AWS Marketplace Hits 330,000 Active Customers: Here’s Why
AWS’ global channel chief, Ruba Borno, discusses new improvements on the AWS Marketplace and making the online store ‘a place where our SI partners can reach new customers.’
The AWS Marketplace is flourishing as the platform now has 330,000 active AWS customers subscribed to software and services purchased from the cloud marketplace.
“We have over 330,000 customers that transact on a regular basis on the AWS Marketplace,” said AWS’ global channel chief, Ruba Borno, in an interview with CRN. “So we’re excited to make that a place where our SI [systems integrator] partners can reach new customers.”
Borno said AWS’ online software store is helping more and more customers each day find, procure and immediately start using solutions and services that run on AWS. Customers spend 80 percent more on third-party ISV applications and partners close a higher percentage of deals, 27 percent, when transacting through the AWS Marketplace versus traditional selling, according to a Forrester report.
[Related: AWS’ 6 Huge Generative AI Products, Partner Plans: Ruba Borno]
Victor Raymond, CEO of fast-growing AWS Premier partner Triumph Technology Solutions, said Triumph currently has 19 offerings listed on the cloud company’s marketplace.
“The marketplace is certainly a growing area for us,” said Raymond. “Our 19 offerings on the marketplace are a combination of professional services offerings and offerings that we have with specific ISVs.”
The Philadelphia-based AWS partner combines its own IP and services with ISV’s solutions to create a packaged offering on the AWS Marketplace.
“It’s a packaged offering for the customer to be able to get their products, our partners’ products and our services in one easy-to-use place,” he said. “We transact a decent amount in private party offerings on the marketplace. … The goal is to market to those 330,000 customers. We’re focused on, ‘How do we market specifically to our end customers about these marketplace offerings?’”
AWS Marketplace’s New Enhancements
As AWS continues to push channel partners toward listing their solutions and services on the marketplace, the Seattle-based cloud giant is constantly investing into the platform.
AWS recently added new features such as search auto-complete, which allows customers to easily discover a partner’s product listing, as well as its SaaS Free Trials initiative, which helps partners acquire new customers through free product evaluation for prospective buyers.
On the tooling front, Vendor Insights is now available that enables partners to make security and compliance information available to buyers on the marketplace. The marketplace is now integrated with Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Services (Amazon EKS) to bring partner solutions to customers directly in the EKS console.
AWS Launches Partner Central 2.0
AWS has also revamped its AWS Partner Central by launching Partner Central 2.0 this year.
The new partner portal includes new site navigation, faster page load times and expanded user roles to help individuals find relevant content faster based on their role.
“It’s providing a customized user experience and user interface based on that assigned role, based on which Partner Path the partner is in, and what stage they’re in. So this provides proactive guidance and personalization,” said Borno, vice president and head of worldwide channels and alliances.
AWS’ channel chief said the new site navigation and common workflows are tied to specific outcomes the partner is trying to achieve. “We also launched the new site navigation with a menu structure that aligned with our profitability framework of build, market, sell and grow,” she said. “This won’t be a one-and-done launch. We’re going to continue to make improvements to Partner Central.”
AWS Giving SI Partners ‘More Value Out Of The Marketplace’
AWS is striving to provide systems integrator partners more value out of the marketplace in 2023.
“Our goal is that the marketplace isn’t just for ISVs. We have global systems integrators putting their offers on the marketplace who are realizing net-new logos because they’re getting access to customers they didn’t have before,” said Borno.
One of the biggest barriers for AWS partners to realize their full potential is not selling through AWS Marketplace, according to Borno. Creating a product listing on the AWS Marketplace can increase a partner’s customer reach and accelerate the sales cycle, she said.
“It’s music to my ears when SIs say, ‘Hey, we got net-new logos from your marketplace.’ We hear that from ISVs pretty regularly, but to also hear it from our SI partners means that we’ve got a real value proposition there for them,” Borno said.