pricing or cloud hosting). To truly become agile, SD-WAN solutions must accelerate the customer experience as a key differentiator. This means that SD-WAN needs to focus on making it easier for SaaS companies and their customers to move faster and be more agile.
Vendors who are able to think through their customer’s needs and provide a seamless experience are most likely to see their profit margins protected.
Apply SaaS Principles Across the Entire Customer Journey
To reach that level of seamlessness, SD-WAN vendors need to apply SaaS principles across the entire customer journey, not just specific touchpoints. Unfortunately, this seamlessness is an area where many vendors continue to fall short.
“Right now, the customer experience of many SaaS vendors often feels disjointed. All too frequently, for instance, legacy billing processes and order forms riddled with confusing product terminology make it hard for customers to know what they’re paying for,” writes McKinsey.
SD-WAN vendors need to shift thinking and perhaps abandon previous offers or models to ensure that customer experience of both SD-WAN and SaaS improves. With customer experience lying at the heart of vendor profitability (and survival), dated offerings need to be ditched in favor of offerings that enable customers and SaaS companies to move quickly and easily.
性知音’s SD-WAN platform offers SaaS companies the agility they require. Our white-label, subscription-based SD-WAN platform is easily bundled with SaaS offerings. Plus it’s fast and easy to deploy, and multi-tenancy makes it simple to scale.
Put your customers first. Think quick. Think easy. Your profit margins will thank you.