The State of US SMB Cloud Channel

The SMB IT channel has reached an inflection point. Faced with an expanded SMB buyer community and requirements for specialized skills to support different solutions, the channel is beginning to segment by focus area. Although different specialties are starting from a common point today, Techaisle expects to see each develop unique characteristics over the next several years.

This report focuses on the US SMB Cloud Channel in 2015.

Table of Contents

• Executive Summary
• Prologue
• The business of the SMB channel
  • By the Numbers: The SMB channel in 2014
  • Time Allocations, and “the dog that didn’t bark”
  • Delivery models and target markets
    • The links between average sales cycle length and delivery model – and cloud positioning
  • Trends in specialized offerings
  • Cloud business approaches
    • Reasons for moving to cloud
    • Cloud and channel conflict
  • Lead generation
• The role of the vendor in the SMB cloud channel
  • Best-of-breed vs. single vendor solutions
  • Important vendor partnership criteria
  • Key vendor contributions to SMB channel business success
    • Supporting the SMB cloud channel
  • Marketing to the SMB channel
• Working with the SMB cloud customer
  • Cloud as a business offering
  • Channel support for cloud delivery models
    • Key cloud workloads
  • SMB Customer relationship types and impact on cloud success
  • Positioning cloud and related solutions
  • Channel challenges in selling cloud to SMBs
• The SMB buy-side/business perspective
  • • Cloud also addresses key channel business priorities
  • The evolution of hybrid infrastructure
  • Building the SMB business relationship
• Summary observations
• About Techaisle

List of Figures

Figure 1. By the Numbers: The US SMB Channel in 2014
Figure 2. Time allocation across sales activities by channel businesses
Figure 3. Delivery models, target markets and growth expectations
Figure 4. Average length of SMB sales cycle by channel delivery model and by cloud business approach
Figure 5. Current and planned technology offerings, US SMB channel, 2015
Figure 6. Channel approaches to cloud business and small business demand for cloud delivery
Figure 7. Reasons for developing cloud business practices and sources of cloud competition
Figure 8. Lead generation sources for the US SMB channel
Figure 9. Channel partner preferences: best-of-breed vs. single vendor solutions
Figure 10. Important vendor partnership criteria within the US SMB channel
Figure 11. Important vendor sales and marketing support offerings to the US SMB channel
Figure 12. Channel requirements for vendor program support in SMB cloud sales
Figure 13. Channel requirements for vendor program support in SMB cloud sales, clustered by category
Figure 14. Sources of information used by channel partners
Figure 15. Sources of information used by channel partners grouped by primary effect
Figure 16. SMB channel partners offering cloud solutions and 2015 cloud revenue expectations
Figure 17. Channel support for IaaS, PaaS, SaaS and CaaS
Figure 18. Current and planned US SMB channel support for cloud applications
Figure 19. Customer relationships and cloud success
Figure 20. Preferred method of positioning/selling/supporting advanced offerings
Figure 21. Cloud sales challenges faced by SMB channel firms
Figure 22. Top 10 US SMB business and IT issues
Figure 23. Top channel business issues for 2015
Figure 24. SMB demand for hybrid cloud/on-premise server infrastructure
Figure 25. Key elements in the channel/SMB customer relationship

Price of Report: US$6500