I recently wrote a post about the coming Revenue Sharing model for Microsoft Business Applications ISV's. As expected, there is some screaming going on about forking over some of your revenue to Microsoft. But there is another side of that story... what Microsoft will be doing in return.

Starting soon Microsoft will be moving to a pay-to-play model for ISVs. The first reaction I am hearing from many ISVs are various "avoidance" schemes. Remember, this only applies to SaaS products. Since all of these SaaS products are hosted by Microsoft, and they have all the telemetry they want, you really will be challenged to find a way to avoid Revenue Sharing. It is not an "Optional" program. Though for the time being, you can still "side-load" your solutions, Microsoft will easily discover them. When they do, if you are not part of the program, according to Guggs, "If your solution is not on Appsource, we will tell customers not to use it --- we will get very "pointy" with this message over time". I can't think of any intelligent customer who would not heed this warning, so I suggest you drop your "avoidance" plans. Instead, focus on the promised benefits, and maximizing those.

Depending on where you fall, you have several "levels" of benefits across three buckets: Technical, Marketplace and Sales. I'll share the slide first, and then we can unpack these. Understand that these are subject to change, it is a lever Microsoft can use to increase engagement.

Let's start at left most column, which is the minimum required "non-optional" option. When you publish a Bizapp solution to AppSource, and you commit to 10% as part of that process, this is what you will get, even without selling anything yet:

• Architectural Consultation. This is a one-on-one consultation with Microsoft. Unfortunately, you don't get this benefit until after you have published, and it probably would have been handy to have beforehand, but I can also see how Microsoft does not want to waste time with tire-kickers either.

The above are all listed as "Technical Benefits", and you may notice that they are the same across all levels. This is where I expect whatever they are planning to do around IUR will probably be differentiated. Today, the differentiations between levels are really around Marketing, (Sales does not kick in until later), so let's take a look at the minimum Marketing Benefits

• Marketplace Listing Optimization. This is not "prioritization", it is "optimization", but it is important to understand how solutions are surfaced in AppSource so that your wonderful app is not sitting on page 26. This will include a quick consult with the MS Enablement Team, and will become more programmatic down the road. Think, built-in recommendations against what you have done, surfacing Best Practices suggestions.

Once your app has generated $50K USD of revenue sharing fees, which is actually $500K of ISV revenue, in a rolling 12 months, you move up the the $50K Club. This is no small feat, if your solution sells for $10/Month/User, you would need to have sold about 4,200 seats. Again the technical benefits, for the moment, are the same. But you do get additional Marketing Benefits, in addition the the entry level benefits, including:

• Customer Story. This is a basic customer success story that you can create from Microsoft Templates, and submit for publication here. Again, you will want to amplify this with your social channels, but it is a nice "credibility" builder.

Once your app has generated $250K USD of revenue sharing fees, you have the option to "opt-in" to the 20% revenue sharing model, but you don't have to. Understand that this means you will have sold $1.25 million USD of ISV revenue, which for your $10 solution, means about 10,500 seats. The air is starting to get thinner here, and the numbers of ISVs in this category will be smaller. But if you do get there, you will not only get additional Marketing Benefits, but you will activate the  Sales Benefits. The additional Marketing Benefits include:

• Co-Sell Ready Content. As part of the Co-Sell on-boarding process, you will have the opportunity to add to your seller catalog listing, Seller-Facing content, including one-pagers on your company and application, as well as a Customer Story. These are useful for MS Sellers to better understand what you are solving for, and when and where to position your solution with one of their customers.

In addition, this level kicks in the Sales Benefits, which are the same as at the top level, so I will cover those below.

Let's say you somehow sold $3.75 Million dollars of ISV revenue, which for a $10 app, would mean that you miraculously sold about 31,250 seats. I think it is clear that there are only a handful of these ISVs, and maybe not even a whole hand. But you three will also get some additional Marketing Benefits, that include:

• P2P Workshop - in person. At this stage you will have already had a couple of consults and workshops on channel building. This takes that up yet a notch further as an in-person workshop at your office. This is going to get very pointy on your specific goals and requirements.

Once you cross the $250K mark, and you opt-in to the 20% program, you activate the Microsoft Sales Benefits that include:

• Prioritized Listing. You can be listed of course without being in the $250K Club. But on the MS Internal Sellers view of the catalog, those that opt into the 20% program will be listed at the top. But it's actually more relevant that the sellers will be keenly aware, that if they sell one of these solutions, they will get paid. This is the primary the reason for the additional 10%... to create the incentives to motivate the Sellers to move your product. Think about something like CPQ where there are a few ISV solutions. While the Seller will be able to see all of them, the ones in the 20% category will have a golden glow around them. Obviously, Sellers are going to move forward with one of those first.

A final point on Co-Selling. Microsoft is aligned strategically to industry verticals. SSP/TSP teams are not only targeting particular horizontal solutions like "Business Applications", but they are also segregated vertically along industry lines. For Example, "Business Applications in Healthcare Sector" would be a specific charge of an SSP/TSP team. In addition, depending on the size of the industry, the teams may be geographically bound also, ie. "Business Applications in Healthcare Sector for US East". Basically, there are a lot of people you would ultimately want/need to engage with.

Needless to say, horizontal Solutions and "widget" solutions are probably not a good fit for Co-Selling, as should be obvious from what I wrote above.

So this was a long post and I am sorry for that. To add to that, everything I wrote above is subject to change as the program rolls out. It may change a little, or it may change a lot, but as I opened with, this side of the program is a lever that Microsoft can easily adjust.

For ISVs that are confused, worried, mad or acronym challenged, I am part of another consulting group called PowerISV with four other MVPs who may be able to help.