Ultimate Partner®

In this interview, Chris Pyle and I sat down for a discussion on partner profitability and relevance during the transformation. Chris is the CEO of Champion Solutions, a premier Microsoft partner based in Boca Raton, Florida who has made the transformation and now shares his advice to help other partners benefit as they migrate to cloud service providers.

Champion started as a IBM hardware reseller and transformed to a premier cloud solution partner of Microsoft. Chris discusses how he addressed the challenge of transformation in positioning his new identity with his traditional customer and bringing his sales organization along. In order to make the transformation, Champion started an entirely new company and brand Message Ops to focus on this new and emerging market.

Chris takes our listeners through his 3-Step approach applying digital marketing to build a new business, brand and market. His 3 steps - Acquire, Engage and Monetize.

* Acquire - created value for potential clients through providing support - he initially grew a follower base of 5,000 members.

* Engage - built free tools, products and utilities growing to 90,000 members

* Monetize - began engaging with customers helping with migrations and supporting customers in their transformation.

This "3 - step" approach ultimately led to being partner of record for over 3.2 Million Seats of Office 365.

By building this new business Chris finally got Champion to break out of its old mold - think Entrepreneur's Dilemma - and transform while the traditional business continued to perform.

Chris recently commissioned a study, "The True Price of Office 365" to inform his community on the true cost of running Office 365 and how he could add value to customers.  This study helped him develop a statement of work and better profitability in supporting clients.

Speaking at industry events, Chris cautions partners to stay relevant as clients migrate more and more workloads to the cloud. Chris has also launched a platform to help clients best utilize their investments in O365 - Office365adoption.com.

I asked what makes a great partner and for him it's all about Speed, Innovation and Execution. In today's environment it's fail fast - ready, fire, adjust!

Toward the end of our interview we also discuss career journey, personal pursuits, advice he'd give his younger self, books he values and thoughts to live life.

As with each of my interview and articles, I appreciate your feedback. You can reach me on Linked In or on email at [email protected]. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

Thank you for following and listening.

I hope you enjoy this episode!

Vince Menzione

Microsoft Channel Incentives can be a complex and polarizing topic for Microsoft Partners. In this episode of this special series, "Season of Change and Transformation", I interview Microsoft's US Channel Lead - Scott Peltier.

Scott and I peel back the topic of Microsoft channel incentives available to close to 100,000 Microsoft Partners in the U.S Market. Scott simplifies the topic, how channel incentives have evolved to support the transformation and feedback he receives from partners.

Scott does a nice job of discussing his approach to the business. His insights and appreciation for what makes a great partnership and how the approach to partners has evolved to better support the business and is why Microsoft is the place for partners to place their big bets. Scott also gives advice for partners looking to better engage with him and his team.

In the interview, we also discuss his career journey, valuable lessons he learned when he started in his career, role models and advice he gives to the people he mentors.

You can read the entire transcript of the interview below.

As with each of my interview and articles, I appreciate your feedback. You can reach me on Linked In or on email at [email protected]. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

Thank you for following and listening.

I hope you enjoy this episode!

Vince Menzione

Vince Menzione:             Scott, welcome to the podcast. I am really excited to have you on, my friend. We had the opportunity to work for several years together within the US Partner Organization. Your topic, channel incentives, is one that's near and dear to our partners, so I'm glad you could join us today during this season of change at Microsoft and to tell our listeners all the exciting things that are happening in your role and your organization. So, welcome.

Scott Peltier:                    Hey, Vince. Thank you very, very much. You are exactly right. Channel incentives, I've been running this business for several years and it is an exciting business. It's sometimes a very hard business, but I am delighted to be here with you and to talk through some of the strategies, the things that we're doing, things that as you know are very, very important to partners and that's their profitability. I have been at the heart of that for several years, and I can't think of a more exciting role that I've been able to partake up in the last several years and to really get to know partners and really what makes them work. So, glad to be here and looking forward to our time together today.

Vince Menzione:             We're going to peel back a little bit on that channel incentives piece, but I want to give you a little bit of insight from my side, you and I working very closely together over the years. This is a very complex topic, and it's one that isn't very well understood for a lot of people both partners and internally to Microsoft, so I think this interview will be very insightful for folks. To begin, can you take our listeners a little bit through your role and your mission that you're looking to accomplish for partners?

Scott Peltier:                    Sure, and I'm gonna digress just for a moment because when I visit with whether it's family members, relatives, they all want to know what I do at Microsoft and when you work in Microsoft you can ... You get very complex very fast,

On this week's 25th episode of the Ultimate Guide to Partnering, my guest is Tony DiBenedetto, the Chairman, CEO and Co-founder of Tribridge, a DXC company. Tribridge recently won Microsoft's highest honor as the 2017 Dynamics Partner of the Year. Several of my friends in the industry recommended Tony as an interview guest and he didn't disappoint.

