6 Lingering Thoughts from Integration Business Outlook Webcast

Words can hurt margins. “Nobody means any harm by it,” Wilson said, before explaining that manufacturers contribute to the commoditization conundrum through their marketing language. “They’re advertising that anybody can operate it, anybody can install it, it cuts your labor in half,” he said. Customers, of course, see that language and assume that integrators aren’t required to add a lot of expertise and labor in order to make the solution work seamlessly. The reality, Wilson said, is “often the simpler the system is to operate, that means the harder we have to work behind the scenes to make it simple. It still takes a qualified professional to do a lot of work, a lot of intellectual property to make it work in a seamless fashion.”