SANTA ANA, CA--(Marketwire - Apr 11, 2012) - Ingram Micro Inc. (
The three-day event takes place April 11-13 at the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Hotel in Orlando, Fla., and provides Ingram Micro's SMB Alliance (SMBA) partners with insight on current and imminent technology trends that are expected to drive demand and opportunity among small and midsize businesses (SMBs). Partners will hear valuable advice on how to capitalize on these trends by leveraging the power of the community, Ingram Micro and sponsoring IT vendors. Activity from the SMB Invitational will be featured on the community's Facebook page, website and reported on Twitter by attendees using #SMB2012.
The Ingram Micro Spring SMB Invitational offers constructive breakout sessions, hands-on workshops and a multitude of networking opportunities proven to help channel partners make the most of new technologies and services. The content is geared to assist partners in maximizing their sales and profitability potential within the SMB marketplace by utilizing technologies such as cloud and solutions geared toward key verticals such as healthcare. The event also introduces partners to lucrative technology opportunities fueled by IT convergence trends impacting the SMB marketplace, such as mobile IT.
"The SMB Invitational offers our community members an exclusive opportunity to expand their understanding of the SMB market and identify best practices around growing their solutions and services portfolios, while also expanding their role as a trusted advisor," says John Fago, senior director of channel marketing, Ingram Micro North America. "Community members can take advantage of an exceptional agenda featuring insight from a wide variety of thought leaders, as well as networking opportunities and access to resources unique to Ingram Micro and our SMBA partners."
Attendees will hear from industry experts such as keynote Tiffani Bova, vice president of indirect channel programs and sales strategies worldwide, Gartner; and Jose Ramos, area manager for the North Florida District office of the U.S. Small Business Administration. Veteran industry educator Paul Dippell will offer advice on developing and implementing sales incentive plans, while Laura Posey, Dancing Elephants Achievement Group, will provide tips for understanding your customers' decision-making matrix.
Available throughout the event and at the solution-focused Technology Fair, this year's SMB Invitational vendor sponsors including AMD, APC, Brother, Cisco, Dell, HP, Microsoft, Quantum, Ricoh, Symantec, Trend Micro and VMware will be on hand to discuss their latest technology solutions, programs and partner enablement offerings.
New Exclusive Offerings for SMBA Members
Members of Ingram Micro's U.S.-focused SMBA partner community will enjoy VIP access throughout the entire event, including private sessions with Gartner and sponsoring vendors, as well as invitations to exclusive social networking events. Additionally, two new and exclusive member offerings will be unveiled at the event from Ingram Micro Business Intelligence Center and new IMSourcing program.
In Q2, SMBA community members -- both existing and those partners who join during the event -- will receive access to two Ingram Micro Business Intelligence reports at no charge. The first custom report is the Refresh Opportunity Report, which provides each reseller with its current refresh opportunities as well as identifying which end users are due for new product replacements.
Additionally, members will receive the White Space and Cross Sell Opportunity Report, which identifies the untapped business opportunities that exist within the member's install base. For example, if an end user is currently purchasing printers but not purchasing ink from the reseller, then this would be an identified cross sell opportunity. The report also offers contextual talking points around these opportunities. Each report prioritizes opportunities based on size, likelihood and proximity of the end user to the reseller. After Q2, the reports will be available at a discounted rate to SMBA members.
Also exclusively available to Ingram Micro SMBA members is a comprehensive catalog of IMSourcing items, as well as a 1 percent instant rebate on all IMSourcing products for 12 months, several special SMB offers on IMSourcing products, and an electronic data feed with recently discontinued product and high-margin items. IMSourcing is a new Ingram Micro program that allows reseller partners the ability to source manufacturer-discontinued items no longer readily available in the channel from Ingram Micro and avoid any uncertainty around secondary market procurement and help ensure manufacturer brand protection.
"These exclusive member offerings are great examples of Ingram Micro's ongoing dedication to providing the tools and resources our SMB partners need to drive more profitable and sustainable growth," says Jamie Ferullo, director of sales, SMB Business Unit, Ingram Micro. "Our goal at Ingram Micro is to be universally regarded as the distributor of choice for SMB, and we encourage our partners to leverage our community, programs and services as an extension of their business in order to dominate the SMB market."
For more information about the SMB community, solution providers and IT vendors can email smb@ingrammicro.com, call (800) 456-8000 x67850 or http://www.im-smba.com/.
For more information on Ingram Micro visit www.ingrammicro.com.
Follow Ingram Micro Inc. on Facebook at www.facebook.com/IngramMicro and Twitter at www.twitter.com/IngramMicroInc.
About Ingram Micro's SMB Campaign and SMBA Community
Ingram Micro's SMB campaign touches more than 20,000 customers throughout the United States and has an end-user focus of 1,000 seats and fewer. The SMB campaign provides a variety of tools and resources geared towards enabling our small business partners to enhance their technology and vertical market expertise, along with overall Ingram Micro knowledge, in an effort to help them grow profitably. Within the SMB campaign, there is an exclusive U.S. partner community, SMB Alliance, that provides customers the opportunity to enjoy deeper engagement from manufacturers and access to business-building resources, tools and training to help them run their businesses more effectively and efficiently. As a community, members have the ability to form partnerships, network among their peers with similar business models, share best practices and tap into growth opportunities not available through other distributors.
About Ingram Micro Inc.
As a vital link in the technology value chain, Ingram Micro creates sales and profitability opportunities for vendors and resellers through unique marketing programs, outsourced logistics, technical and financial support, managed and cloud-based services, and product aggregation and distribution. The company is the only global broad-based IT distributor, serving more than 150 countries on six continents with the world's most comprehensive portfolio of IT products and services. Visit www.ingrammicro.com.
Contact Information:
Press Contact:
Marie Rourke
WhiteFox Marketing (for Ingram Micro)
(714) 292-2199
marie@whitefoxpr.com