Tony's career is pretty amazing. A few highlights include 30 years of experience in the technology industry, the recipient of numerous leadership awards, including the Ernst & Young Florida Entrepreneur of the Year Award, and induction in the Florida State University College of Business Hall of Fame. Recently CRN Magazine ranked him among the top 25 technology disruptors in the country.

Tony co-founded Tribridge in 1998 and led the company through the successful acquisition and integration of several companies, resulting in a compounded annual growth rate of over 40% each year. Under his guidance, Tribridge has grown from a start-up to one of the leading technology companies in the United States and Microsoft Dynamics Partner of the Year status.

Tony and I had a really great conversation on Tribridge's journey to premier status with Microsoft, some of Tribridge's successful solution areas, where he sees the business moving forward now as part of DXC, his secret sauce in partnering with Microsoft and his professional journey.

You can view the full transcript of the interview in the show notes below. You can also subscribe on iTunes , Google Play, Player FM, other Android podcast players.

As with each of my interviews and articles, I appreciate your feedback. You can reach me on Linked In or on email at [email protected]. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

Thank you for following and listening.

I hope you enjoy this episode!

Vince Menzione

Transcript of the interview

Vince                      Tony, I want to welcome you to the podcast. I'm so excited to have you here on our podcasts. Tribridge has been a premier Microsoft Dynamics Partner for quite some time, award-winning partner and your organization has done some great work. In fact one of our previous guests, Mike Bat, on episode four, specifically discussed the success with Tribridge in opening up new markets in the government space. So it's an exciting time for you, given the firm's recent acquisition by DXC and your 2017 award for Partner of the Year, so I'm so excited to have you, welcome to the podcast.

Tony D:               Vince, it's great to be here and appreciate to have the time today.

Vince M:             So I want to dive right in and have a lot of question...

This interview episode of the Ultimate Guide to Partnering was recorded onsite at the XChange2017 event in Orlando. I had the chance to sit down with a former colleague Eric Martorano, Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) of Intermedia, a one stop provider of solutions for the business cloud and a premier Microsoft Partner.

Eric is responsible for sales and strategic partnerships across the globe. He brings to this role over 20 years experience in the industry, deep expertise in working closely and strategically with a range of customers and partners, and his passion for customer and partner success.

Martorano has been recognized as a top industry performer, including being named to CRN’s “Top 100 Executives” and “Channel Maverick” lists, among others.

In this interview Eric takes our partner listeners through Intermedia's unique business cloud value proposition for both customers and partners and if you are a partner trying to determine how to best monetize business cloud offerings in this age of rapid digital transformation, you may find Intermedia's partner-centric model and business cloud focus very compelling.

As with many of my interviews, I found Eric's personal story of transformation to be very compelling. His is a story of grit and determination to overcome failure and to reinvent himself, ultimately leading to a highly successful career in technology.

As with each of my interview and articles, I appreciate your feedback. You can reach me on Linked In or on email at [email protected]. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

Thank you for following and listening.

I hope you enjoy this episode!

Vince Menzione

Transcript of our interview

Vince Menzione:            Eric, welcome to the poscast. You and I have had the opportunity to work closely together for many years at Microsoft and I'm really excited to have you here today to share with our listeners your company's unique value proposition, how you go to market, what you look for in successful partnerships, and your career journey and personal story.

Eric Martorano:              Thank you very much, Vince. Really appreciate the opportunity. Thank you for allowing me to join you here today, and being part of the Ultimate Guide to Partnering.

Vince Menzione:             I'm so excited to have you and to tell your story. So let's just dive in now. Can you tell our listeners about your company, Intermedia? What the company's value proposition is, the mission, and how it's evolved over the years.

Eric Martorano:              Sure. Well, Intermedia's a client-oriented one-stop shop for cloud business applications. For customers, we deliver security, scalability, and someone to manage the intricacies of the cloud forum. For partners,

I've dubbed this interview and series, Microsoft's Season of Change and Transformation. This is the first interview in a series to help the partner community best engage with the technology giant as it evolves it's partner business to better serve partners and customers.

As most of you know, Microsoft announced a major reorganization to it's customer and partner - facing business in early July which included the formation of a "One Commercial Partner" or OCP organization. This included three key elements - "Build With", "Go to Market", and "Sell With"*.

*In an earlier episode, Bill Hawkins helped decode the announcements for our listeners in greater detail and you can listen to this Episode 18 as a primer.

With Microsoft summer and implementation still underway, I thought it would be good to walk our partners down the hallways of Bellevue and Redmond and "peel back" through interviews with partner leaders on how to best align and engage with Microsoft at this critical season.

