Supported Products
Infrastructure Management & Infrastructure Services
Problem/Solution
Messaging
Sales Cycle Situations
100

What Catalyst models include access to all IOS updates?  

2900s - 4500s, Cat 9K

100

Describe the 3 different tiers of support for Infrastructure Management Services and the deliverables (verbs)

  • Base / NOCaaS (Monitor, Identify, Triage, Escalate)
  • Plus / Remediate (Base+, Fix and Patch)
  • Full / Manage (Plus+, Run, Operate, Administer, & Execute)
100

A customer is refreshing a removing their FAS2650 NetApp array from their support contract. 

PIVOT - What value is the proposition or service/solutions we can provide. (you must get all 5)

Short-term maintenance

Hardware purchase preowned Curvature or New

Transform

Deployment

Data migration

ITAD services

 

100

Where do source our parts from?   Describe our quality control process.

- Same secondary markets as the OEMs

- We test them in our warehouses for 48 hours to ensure reliability before sending them out to our customers, giving us the lowest DOA rate in the industry at .25

100

Walk us through the process you would go through in Outreach to create a good sequence enrollment list for a Clearview campaign targeted at current customers.

  • Filter Account list - campaign tag
  • Filter Classification: Win back, NL, IB
  • Select all accounts
  • Select prospects - in search bar (network)
  • Any additional creative filter to get to networking contacts will be accepted
200

Describe Day 1 support and one qualifying question you should ask.  

Park Place provides a cost effective alternative to the OEMs warranty uplift.  We can pick up support for x86 servers because sw/fw is available regardless of contract status with the OEM.

Qualifying Qs:

When is your next server refresh planned?

Who or How do you typically purchase servers? Direct for OEM or VAR?

How often do you refresh?

Who on your team purchases the servers?

200

Name 3 professional services and what they are. 

•Data center relocation - Moving IT assets from one space to another and standing it up. 

•Data migration - Migrating data from one system to another.

•Discovery services - Physical audit or software application to manage the inventory of IT hard & soft assets.

•IMAC (install, move, add, change) 

•ITAD (IT asset disposition) 

•IT deployments - deploying near equipment (refresh)

•Remote hands - temporary IT personnel help.

•Staff augmentation - long-term IT personnel help

- Wireless transformation - Assessing WAP performance and fixing gaps.

200

You’re talking to a prospect on a discovery call. They have acquired 3 companies in the past year. What are some services/solutions you can present to them?

ParkView Discovery or Physical Audit to inventory all IT hard a& soft assets.

ITAD to destroy data and buy or dispose of the old equipment responsibly.

IMAC - moves and/or changes.

Data Center Asset Relocation 

Data Migration

200

What is included with support for EMC Compellent?

Hardware break/fix, Technical advice and guidance from L3 engineers accessible 24/7/365, access to FE onsite. Parkview hw monitoring,  storage management 

200

You're on a call with your customer discussing the upcoming renewal which includes TAG and STORM.  They ask what the added costs are?  How do you respond?

  • Start with a story: Tickets were submitted by customers were previously 'out of scope' because PPT didnt have resources to assist with the OS specific to the (oem/model).  Or many customers running into SW issues affecting the hardware without a storage admin to assist...
  • TAG provides a collaborative approach to review and assist in resolution of hardware break/fix issues surrounding hardware, software, firmware, and network connectivity and compatibility issues. Additionally, it offers support for remote administration assistance, storage performance, and support for licensed features
  • If still confused or if prompted for more detail...Show and tell TAG document that lists out the admin tasks they'll receive...highlight a few
300

Name 3 examples of TAG supported OEM platforms. Include both hardware and software examples.

NEED TO EDIT

Any supported server, storage, HCI platform or software example will be accepted. 

300

What is included with our Base / NOC Infrastructure Management service?  

- At a base level, we are providing a NOCaaS. We’ll have 24x7 eyes on glass, identifying actionable events and escalating based on the pre-established runbook.
We manage the ticket through close and provide 3rd party call management communication w/ ISP, OEM, MSP. etc. 

 

300

You are in a competitive sales cycle with another TPM who claims to have same type of "automated support" we do. How will you differentiate yourself? (include your message and sales tactic)

- Proactive support - Predicts a failure or identifies a failure real time. 

- Automates ticketing and triage

- We know model #, serial #, and exact location of the failed component. 98% 1st time fix. First time fix guarantee. 

- We notify you of the failure. No more entering tickets. 

