Insider Strategies for Evaluating Enterprise Software and Cloud Alliances

Are you embarking on a journey of building alliances with Software or Cloud ISVs? Refer to my previous post (link at bottom) on what drives Software and Cloud ISVs to invest in their 3rd party ecosystem.

In this post, I'll highlight a path to clarify your alliance objectives and decide which alliance partners will help you meet your business goals. These tips are directed towards alliances between a smaller ISV and a large ISV Software or Cloud vendor. Alliances between equals is a different animal and will not be covered here.

For convenience and brevity, I'll use "PL-ISV" (Platform Vendors) to denote the large Software and Cloud vendors you aim to partner with and "3P-ISV" (Third Party Vendors) as the ISV joining an alliance program.

Prioritize Your Objectives

The initial step involves analyzing your objectives to identify the ideal PL-ISV (or multiple) that can bring value to your marketing and sales machine. Once you have a shortlist, it's helpful to layer pragmatic considerations atop your shortlist to ascertain not just the best partner in theory, but the partners that will deliver the best results.

Alliance Objectives

Here are the key benefits that an alliance can offer. Prioritize your organizations objectives.

• Part of an Ecosystem: Do you want your company to be recognized as part of an existing vendor ecosystem or technology stack by customers?
• Reach, Name Recognition & Value by Association: Having your brand linked to a respected global technology brand and using that to reach more customers.
• Reduce Perceived Integration Risk & Friction: Getting your integration tested or approved by the PL-ISV and potential access to APIs can reduce the risk customers face in integrating products.
• New Leads: Generating leads through webinars, web advertising, and in-person events, both regional and global. Some of these are 3-ISV led, and you can gain access to funds, people, or marketing muscle via the PL-ISV; others lead gen activities are 3P-ISV led.
• Co-Sell Motions: Engaging in co-selling with PL-ISV's sales force for new, warm leads or co-selling with 3P-ISV's sourced leads.
• On Marketplace/Store: Facilitating downloads or instant access to demo or full products. This is generally more relevant to solutions that are low touch or self-serve (PLG- Product-Led Growth). For others (SLG - Sales-Led Growth) it's just a listing.

Once your objectives are clear, you need to spend time reading the program guides for each potential partner. You must also engage with alliance leads, product executives and AEs at the PL-ISV, and get feedback from your sales organization and other internal stakeholders. I emphasize the importance of your sales organization, as it is likely to benefit most from alliances. However, the process will require patience and careful management.

Note that these alliance programs can be gated by design and tend to be low touch at the beginning of the funnel. You will need to be resourceful in order to assess the actual potential of the alliance beyond partner handbooks, portals, and initial conversations with alliance managers.

Tactical Factors to Consider

Product

• Plug Holes: Does your solution fill a crucial gap that enhances PL-ISV's platform and helps win deals?
• Alignment with Key Initiatives/Messages: Do your capabilities or message align with PL-ISV's top 3-5 initiatives this year? Can you align with existing sales plays cut in stone for this year?
• Competition: Are you consistently winning deals against your competitors that are also program partners of this PL-ISV, and the PL-ISV sees the tide turning towards you? Are you winning against one of PL-ISV's own products? If it's not core to them, they might be open to your solution as an alternative for their customers. If it is core, you might have an uphill battle.
• First Mover Advantage: Being the first in your category with a fast-moving PL-ISV can create a strong barrier to entry. Since your solution is the only option, it's easier to join marketing events, become the field's go-to, get linked into sales plays, close more deals, and move up through program levels gaining more leverage. Conversely, if you are last on board, it will be more difficult to catch up.

Field

• Pricing Model: Consider how your pricing compares to the PL-ISVs' sellers. Significant discrepancies in deal sizes can influence their willingness to include you in deals.
• Common Customers & Field Enthusiasm: How many common customers do you share with the PL-ISV? Engage with AEs, pre-sales, or regional executives at the PL-ISV. Are they enthusiastic about your solution?
• Service Partners: Are you engaged with PL-ISV's service partners, VARs, or GSIs? Are you successfully closing deals with these partners? Will joining the alliance program drive more business through partners? Creating clusters of integrated products, while having service partners that can deliver an end-to-end solution sends a powerful message to customers.
• Specialized Sales Force: Identify if there is a specialized sales force relevant to your offerings. This might be a GTM group, product, or industry-specific overlay or specialist sales group. Some may get compensated on third-party ISV sales, while others do not. Compensation matters!
• Alliance Model: Determine if the PL-ISV runs a centralized or distributed alliance model. This will affect how you engage and drive business either centrally or regionally.
• Enablement: Field enablement of the PL-ISV is a process; it needs to be simple, repetitive, and from multiple channels; enablement sessions, field-centric material, pass-through material to customers, newsletters, etc..

Alliance Program

• Ecosystem Position: Evaluate how crowded the ecosystem is. Do you need to be louder than hundreds or thousands of other vendors?
• Technology Integration: Using underlying technology or cloud of the PL-ISV can lead to better program benefits or compensation for PL-ISV sellers.
• Program Hoops: Assess the time required to ascend the partner program ladder. Look for ways to fast-track this process to gain traction (marketing, enablement, co-sell, etc.) even at the most basic partner level. Will the PL-ISV move you to a higher level if they deem you strategic? What are those criteria? Who makes those decisions?
• Co-marketing Funds: Free money is good. However, one of the purposes of co-marketing is to spend money and time on a particular PL-ISV and not another vendor. Free money is only good if it creates money. IMHO. this is a nice to have, but not crucial unless short on cash.
• Alliance Manager: Will you be assigned a partner manager? How many partners will that manager own? Is that manager capable of moving mountains for you? Can you get executive sponsorship from a BU or Alliances leadership?

The next posts will provide structure on how to set KPIs, activities and milestones and break up a the complexity of the alliance into building blocks.

Questions - Drop them in the comments.

Link to my previous post.

Have Enterprise Software Vendors Adopted the Apple App Store Model?

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/have-enterprise-software-vendors-adopted-apple-app-store-fried--oovwf/?trackingId=Zq7N7wFZAH8zyZR67eV7Zw%3D%3D

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