My guest for this interview episode is Eric Loper. Eric leads a "Build With" organization of partner business development managers focused on growing competencies, capabilities and capacity with Microsoft's top partners in the United States.

This is a second or " encore" interview episode with for Eric. If you listened to Episode 2 of the Ultimate Guide to Partnering you will remember Eric as my very first interview guest. At the time Eric and I had a great discussion and he shared with partner listeners the essential elements of partnering, his observations on technology trends and recommendations on how to best engage with the technology giant. You can listen to that episode here.

For this interview episode, Eric updates us on how the changes are positively impacting his organization, the renewed excitement and energy around partners, how both partners and partner sellers now need to think and act, and the increased investments in growing the business with and through partners.

A full transcript of the interview is below in the show notes.

If you have not listened to the podcast, now is your chance by going to iTunes , Google Play, Player FM, other Android podcast players or by going to my website “Ultimate Guide to Partnering“. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

You can also follow and like on Facebook, Twitter, 

This episode features Shawn Toldo who leads the Worldwide Solution Partner Program as a VP for VMWare, Inc.. In this episode Shawn shares the opportunity for channel partners looking to engage with VMWare.

VMware, Inc. is a subsidiary of Dell Technologiesthat provides cloud computing and platform virtualization software and services.[2] It was the first commercially successful company to virtualize the x86 architecture.[3]

In this episode Shawn tells the business story and value proposition to partners of this  cloud computing and platform virtualization software and services company, how he thinks about what makes great partnerships and his personal and professional journey.

I'm also excited that Shawn offered to join the podcast in the days leading up to VMWare's big VMWorld Conference in Las Vegas, NV and what was an outstanding event for its partners and customers.

A full transcript of the interview is below in the show notes.

If you have not listened to the podcast, now is your chance by going to iTunes , Google Play, Player FM, other Android podcast players or by going to my website “Ultimate Guide to Partnering“. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

You can also follow and like on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Thank you for following and listening.

Vince Menzione

Transcript of our interview.

Vince Menzione :            Shawn, welcome to the podcast. You and I have had the opportunity to work closely together for many years and I'm really excited to have you on today to share with our listeners VMware's unique value proposition, how you go to market, what you look for in successful partnerships, your career journey, and your personal story. Welcome.

Shawn Toldo:                  Thank you, Vince. It's a pleasure to have a chance to speak with you as well as the a...

While I was speaking at the XChange 2017 in Orlando*, I was reminded of the stories of grit, determination and personal transformation of many interview guests.

*I really enjoyed the opportunity to connect with so many great friends and partners at the event and wish to thank Robert DeMarzo, Doris Branscombe and the entire Channel Company team for the opportunity.

This 21st episode is a bit of a milestone or a mid year point for the Ultimate Guide to Partnering. We've built an amazing body of work through the terrific interview guests that I now share broadly in talks with technology organizations to stay better informed, connect and thrive.

This is a "solocast" episode where I share the genesis of the podcast, a unique story of grit, determination and personal transformation, and ask my tribe of listeners for feedback to make this the best podcast on partnering.

So where do we go from here? Please provide your constructive feedback on what you wish to see or hear in future episodes of the Ultimate Guide to Partnering. Do I focus more or less on the grit, determination and personal transformation I uncover in so many of my interviews? Or do I focus more on the mechanics of busienss? It's not good enough that I might like an episode or a particular topic or guest, it's important that it serves you!

If you have not listened to the podcast, now is your chance by going to iTunes , Google Play, Player FM, other Android podcast players or by going to my website “Ultimate Guide to Partnering“. You can also review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

You can also follow and like on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Thank you for following and listening.

Vince Menzione

When I started the Ultimate Guide to Partnering, I set as my objective to "inform the partner ecosystem" on how to best engage with the technology giants. My first series of episodes emphasized my roots and experience at Microsoft. My goal has been to expand and explore the partner strategies of the other technology giants, how they view their partner ecosystems and what they seek from and what makes great partnerships.

In this episode I interview a partner leader at one of the other technology giants, another "hyperscaler". For those not deep in the technology sector, a "hyperscaler" is one of only a few companies in technology capable of making the significant investments in cloud infrastructure, geographically dispersed data centers, network infrastructure, etc. Only a few companies are capable of these investments at scale and the most notable are: Amazon, Microsoft and Google.

Definition from Wikipedia - In computing, hyperscale is the ability of an architecture to scale appropriately as increased demand is added to the system. This typically involves the ability to seamlessly provision and add compute, memory, networking, and storage resources to a given node or set of nodes that make up a larger computing, distributed computing, or grid computing environment. Hyperscale computing is necessary in order to build a robust and scalable cloud, big data, map reduce, or distributed storage system and is often associated with the infrastructure required to run large distributed sites such as Facebook, Google, Microsoft, or Amazon.

