How can cloud suppliers identify the partners most likely to be successful or very successful in selling cloud? Techaisle’s 7th year of channel tracking survey data indicates that a powerful indicator is found in the growth paths identified by channel firms.
Characteristics of very successful cloud channel partners (“what to look for”)
- Very successful cloud channel firms view advanced solutions as major opportunities and are focused on growing business in BI/analytics and IoT
- Very successful cloud firms recognize that hybrid IT is the key and are anticipating increased revenue from data and/or application integration than their less successful peers
- Nearly 90% of very successful cloud channel firms (as compared with just 23% of unsuccessful firms) offer IaaS to SMB customers
- Over 90% of very successful cloud partners offer SaaS today. Less than one-third of unsuccessful cloud partners offer SaaS, and 20% neither offer it nor are planning to do so
- Successful cloud partners view partner-to-partner (P2P) relationships as a strategic imperative, whereas unsuccessful partners connect with other channel firms on an opportunistic basis
- There is a clear, multi-year trend of very successful cloud channel partners differentiating themselves by selling self-branded (and supported) cloud offerings
- There is strong evidence in data to support the notion that very successful cloud partners are focused on assembling multi-sourced solutions to meet customer needs, 57% of very success cloud partners as compared to 31% of unsuccessful and 34% of successful partners
- Three-quarters of very successful and nearly 70% of successful cloud partners offer UCaaS, vs. just 20% of unsuccessful firms
- Successful channel firms are actively participating in cloud and IT orchestration and are investing in technology advisory & architects
- Digitalization & digital transformation are new focus areas of very successful channel partners
What to look out for – characteristics of unsuccessful cloud partners
