GUIDEBOOK - Resello

GUIDEBOOK

Grow your Microsoft CSP business

to the next levelMaximize your organization’s use of the resources and opportunities offered by

Microsoft’s partner network.GU

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Table of contents:

1 Introduction

1.1 For whom is this guidebook?1.2 Why this guidebook?1.3 Programs, hubs, tools, services1.4 What can you find in this guidebook?

2 Building and developing with added value

2.1 Microsoft Partner Center2.2 Transformation Readiness Assessment2.3 Microsoft Solution Workplace2.4 Cloud Profitability Scenarios2.5 Cloud Enablement Desk2.6 Partner-to-partner resources2.7 ISV Connect2.8 Customer co-creation

3 Learning, knowledge, skills and certifications

3.1 Certification benefits3.2 Fundamentals, role-based and specialization certifications3.3 Available certifications and exams3.4 Certification exams3.5 Learning partners3.6 Microsoft Learn3.7 Get Licensing Ready3.8 Cloud Champion3.9 Other learning resources

4 Partner status, competencies and benefits

4.1 Silver, gold, or both?4.2 Action Pack4.3 Available competencies4.4 Competency requirements4.5 Competency benefits4.6 Access your organization’s skills, competencies and benefits in Partner Center4.7 Advanced specializations4.8 Azure Expert MSP program

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GROW YOUR MICROSOFT CSP BUSINESS TO THE NEXT LEVEL (C) RESELLO

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5 Go-to-market, grow and expand

5.1 Co-op funds5.2 Smart Partner Marketing5.3 Partner Network resources5.4 Qorus Content Hub5.5 Digital Content Marketing OnDemand5.6 Microsoft partner directory5.7 Offers and free trial periods5.9 Microsoft Digital Commerce & Campaign Network5.10 Co-sell with Microsoft and the commercial marketplace5.11 Azure Marketplace5.12 AppSource5.13 Global Expansion Readiness5.14 Third-party paid services5.15 Access sales insights in Partner Center

6 Following the latest developments at Microsoft

6.1 Microsoft Product Terms website6.2 Social and other news channels6.3 Local partner hubs and newsletters6.4 CSP Spotlight and license updates6.5 The big-three conferences6.6 Other events6.7 Organizing your own events6.8 International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners6.9 The Microsoft Partner & Tech Communities

7 About Resello

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INTERESTED? CONTACT US VIA [email protected] OR +31 88 002 8200

mailto:[email protected]

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1. Introduction

If you are reading this guidebook, it is safe to say the organization you work at is likely a Microsoft CSP partner. Perhaps your organization has been a CSP Direct Bill Partner for many years, and you are looking at ways to expand its business further. Maybe your organization is transitioning to the CSP program com-ing from one of the other Microsoft programs, such as Open License or SPLA, and you are looking into what all the fuzz is about. Or perhaps your organization has just been on-boarded by an Indirect Provider, such as Resello, into the program as a CSP Indirect Reseller. Chances are, you are trying to find out just what kind of resources and opportunities are available to your organization as a partner in the Microsoft CSP program.

Either way, the central questions that this guidebook is meant to support you with are:

“Where do I go from here?” and “How can I grow my Microsoft CSP business?”

1.1 For whom is this guidebook?

This guidebook is written for Microsoft partners who are actively engaged in the Microsoft Cloud Solu-tion Provider (CSP) program and looking for ways to expand and grow their business. That includes both Indirect Resellers, as well as Direct Bill Partners. If your organization hasn’t started in the Microsoft CSP pro-gram yet, or it has just been on-boarded, you might also be interested in downloading Resello’s ‘10 Tips for successfully selling Microsoft Cloud Solutions’ eBook. It, and other CSP guidebooks, can be found on our special resources-page.

And as Resello, as an Indirect Provider, has Europe as its geographic service area for its Indirect Resellers, it makes sense to focus on the European region. So, this guidebook can be informative to any Microsoft partner, its target audience is partners in the Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider program within Europe.

1.2 Why this guidebook?

We decide to write this guidebook because we see the environment in which CSP partners are operating is changing. And Microsoft is actively driving this change, for instance with new, stricter requirements for becoming or remaining active as a Direct Bill Partner.

When the CSP program was launched, back in 2014, it started small. A select number of hand-picked mar-ket makers, and a small selection of cloud services, with Office 365 as the main driver. Fast forward to 2021 and Microsoft has over 90.000 partners actively transacting via the CSP program. Microsoft has also added a plethora of cloud services to the CSP program, including Microsoft Teams, Azure Reservations, Windows Server subscriptions and on-premises perpetual licenses. The new commerce experience was launched, and Azure Marketplace opened up to CSP partners. Partner were required to sign the new Microsoft Part-ner Agreement, and customers the new Microsoft Customer Agreement. And Microsoft announced stricter requirements and enforcement, to limit the amount of CSP Direct Bill partners per geographical region. And that are just a few of the bigger changes that have happened over the course of the last few years.

Out of all these changes, one trend emerges: the Microsoft CSP program is to become the sole partner program, and it has Microsoft’s full focus. Sure, others are still around, but Microsoft has already an-nounced it will transition Open License partners to the CSP program. So, the CSP program gets a lot of attention, through both local offices and company-wide platforms, programs and partner support via a multitude of initiatives.

https://www.resello.com/resources/

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That brings us back to the reason why we decided to write this guidebook. To create some order, and some more insight, into just what is available out there for Microsoft CSP partners to help them build solu-tions, add value, drive adoption and usage and to grow and expand their CSP business. 1.3 Programs, hubs, tools, services...