- Deliver within the contracted SLA (local spares)

- Takes the admin work of placing tickets & collecting logs for triage off your plate, puts more time back in your day to focus on business impacting projects. Avoids multiple interactions of triage with our team. 33% improvement w/out meantime to repair. 

- MIB file is the show vs tell.

 

300

What 6 tabs that are covered during a portal demo?

1. How to place tickets

2. How to view ticket history

3. How to view, add/drop assets

4.  How to escalate a ticket

5. How-to stand-up PV

6. The analytics tab

300

What do you do if you uncover that there is a competitive quote from another TPM on the table?

  • Understand the ticketing process to differentiate between the other TPM.
  • Understand what the "lifecycle" plans are for this gear to differentiate add'l value.
  • What is most important when making this decision?
  • Price aside, what other factors are important when you're looking for a support provider? 
  • Qualify their support expectations, then leverage our differentiators. 
400

Name a model of a Converged or Hyperconverged system that we support today.

VCE - Vblock/VxBlock

Nutanix XC NX-xxxx

VxRail

VxFlex

SimpliVity

400

Walk through the steps in the portal to stand up PVHM. 

  • PV HUB
  • Agent Manager
  • Plus sign, set up agent
  • Install new agent
  • Choose how to install (windows installer, linux installer, etc)
  • Choose HW monitoring
  • Download OVA file
  • Once installed, asset configurator
  • Click into each asset individually and enter in required info
  • Or bulk config
400

We No Bid a piece of equipment but another TPM says they can do it. What are your next steps with the customer?

-  Leverage Pre-Sales on the call.

- Qualify the support requirements (software hardware)

- Educate the customer with full transparency why we can’t support the gear using information you received from Product Mgmt. or Pre-Sales

-  Create doubt in the competitor’s ability to support the gear by asking “Now that you know this, how does the competitor plan to support this for you?”

- Share facts in email. 

400

Show us an example of how you'd use a tool to mine for a new contact, and how would you use the information you find in your prospecting pitch.


- Use Tech Target

    -  Buying team (prospect interest)

    -  Account Interest, Web visits, Tech Stack

- Use LI Nav

     -  Find a contact who is not in CE, leverage the data in the the contact's profile

-  Using Demandbase 

    -  Use the web search history, filter to specific urls, 

400

Your champion needs approval from their boss.  How do you drive urgency and qualify next steps?  (Roleplay)

  • Who else will weighs in on this decision?
  • What’s most important to your team?
  • When are you meeting with your team?
  • Can I join the meeting?
  • Does this person take your recommendations?
  • What feedback would this person provide if they were on the call now?
  • Provide your contact with all the ammo they need to best sell PPT solution. 
  • Try to get time with the DM... When do they speak with the vendor?
500

What is included in Meraki support and describe the caveat 

Park Place can provide a hardware replacement, software support, and onsite FE within a desired SLA, compared to Meraki Base's best effort.  The end user will retain entitlement to the license from the failed Meraki device, and Park Place will assist in re-claiming the Meraki license on the replacement hardware.

500

Name the 2 Park Place managed services that include patch management and the type of patching included in each of those managed services. 

PVMS Plus/Remediate = OS patching (minor revision updates, bugs, security/vulnerability)

PVMS Full/Manage = OS patching (minor & major revision updates, bugs, security/vulnerability) & Firmware patching. 

500

A customer lost 2 admins (4 previously) and uses SolarWinds to monitor his environment.  What questions are you asking to qualify this as a managed services opportunity?

  • What were your admins who left responsible for?
  • How has this impacted your team?
  • What happens once SolarWinds notifies you of an error?
  • Who is responsible for remediation the issue?
  • How do you handle off hour incidents?
  • Its 2am and you get a critical alert on an OS instance, how are you resolving the issue?
  • What types of OS are you running (Windows, Unix, Linux, AIX)
  • What do you wish SolarWinds did for you that you're not receiving today?
  • How do you handle patching today?

500

Explain what the ClearView report is and what we use to measure a devices eligibility for support. 

We use OEM milestone dates for 

SW (software eligibility, lifetime warranty)

EOSW (End of Software)

EOVS (End of Vulnerability Updates)

LDOS (Last Day of Support) 


500

You're on a Discovery call with a prospect. No hardware maintenance opportunity. What can you do?

PIVOT, by asking open-ended questions. 

•How are you notified of a problem? Failure? Utilization error?

•Who handles the issue? Your team? An MSP?

•What do they do? What is that process?

•How do you handle after-hour incidents?

•How do you manage your patching… OS & Vulnerability updates for server & network?

- PS What upcoming projects are you working on? Upcoming refresh?