Neil Williams worked for over 20 years at a company that specialized in paper forms and templates before selling DocuWare solutions. When technological change rolled across Jamaica – and paper become less and less in demand among his customers – the company ventured into the IT solutions business.
Neil Williams was able to gain valuable experience in the years that followed, initially selling an American DMS product developed for use in large companies. In a project for the Jamaican government, the company digitized twelve million forms for a census and evaluated the content using intelligent OCR software. “The potential applications intrigued me from the start,” Neil recalls. “However, I also quickly came to realize that there were other requirements to be met for a truly successful DMS launch.“
“Expensive high-end solutions can theoretically solve all corporate document problems, but in the end they are often impractical. Their implementation takes too long or they are far too expensive for most potential customers – especially in my main market of Jamaica.“
When Neil left his old company, he looked into alternative ways to market DMS products on the Caribbean island. Through a contact from Ireland, he came across DocuWare as a cloud solution for SMEs. After doing the analysis, Neil got down to business: as a one-man show, he quickly founded an IT company specializing in DocuWare in the capital city of Kingston.
Neil spent the first few weeks primarily getting to know the software. He realized that in comparison to other document management systems, DocuWare is very quick to learn. The product is also well-designed to be sold through sales partners: “Its system architecture and administration are kept extremely simple. Yet the solution offers tremendous flexibility for customization.” As a result, Neil earned both the sales product specialist certification, “DocuWare Application Consultant” or “DAC”, and the technical title of “DocuWare System Consultant” (DSC) through the DocuWare Academy.
“My big advantage is that I focus almost all of my working time on DocuWare. As a result, my learning curve was very steep, especially in the early days, and my company enjoyed rapid success.“
Neil immediately applied the structured sales process suggested by the DocuWare Academy to his customers. He observes: “I already knew the value proposition approach from my past, highlighting the monetary benefits of using the solution. Especially with DMS products, it’s very important to communicate the value of the solution and the ROI to potential customers. This is the only way to be successful in the long term.”
“I now know DocuWare Cloud like the back of my hand. That’s worth its weight in gold, especially during customer presentations.”
