Certance Unveils First Channel Program

Although the Costa Mesa, Calif.-based company, formerly known as Seagate Removable Storage Solutions, has been working with resellers for years, it is now ready to offer some specific incentives as part of its Americas Reseller Partner Program, unveiled this week.

Certance currently maintains several thousand solution providers across North America and South America and is looking to get at least 1,000 of those to sign up for the program by the end of the year, said Jo-Ann Downey, director of channel marketing.

There is no penalty for not joining the program, but there is no reason to not join, said Downey. Participating solution providers become eligible to go the company's online portal, where information on products, programs and support has been centralized, Downey said. Included on the portal is a resource product center that offers tools to help resellers find the right solution for customers and training videos of 7 minutes to 10 minutes each to help solution providers sell disk-to-disk-to-tape appliances, LTO-2 drives and DAT72 drives against competitive offerings, said Downey. Also available is an online version of the company's product reference guide.

The Americas Reseller Partner Program also offers partners a seed unit discount from $100 to $750 depending on the product and an end-user registration discount program, Downey said. The discount, launched to a few partners on a test basis in January, gives solution providers that register an end-user opportunity an exclusive 5 percent to 10 percent discount when the sale is closed. Solution providers can keep that discount or pass it on to customers, she said.

Signing up is easy, Downey said. "The barrier to entry is answering 10 simple questions."

Certance products are available in the United States via Bell Microproducts, D&H Distributing, Ingram Micro, Synnex and Tech Data.