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Betting on Custom Installers

OneVision Resources invests in new services to help increase revenue opportunities for their dealer partners.

To call OneVision Resources founder and CEO Joseph Kolchinsky bullish on the custom integration industry would be an understatement. “We think that every integrator in this industry is sitting on a gold mine,” he says. “We think this is one of the best industries to be investing in. Of course, you’ve got to invest in the right companies and in the right teams — the teams who agree that they’re sitting on a gold mine.”

The gold mine, in this case, is the custom install service operation and its potential for recurring revenue. Which is why OneVision provides 24/7 technical customer service for their dealer partners — and they do it at a greatly reduced price in exchange for a percentage of the recurring service plans they help sell.

“We subsidize our fees to these partners and share in the recurring revenue that we build up with them,” says Kolchinsky. “So we effectively become investors in their company.”

With the recent announcement that OneVision has expanded its offerings with business services — including hiring and HR, financial planning and accounting, and business coaching and leadership development — it is clear that they are going all in on their investments.

OneVision Resources - Service Chart

“If you fast forward over the next several years, what does success look like? Integrator service departments are going to end up having 50 to 100 employees and we’re going to end up getting customers not through projects, but through service. We’re going to be doing more than smart home support. We’re going to be doing personal technology support — computers, mobile devices, etc. We’re going to be doing more takeovers because, for every client who’s building a house, there are nine other clients who already built the house and want more out of their service experience. So what do we have to do to enable our partners to be successful over that timeframe?”

The answer for OneVision would be to take over the tasks that keep them focused in the business rather than on the business. Technical support was a big part of that, but when you take hiring, accounting, and training off their plate, the opportunities increase dramatically, Kolchinsky believes.

“We now know how to hire people from outside the industry and train them in this industry,” he says. “With accounting, a lot of integrators don’t have their books structured in such a way that lets them use them as a strategic tool. Those are two areas where we can clear hotspots in terms of growth limits to integrators.

“We helped them with service and getting the whole recurring revenue thing figured out, but we realized we needed to invest more. That’s why we built out the accounting and the finance arms — and also the business coaching arm through EOS — in order to help our partners really crack through the ceiling and unlock the full potential of their client base.”

Like their customer service model, OneVision also heavily subsidizes the business services, anticipating increased revenue through expanding the shared recurring revenue programs. “We firmly believe that if we free up our partners’ bandwidth, time, and energy, and enable them to run their businesses better, that their businesses will take off through service and, long-term, we’ll get the ROI,” says Kolchinsky.

With a model such as this, OneVision is pretty particular about the dealers they partner with. “When we look for more integrators to invest in, we care most about the leadership team,” says Kolchinsky. “We care about the culture — that’s what matters most. It doesn’t matter to me if you are in the CE Pro 100 or if you fly under the radar. What matters more than anything is: Are you open-minded? Are you a strong team leader? Do you have committed team members with low turnover over time? Do your employees like you and the team that you’ve built? Do your clients like your company? Are you respected in your community?”

For clients who are interested in working with OneVision, the process starts with a meeting to gauge interest and fit between the two companies. From there, the vetting process involves more meetings with different people from the dealer’s team and the developing of a business plan. The full process tends to take from four-to-six weeks.

“Our smallest partners are anywhere from seven or eight employees, but we also have partners as large as 60 employees, so size doesn’t totally matter,” says Kolchinsky. “What does matter is that the dealer sees the lifetime value of a client, not just the one-time value of selling the project.”

Using OneVision’s technical and business services allows dealers to compete with larger competitors by offering 24/7 support as well as CFO-type services that manage the entire financial ecosystem — from bill pay and accounts receivable, to time tracking and payroll, to inventory.

Plus, it offers advantages to those looking to sell or expand their businesses. “Within our partner base, you have some integrators that are looking to exit the industry and you have some integrators who are looking to expand,” says Kolchinsky. “And if you can imagine that, in one local marketplace, we have three or four partners, who would you rather absorb and sell to? Wouldn’t it be better to absorb a company that’s already on the business platform that you also use?”

To find out if OneVision Resources is right for your company, check out https://www.onevisionresources.com.

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