Customer Engagement Center opens access to HPE Products, Experience

By Brandon Samuel

As an account manager, one of my roles is to make sure that I’m providing the absolute best solutions to my clients that my manufacturer partners can offer. The process of a sale can be as quick as 15 minutes – or a year or more, depending on the project at hand.

When it comes to longer-lasting projects, we often spend much time perfecting the configuration and doing rigorous testing to make sure that whatever solution is purchased will work in the client’s existing environment. This testing can require demo units to be allocated, shipped, installed, configured and tested, all of which can take several months to complete, depending on the scale of the solution.

No one can blame a client for wanting to put this level of effort into making a decision. In fact, we encourage it, even if clients might walk in thinking they already have the answers. To be a valued long-term partner, we believe in investing the resources to make sure that the solutions and products that our clients ultimately purchase will differentiate that business not just today but position them to continue building for the next five years.

Let’s face it, when it comes to IT nobody really gives it much thought unless you work on the IT team. Or worse, when the network is down and you can’t do your daily tasks. CIOs and IT directors must make sure that their staff is comfortable with a solution, both from an implementation and management standpoint. The best way to ensure that confidence is by testing their data on the solution being presented. The price and the pressure are far too great of a risk for the solution to not be fully vetted.

What if there was an easier, less time consuming, but equally thorough way? What if we could tell you that the entire process could take less than half of the normal time? Well, we can – and here’s how!

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Customer Engagement Center: New York City, New York

Located in the heart of Chelsea is the HPE Customer Engagement Center. Aside from the HPE logo on the window, you probably wouldn’t give the building a second look, but once you get inside you are in technology heaven! HPE designed this space to show the latest and greatest technologies that HPE has to offer. The goal is to show the future of both one of our primary partners and the companies we serve. 

The center was designed to allow CIOs, directors and managers to not only see the latest and emerging technologies but also to discuss their bottom line. Discussions cover how each piece of hardware and software is designed to meet a specific need, while keeping ease of configuration, deployment and management at the forefront of the conversation. High-level discussions about total cost and return on investment are always hot topics, as well as conversations about making IT teams from every organization more streamlined and focused on innovation, instead of being reactive and becoming stagnant. 

CTG is excited to be taking guests to the HPE Customer Engagement Center on Jan. 26. Our attendees will get to see products in a production environment, receive a hands-on demonstration and experience a tour of cutting-edge HPE technology. 

Brandon Samuel is CTG's sales manager.

Test and Learn

Do you remember how some of the best days in high school science class were when you got to go in the lab? When you had a problem to solve and you got to roll up your sleeves and experiment until you got the answer?

We got to do the professional version of just that last week, when we brought a handful of customers and special guests to the HP Customer Experience Center in New York. This is a living production laboratory for testing and learning, featuring the latest-and-greatest technology from HP today.

What made the trip invaluable:

• We learned from the best in the business. At the Experience Center, HP offers its top subject matter experts to share new and emerging technology and answer questions on the spot. Technology represents one of the biggest line items for any company, and business leaders need to be confident that their suppliers and partners understand their needs and environment to offer the right resources at the right cost at the right time.

• We saw the latest technology in action. Nothing is more important than seeing first-hand how different products and software can perform. The demonstrations not only presented good introductions to different resources, but they illustrated how to make the most of your technology. (Dare I admit that being in a nearly 10,000-square-foot facility with all that cutting-edge IT brought out the best geeks in us?)

• We solved some vexing problems. A couple of clients came looking for answers to specific challenges with storage. In that real IT setting, HP experts were able to configure and demonstrate a storage array that would specifically eliminate those problems. Those clients now have a strategy to discuss with their business leaders and to use in determining how to prioritize the HP recommendations.

• We got a sneak peak at what’s coming next. Our visit last week allowed us a glimpse into HP’s next generation of products, and how they will integrate with existing platforms.

Unique opportunity for customers
This hands-on experience is a rare perk of collaborating with CTG, which is an HP Gold Partner. During our nearly 10-year history, we have worked with a host of technology manufacturers, but we have chosen this specific partnership for HP’s comprehensive and integrated product portfolio. We know that all technology has a lifecycle, and our clients trust us to recommend hardware and configurations that meet today’s needs and are scalable for future business growth.

What our customers and guests told us was that this hands-on day gave them better insights into how HP’s architecture and products can deliver on all IT needs, from security to software, hardware to mobility. Because HP is one of the biggest in the industry, we know it can be daunting for our clients to navigate through all those products. This visit allowed our customers to learn more about why we trust HP, which delivers products that are equally innovative and reliable.

What happens next?
Our CTG team will be meeting with local HP account teams to host a technical discussion, where we will dive deeper into the day’s learnings.

And in keeping with our commitment to be on the leading edge, we already are planning our next visit to the HP Customer Experience Center. If you've got an IT challenge that is continuing to haunt you, let our CTG team know – and join us on our next trip to this IT laboratory.

John Monahan is co-founder of CTG.