Every year, i2S organises a ‘Sales Meeting’ with international distributors in order to exchange views on the subject of plans within the digitalisation market and to present their digitalisation solutions, image processing and cost sharing. From the 5th to the 7th of April 2016, this meeting took place at i2S’ headquarters, welcoming guests of 19 nationalities, from Africa, Asia, America and Europe- a great occasion for the distributors.

• to shareinformation on the market;
• to see and touch new products and services ;
• to enrich theirselling points.

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OBJECTIVES

• to see i2S perform better in a ferociously competitive market ;
• to be time after time improving time to market ;
• respond to the demands of our clients.

Generally, in a format which is agile and interactive , this meeting consisted of morning plenary sessions in order to share information about the international market, but also to conductthemed workshops on i2S’ software products and solutions and collaborative work on the future of our market.

WHY WE HAVE THESE TYPES OF EVENTS

We hope to unite our distributors on the values of i2S. By establishing such an event, we have produced an essential and fool-proof plan for talking with and motivating our distributors, bringing the group closer together by presenting new products to them before they are put on the market. This event also enables direct exchanges between our international distributors so they can share their experiences and move forward with marketing i2S’ products and services.
For Alexandre Besson, (international sales manager) it is all about ’raising the level of togetherness for our distributors, presenting them with our new solutions and our competitive advantages with regards to competition. We are sharing our vision of the future in order to come up with a common project together,’ em>

MARKETING ADVANTAGES FOR DISTRIBUTORS

During this type of event, the whole commercial group presents their strategy and positioning for i2S and increases the level of knowledge of our products and services. For Aurélie Baronnet (international sales manager) ’ Case studies which are presented by other distributors are worth all the riches in the world and carry more weight than similar plans by salespeople.’ As a Dutch distributor stipulates, ‘At i2S, you have everything you need to become a ‘love brand’, em>, together, we are moving towards dreams, towards more feeling, in order to sell our products in a more logical way, we are increasing marketing/communication budgets, together, we are creating more events, we are being less technical about it…’ . Aurélie is consistent with the opinions of this distributor ’we must centre our workshops on the advantages of our products. At i2S, we are working on the design of our products, which are known for being functional and ergonomic. In the market, everyone knows that we have our signature style, it’s up to us to evolve without breaking our codes and our strong image in the market …’Alex Besson tells us. David Dassié (Sales Director) indicates that in his view, ‘by being invited to i2S, it is proved to clients how important distributors are to i2S’.

COLLABORATIVE WORKSHOPS ON CLIENT SERVICES

During these workshops, i2S colleagues are not only facilitators in the service of their distributors, who for this event represented some twenty different nationalities, and we know that diversity makes wealth. Therefore, after having designed the format of the workshops and the content, together with the whole i2S team, notably David Dassié, Agnes Mauléon confirms that ‘these types of workshops encourage our distributors to communicate with one another. Also, unconsciously, they forget the company they work for and let go, make suggestions, engage in doing things, put actions in place, adapted to each of their countries.’ . As for David Dassié, the Business Director, agrees with Agnes’ remarks. ‘This allows each person to be fuelled by their work and others’ thoughts. It is also an indirect way of suggesting to some people that they employ methods or discussions which work elsewhere…This also allows you to optimise discussions and strategies according to the country’. On this subject, Alex Besson highlights that ‘even if they all have different issues, one observes with more space that it is about a temporal gap and not a spatial one – what happened in these markets a few years ago in Europe or the USA is in the course of happening in other areas, notably Asia or other countries and new democracies.’ .

CONCLUSION

At i2S, work is important, just as it is in other companies, but we are continuing our coming of age in terms of ‘sustainability’ – we want to be the factory of the future. However, reception is also important and that is why receiving our distributors in complete togetherness is particularly important to us at i2S. For example, encouraging them to sample the gastronomic riches of our region and go out in order to find themselves out of their comfort zone after a day of work is just normal for us. At this type of event, one of the first criteria for success is the participation of the hosts, as the renowned David Dassié tell us, ‘Our guests participate a lot, it’s the first of our criteria. In this way they have fun and discover the almighty power of the i2S offers for 2016, as well as the seriousness of those behind the scenes.’