Back in February I posted a video on how we work. I recently realized that I never really wrote out a process of how our service works.

A bit of background. Everyone at ColoAdvisor is out of the hosting and managed application business without exception. We’ve all worked for top firms as systems architects and sales people but really had issue in that we realized our employers were good at 1-2 things but sold maybe 10-15 different solutions. Walking away from opportunities is painful but being forced to sell an inferior product is much worse.

So here’s how we work:

You’re looking for cloud computing, hosting or colocation services. You may have a specific application in mind or you have your own web application that you’ve developed.

You want to ensure you get the best fit from a cultural, financial and technical perspective. You fear choosing a provider that will perform poorly. Additionally, your to-do list isn’t getting any shorter so managing the procurement of these services with 6 vendors can be quite involved.

We see the standard process this way: (let’s pretend you want to get 6 quotes)

- 6 initial emails or phone calls out to the vendors (after searching google to find them)
- 6 initial phone calls for the vendors to size up your time frame and seriousness
- 6 phone calls to gather requirements
- 6 sets of documents you need to send out containing a requirement doc + diagram
- 6 additional technical presentations to hear the vendors solution + a quote
- 6 potential revisions when they miss something
- 6 follow up emails from the vendors requesting clarification of something.
- 6 more presentations/proposals to review

At this point, you shortlist down to 2 vendors

- 4 vendors calling for an explanation of why they weren’t chosen
- 4 vendors sales managers asking you via separate phone calls the same thing
- 4 vendors offering you lunch to re-consider this obvious blunder.

You’re back and focused on your 2 finalists

- 2 vendors to clarify technical issues
- You begin to review Terms and Conditions
- You begin to request best and final offers
- legal revisions continue back and forth
- you negotiate a solid deal and pick the vendor

You’re getting prepped for implementation but before then:

- 5 vendors asking you what went wrong
- 5 vendors offering you lunch to reconsider

Now you get to implement. I won’t go through that process.

So let’s look at how we work:

Phase 1

- 1 initial call – we gather technical details asking for diagrams and everything upfront
- We understand the business drivers and time frames
- We May suggest minor adjustments based on other clients we’ve engaged with
- We draw a detailed requirements diagram and document
- We send the diagram to you for approval before we send to our partners
- We may or may not revise based on your input

Phase 2

- We check our index, and usually have 3 – 10 potential vendors to work with.
- We chose 5 vendors and mail them the requirements document.
- All subsequent technical calls happen with ColoAdvisor
- Vendors begin to prepare proposals and send them to ColoAdvisor

Phase 3

- We review the proposals, summarize technical, cultural & financial merits into a concise report
- We mutually select 2 remaining providers
- ColoAdvisor will arrange facility tours as needed
- Facility tours occur you’ll pick 1 vendor

Phase 4

- ColoAdvisor will introduce the vendor to you for pricing best and final discussion
- Terms and conditions to be discussed
- Contract signed and implementation begins.

Phase 5

- ColoAdvisor informs all the other vendors of your decision, no specific info is given.
- ColoAdvisor is available during the implementation process to assist with any issues

So far we’ve had great success with this and a few of our past engagements have written letters of recommendation.

The kicker is that we don’t charge a penny for this service. We are ultimately paid by the final hosting provider that you chose. If you chose to table your project then we part as friends hoping that you’ll think of us the next time you need hosting, colocation or cloud computing services.