What are the top steps Microsoft partners can take to help their businesses succeed in 2019? We put that question to top experts, including Keith Lubner, Chief Strategy Officer, Sales Gravy.
Your success will be predicated upon how well you can manage your time in 2019.
Collectively, we are consumed by inordinate amounts of data, by vast arrays of communication methods, and by the demands of an "instantaneous" society. As professionals, we are being asked to respond quicker, be more thoughtful and compete in more situations. More
Posted by Keith Lubner on January 24, 20190 comments
What are the top steps Microsoft partners can take to help their businesses succeed in 2019? We put that question to top experts, including Toby Richards, General Manager, Partner GTM and Programs, Microsoft.
Going into 2019, we're hoping more and more commercial partners, including services partners and independent software vendors, take advantage of the Microsoft portfolio of go-to-market services. Partners should focus on attaining technical competencies and delivering validated solutions in order to remain competitive.
In the past year, Microsoft has released new programs that help partners differentiate themselves in the marketplace, including the Azure Expert MSP program, the release of the company's security competency later this year, and advanced specializations in the area of SAP solutions on Azure and Azure Stack partners. I encourage partners to take advantage of these programs that work in tandem with Microsoft to differentiate. More
Posted by Toby Richards on January 24, 20190 comments
What are the top steps Microsoft partners can take to help their businesses succeed in 2019? We put that question to top experts, includingMike Harvath, President & CEO, Revenue Rocket.
The cloud is a means, not an end.
Success in modernizing IT in 2019 and beyond, through the cloud, will be driven by a complete standardization and through intentional growth strategies.
What we're seeing is that cloud adoption has been increasing at a rapid pace. According to research from Forbes and Gartner, cloud-specific spending is expected to grow more than six times the rate of general IT spending through 2020. Many companies, both large and small struggle to get the full value of this trend of moving their enterprise systems to the cloud, despite many organizations finding success by implementing specific software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions or adopting cloud-first strategies. More
Posted by Mike Harvath on January 22, 20190 comments
What are the top steps Microsoft partners can take to help their businesses succeed in 2019? We put that question to top experts, including Gavriella Schuster, Corporate Vice President, One Commercial Partner, Microsoft.
It's 2019, are you ready to give customers what they're craving? Customers have sky-high expectations of both Microsoft and our partners. We all need to rise to the challenge to meet customers' needs. The good news is, with our technology and your expertise, IP and services capabilities, we have the perfect ingredients for success.
In 2019, Microsoft is calling for partners to up their competitive edge through collaborative innovation as we develop even more effective resources and investments for our partners to win in the market. The demand for cloud and other emerging technology is high, and the innovations from Microsoft -- coupled with the incredible partner leadership in our ecosystem -- present both opportunity and a responsibility to delight our customers with solutions that drive their digital transformation. More
Posted by Gavriella Schuster on January 17, 20190 comments
So you're a startup? Congratulations on a wonderful and highly exciting journey!
I have started and sold companies my whole life. Now, I focus on investing and helping entrepreneurs. Based on my experience, here's some advice from the trenches. More
Posted by Per Werngren on October 10, 20180 comments
The rate of cool technology is accelerating at an unbelievable pace. Across the board, vendors are developing and releasing applications and services quicker than ever before.
This amazing speed is causing two particular problems in the channel: Partner personnel are becoming overwhelmed and complexity is dictating the day. More
Posted by Keith Lubner on September 12, 20180 comments
The huge theme at Microsoft Inspire this summer was the messaging around, and supporting evidence for, doing business with Microsoft and with fellow partners.
I have been attending Microsoft's worldwide partner events since 2002, and I remember less-successful similar attempts from Microsoft. This time, it clearly got it right. More
Posted by Per Werngren on August 30, 20180 comments
How long does an opportunity last?
Whatever answer came to mind, it's a good bet it isn't very long. You receive a call or an e-mail or some other form of request for quotation from a customer and a very, very short clock starts ticking in your mind. You need to be the first and best response to that request, because you know it's been made of others, as well. More
Posted by Howard M. Cohen on July 31, 20180 comments
What's your plan for the future? If your response is that you don't have one, please remember what Benjamin Franklin told us: "Failing to plan is planning to fail." Especially now in the partner ecosystem.
Unless you're one of the few that have advanced beyond the curve, you simply cannot keep on doing what you've always done. Zig Ziglar said that "If you're doing what you've always done, you're probably getting what you always got," but even that is no longer true. Whether you still call yourself a VAR or a reseller or an MSP, you can't just sit there. Stay still at your own peril. More
Posted by Howard M. Cohen on July 18, 20180 comments
We all struggle with finding talent, nurturing leaders and better understanding our customers. I believe that part of the resolution for these three problems is to make a serious bet on embracing and driving diversity.
Diversity for me is about making sure that the people who are working for you, and with you, do not come in the same shape. It is about actively hiring people who do not look the same as the ones already working for you. Embracing diversity is about actively recruiting women, young people, older people, people with different faiths, people from different cultures and countries, LGBTQ people and people with disabilities. More
Posted by Per Werngren on July 09, 20180 comments
What can Microsoft partners do differently in 2018 to make a business breakthrough? We put that question to 16 top experts, including PER WERNGREN, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR, REDMOND CHANNEL PARTNER MAGAZINE. For more tips on finding success in the Microsoft channel in 2018, read our full Marching Orders feature here.
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Posted by Per Werngren on March 22, 20180 comments