Rapid7 Revamps Partner Program To Drive Security Services, Specializations

Updates to the cybersecurity vendor’s PACT Partner Program aim to improve consistency and enablement for partners, the company’s channel leaders tell CRN.

A major overhaul to Rapid7’s partner program aims to improve consistency with partners while enabling MSPs and MSSPs in a bigger way than in the past, the cybersecurity vendor’s channel leaders told CRN.

The updates to the cybersecurity vendor’s PACT Partner Program, set to be announced Wednesday, also come as Rapid7 sees a “resurgence” in its core areas of vulnerability and exposure management in addition to strong growth in threat detection and response, according to Alex Page, vice president of global channel sales at Rapid7.

While Rapid7’s channel program has historically catered mainly to resellers, the revamped PACT program is now “bringing this wider community of partners that we work with into the program,” said Kelly Hiscoe, director of business operations and strategic partnerships at Rapid7.

This means recognizing and rewarding partners for the “total partnership” whether it’s from resale or services revenue, which should be a key improvement for providers of managed services — including VARs that have an MSP or MSSP business, according to Hiscoe.

“Our vision is to really have our program represent our growing community of partners that looks very different and is continuing to evolve,” she said. “We're not complicating the program by assessing the different types of revenue streams under a partner separately.”

In part, the goal is to help partners to understand how they can move through the levels of the three-tier, medal-based program when they are delivering services around Rapid7’s offerings, Hiscoe said.

“It's just more clarity, more predictability, more consistency,” she said.

Partner Perspective

At Alchemy Technology Group, a Houston-based partner of Rapid7, the increased focus on enabling and incentivizing services is a highly welcome move, according to Mark Grassmann, national cybersecurity practice principal at the firm.

Alchemy, which provides customers with both resale and services, understands that “customers need a diversity of types of partners to solve the complex problems they have to deal with,” Grassmann said.

“Being able to offer a full portfolio of both products and services to meet those needs has led to our success with our customers,” he said. “With Rapid7 now offering a similar consistency across all their partners, that is just going to solve more challenges that we see customers experiencing in a more comprehensive way.”

Focus On Specializations

In connection with the new PACT program, Rapid7 is also announcing two new specializations that aim to further help partners with driving services.

The new MSSP Specialization and Service Delivery Specialization come in response to feedback from partners, who’ve been telling Rapid7 that they’re looking for more ways to leverage their technical skills and competencies in selling to customers, Hiscoe said.

Vendor recognition — demonstrating that they’ve attained technical depth through training — is a crucial way to be able to do that for partners, she said. “That's really going to help a partner just be more successful with Rapid7 overall.”

For Alchemy, Grassmann said that having solid enablement and training from a veteran cybersecurity vendor like Rapid7 is invaluable for his company’s sales team, given that most sales professionals do not have a security background.

“This has given our sales professionals confidence to go and speak with prospects and customers in a more educated way,” he said. “This holistic approach of training across the entire cyber perspective has allowed our new sales professionals to hit the ground running — faster than we've seen with any other partnership.”

Key Growth Opportunities

The new partner program launch comes as Rapid7 is finding strong demand for XDR (extended detection and response) and MDR (managed detection and response) as well as in vulnerability and exposure management, Rapid7’s Page said.

“There's been a very interesting resurgence of the core of our business,” he said.

Meanwhile, Rapid7 is also finding strong initial demand for its recently launched cyber asset attack surface management capabilities, which came through the acquisition of Noetic Cyber last summer, Page said.

“The industry needs more of a unified view across traditional infrastructure, cloud, internal attack surface, external attack surface,” he said. “And rather than using seven different solutions to do that, we're coming to market with a unified approach.”