Building a Better Business

In this, VARBusiness' 8th Annual Partner Programs Guide, we provide indispensable information on more than 340 vendor partner programs across eight technology categories,carrier services, mobile systems, peripherals, software, storage,

systems, voice and data networking hardware, and wireless. Beginning on page 32, you'll find the resulting two-part program directory. The first portion is a compilation of partner-program information from more than 100 leading vendors, which were chosen based on their market share in major technology categories.

On page 57, you'll find a second directory profiling more than 200 additional vendors. Additional information about all vendors and their partner programs can be found in our searchable database at www.varbusiness.com/ppg.

Also new to this year's Partner Programs Guide, we've debuted a star-rating component, which we've applied to each vendor's partner program based on what it does,and doesn't,offer. For details about our methodology, turn to page 28.

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Bear in mind: While our rating system provides a useful gauge of vendors' programs, we encourage you to examine all of the information you can gather before deciding which programs are right for you. Canvass the components of the five-star vendor programs charted throughout the main guide; those are the kinds of elements you'll want to look for in researching other programs.

Also within the main guide, you'll find additional elements of interest, including an overview of mergers and acquisitions since last year, interviews with vendor channel members who offer insight about different program aspects, and a look at how partner-friendly vendors' Web sites really are.

The Finer Points

Now that we've painted the big picture of what this issue has in store for you, let's take a quick look as to how we collected the data. The first phase involved vendors filling out a Web-based questionnaire. Any missing data was obtained via follow-up phone calls. Finally, we tabulated the responses and developed the two directories.

So, what makes vendor partner programs so appealing? In today's competitive economy, cultivating strategic partner relationships is crucial to a solution provider's long-term success. Rewarding vendor programs offer an array of sales, marketing, training and support perks and features.

As we analyzed the data, we found more vendors this year are offering solution providers the tools necessary to generate sales compared with one year ago. Nearly all of the vendor programs we examined offer postsales support (98 percent) and technical training (93 percent) as two of their key benefits,up 12 and 15 percentage points, respectively, year over year, according to VARBusiness data. A vast majority of vendor programs also offer partners access to dedicated account reps (81 percent), assistance with new market opportunities (81 percent) and gated members-only Web-site access (75 percent).

On average, almost three in four of the vendors who responded to our questionnaire (73 percent) offer prequalified sales leads to their channel partners. What's more, prequalified sales leads tend to be more commonly dispersed by traditional technology vendors than by those endorsing emerging technologies. For example, today roughly four in five of the vendors we examined in the voice and data networking hardware (82 percent) and storage (76 percent) arenas offer prequalified sales leads, compared with approximately three in five in the wireless (60 percent) and mobile systems (64 percent) spaces.

Additionally, nearly two in three of vendor programs included on the pages that follow offer links to a solution provider's home page from their vendors' sites (65 percent). And a majority of vendors continue to offer MDF/co-op funds (62 percent) to assist in demand-generation efforts throughout the channel.

Vendors' Expectations

But naturally, you don't get something for nothing: A majority of the vendors who answered our questionnaire require training (68 percent), vendor certification (58 percent) and measurable industry expertise (53 percent) from their partners in exchange for all those benefits. Moreover, industry expertise is rapidly rising as a program requirement, doubling in stature from just one year ago. Annual purchase commitments are also growing in popularity. According to our data, 42 percent of the vendors who answered our questionnaire are requiring annual purchase commitments from their channel partners, up 9 percentage points over last year.

Despite the fact that most existing partner programs

(76 percent) were launched less than five years ago, vendors have needed to augment their business models with strategies that could potentially improve their sales and distinguish their programs,particularly after a year of unrivaled price wars and lackluster demand. As a result, more than half of the vendors who responded to our questionnaire (51 percent) have modified their partner programs during the past 12 months.

Vendors also tend to sign on solution-provider partners more often internationally than domestically. On average, vendor programs in our guide currently report having 1,960 partners in the United States and Canada, compared with 5,220 internationally. Those statistics, however, are skewed by the hardware segments,systems, networking and peripherals, which tend to have significantly more international than domestic partners.

Forty percent of the programs we examined are from small to midsize companies, which comprise fewer than 100 employees. What's interesting about that is smaller vendors tend to sell direct to VARs more often than larger vendors.

In addition, an overwhelming majority of those smaller vendors (86 percent) sell direct to VARs, compared with 69 percent of vendors in the main listing. Those smaller vendors are also appreciably less likely to sell direct to end users or online to end users.

But no matter what the vendor's size, one thing is abundantly clear: Vendors recognize the important role that the channel plays in their continued growth. Despite the fact we're still very much embroiled in one of the most turbulent

periods in recent economic history, vendors are continuing to focus their money and attention on their partner programs in an effort to win both the loyalty and dedication of their

channel partners.

Your task? Weeding through the offerings and finding the partners that best fit your,and your customers',needs. That's what VARBusiness' 8th Annual Partner Programs Guide is all about,helping you make the right choices, sorting through the hype and getting down to business with the right partners year after year.