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Gold? Silver? Gone? Partners Pick Their New Status in the MPN

One of the thorniest decisions Microsoft partners face this year is how to slot their companies into the newly changed structure of the Microsoft Partner Network. Companies that have been Gold Certified Partners for years must decide in 2011 which competency or competencies they'll focus on. Even with that decision made, they must then choose whether to pursue that competency to the gold level or to the silver level, or forego the competencies altogether and concentrate on just being a Small Business Specialist or Action Pack subscriber.

In the Redmond Channel Partner magazine annual reader survey this year, we asked partners what they're going to do. We gave readers a lot of options. Would they pursue one gold competency, multiple gold competencies, one silver competency, multiple silver competencies or a mix of gold and silver competencies? They also had the chance to select concentrating primarily on being a Small Business Specialist, a Subscriber or a Communities/QuickStarts member. Some partners admitted they weren't sure yet, and a few said they'll drop out of Microsoft's program.

By breaking out the answers into three charts depending on whether a reader started as a Gold Certified Partner, Certified Partner or Registered Member under the old Microsoft Partner Program, we give you a way to benchmark your MPN decisions against your peers.

Check out the results on these questions, and many, many others in the RCP Reader Survey here.

Posted by Scott Bekker on March 31, 2011 at 11:58 AM


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