This interview is focused on Google and I was joined by Eric Rosenkranz, Google's Cloud Platform Service Partner Lead for North America. Eric was also a former colleague of mine when we both worked for Microsoft.

In this interview Eric tells his story, share his impression of Google's unique value and his view of partnerships and teams. It's an excellent view for any channel partner who works with more than one of the technology giants, or just wants to broaden their perspective on the industry.

On his focus...

* His role - leads the North American team focused on regional and national system integrators, partners doing IT outsourcing and traditional resellers looking to enrich their offering. He is building the partner ecosystem geographically and across vertical and industry solutions.

* His focus - services partners that build repeatable IP and innovate or leverage the advanced capabilities Google offers - such as machine learning.

* Perspective on competition - the experience and early bets AWS made have led to dramatic success and public cloud adoption. Microsoft has had big success across many cloud offerings and geographies.

* Why Google? - the quality of talent and engineering at Google, delivering things like its search engine and adjacent technologies. Google is solving for the big computer science problems around machine learning, containers, self-driving cars, language translation, etc. Google is also a huge contributor to "open source". Eric references Googles contributions to Tensor Flow, an open-source software library for Machine Intelligence.

* What is Google doing now? - Google has increased the number of offerings and increased its geographical coverage to support the market.

Welcome to the Ultimate Guide to Partnering. In this episode of the podcast, you get to hear me - Vince Menzione - being interviewed by Jen Spencer on her technology and channel podcast - the Allbound Podcast, hosted by Jen Spencer.

Jen was kind enough to invite me to her show which features technology channel leaders to discuss trends and success strategies. We discuss my experiences and insights in the channel and my new venture Cloud Wave Partners.

In this episode, we discuss what makes successful partnerships - how compensation drives behavior - and why commitment to a shared purpose is essential to success. Here is a link to the article and show notes from Allbound.

As a footnote - I'm releasing this episode with the official launch of my website www.cloudwavepartners.net where you can sign up for my weekly newsletter to read about my latest podcast episodes and other useful nuggets of information.

I hope you enjoy this episode

If you have not listened to the podcast, now is your chance by going to iTunes , Google Play, Player FM or going to my website “Ultimate Guide to Partnering“. Please review this podcast by going to iTunes and searching “Ultimate Guide to Partnering” and clicking on the album art and hitting the ratings tab. This helps others find the podcast.

You can also follow and like on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Thank you for following and listening.

I recently returned from an amazing week in Washington DC where I had the opportunity to present to partners on "how to take their Microsoft relationship to the next level", visit many old friends and meet new friends. I also received some amazing feedback on Ultimate Guide to Partnering.

This is an important time at Microsoft and partners need to better understand how the changes will impact their business and engagement with the tech giant.

I asked a voice of the Microsoft partner field to help me take our listeners through the changes - what it means to partners and how this ultimately translates into action in the days ahead.

In this latest episode of the podcast I was joined by Bill Hawkins from Microsoft's One Commercial Partner or OCP organization to share his thoughts on the changes, how they will impact partners and how partner sellers will engage to drive partner success in FY18.

In the discussion Bill pointed to an overarching theme - the right resource, engaging with the right partner, at the right time.

We discuss exactly what has changed. The slide below provides an overview of the roles and motions and we go through each element in more detail on the podcast.

We touch on the shift in compensation to better align sellers to the consumption model versus the transaction. Everyone in the field will be pivoting harder in this regard. More details on incentives plans will follow as changes roll out to the segments. They have not been released as of the date of this podcast to individuals in the Microsoft organization.

Toni Townes Whitley discussed the shift to "industry focused - partner powered" which is fundamental and allow for da eeper and more focused engagement by Microsoft sellers with partners into a given customer's business. The 6 verticals are:

1. Financial Services

2. Manufacturing

3. Retail

4. Education

5. Health - 430 accounts, roughly $2B.

6. Government

We conclude here that it's a great time to be a partner!

Satya's announced 4 key solution areas for the business during his Monday keynote - its important to note that these are not stove-piped business silos, but interdependent solution sets:

1. Modern Workplace & introduced MICROSOFT 365

2. Business Applications - including DYNAMICS 365

3. Applications & Infrastructure -

4. Data and AI

In the days ahead, I'll be asking leaders from Redmond and elsewhere to join the podcast and share more details on how these changes translate into success for partners.

Now more than any time - its important that Redmond have a persistent channel and message to partners and field sellers on how to drive the change to effect mutual success. I'm happy to be a conduit at scale through Ultimate Guide to Partnering.

I hope you enjoy this episode.

If you have not listened to the podcast, now is your chance by going to iTunes , Google Play, Player FM or going to my website “Ultimate Guide to Partnering“.