Microsoft offers a myriad of options when it comes to supporting its partners in expanding and growing their business. This can sometimes be bewildering, especially with Microsoft also periodically updating programs, changing processes, renaming products and launching new (local) initiatives.

For that reason, this guidebook offers a window into the world of Microsoft, with a narrow focus on the op-tions available for Microsoft CSP partners to grow and expand their CSP business. In it we will focus on the benefits these options can bring your organization, not on the process of implementation. For most of the resources available we could probably write complete guidebooks to make the most out of each resource.

Fortunately, this is where Microsoft has done an excellent job with step-by-step tutorials, FAQs and short videos to guide you through their tools and resources. For instance, when talking about incentives we will inform you of the available incentives, the requirements and ways to spend them. We won’t talk about the step-by-step process of claiming co-op incentives, providing proof-of-execution, responding to comments made by the Microsoft co-op staff etc. That level of detailed information is beyond the scope of this guide-book.

Where necessary links have been provided to relevant information provided by Microsoft. Of course, as a CSP Indirect Provider Resello also offers consultancy and support on any questions our partners have concerning the topics discussed in this guidebook, and you are free to contact us should you yourself have any need for more information.

1.4 What can you find in this guidebook?

There are many ways to structure the multitude of resources, programs, platforms and tools provided by Microsoft. For instance, we could structure by solution type (Microsoft 365, Azure etc.), solution area (Modern Workplace & Security, Apps & Infrastructure, Data & and Business Apps), industry, geographic region or organizational maturity. In this guidebook we have chosen to generally follow Microsoft’s phased structure:

• Learn and onboard: Identify your opportunities in the cloud and enroll in the program. • Build practices: Develop your business plan and define your offers, then build your practices and solutions and enhance your skills with technical training. • Go-to-Market: Understand priority opportunities and sales plays. Create your marketing plan, launch your offers and drive demand. • Sell: Get customers leads with referrals, grow your pipeline with better customer targeting, and co-sell with Microsoft and other partners. • Manage and expand: Manage customer satisfaction and expand your practice.


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1. Introduction

As an active Microsoft CSP partner your organization has already gone through the learn and on-board phase. That is why this guidebook starts with chapter 2 on building solutions, business development and adding value. Just plain reselling Microsoft cloud services is an option that some IT-resellers take, but margins can be thin. The real value is in service projects, managed services, or even better, some form of intellectual property that your organization owns.

After that we will dive into Microsoft certifications, options and resources to build skills, expand knowledge and grow expertise in chapter 3. While chapter 4 deals with Microsoft competencies, structured organiza-tional levels of knowledge, skills and expertise. Microsoft competencies come with benefits your organi-zation can make use of, so we will discuss those here as well. We will also talk about additional specializa-tions available, to differentiate your organization even further.

Chapter 5 combines go-to-market marketing and sales resources, platforms and tools, with information about funding your organization can get access to, based on the amount of revenue you generate though selling Microsoft cloud services. This chapter also provides insights into the new commerce experience, sales channels available to your organization and opportunities for expanding your solution profile and partner-to-partner solutions.

The final chapter 6 deals with a challenge familiar to most Microsoft CSP partners: keeping up with everything relevant that is happening at Microsoft. This chapter presents you with ways to follow what is happening and helps you stay up to date on relevant subjects.

Finally, we realize any document of this size and subject matter is only up to date until the point it is re-leased. The current version is the 2021 version, that was created early 2021, about halfway through Micro-soft’s fiscal year (which runs from July till June). We will update this document again late 2021 for the next edition. In the meantime, if you have feedback on what should also be included in this guidebook, feel free to reach out to us via [email protected]. We hope you enjoy reading this guidebook and find it a valuable resource on its own.

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Building anddeveloping

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2. Building and developing with added value

In this chapter we will talk about resources for further business development, building new solutions and adding value on top of Microsoft cloud services. We start this chapter with some information about Microsoft Partner Center, the central partner hub. After that we will talk about the Transformation Readi-ness Assessment and Solution Workplace. Both good places to start if your organization is building and developing apps, (managed) services and other solutions based on Microsoft cloud services, and looking towards building, marketing and selling them. In this chapter we will also mention other resources that can help your organization with building business cases, financial forecasting, collaborating with other Microsoft partners and more. 2.1 Microsoft Partner Center

The Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) and the accompanying Microsoft Partner Center are what Microsoft calls the central hubs for anything and everything partner-related in Microsoft’s world.

A lot of the functionality including purchasing, customer management and invoicing is done via your Indi-rect Provider or an automation platform provider. But other resources, tools and programs, such as insight into training and competencies and managing rebates and co-op funds, can be done via Partner Center.

So the first thing you should do, if you haven’t already, is sign up for a Microsoft Partner Center account. It is the central hub for almost all of the resources, offerings and opportunities that Microsoft has on offer for its partners. This includes all kinds of aspects of the Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) program, such as customer referrals and incentives, which we will discuss later in this guidebook.

The resources available to your organization depend on your organization’s status with Microsoft. A list of examples you can do as a CSP partner in Partner Center include:

• Access benefits based on your Microsoft partner status;• View your competency and advanced specialization status;• Analyze product, customer and training data (see Insights below);• Receive customers referrals and leads;• Manage rebates and co-op funding incentives;• Add your solution to the Microsoft commercial marketplace.

Access, roles and user-rightsOnce your organization is signed up, you can get started creating Partner Center user accounts for any other colleagues who might need access, and set roles and permissions to assign rights to individual us-ers, including guest users. The benefit here is that permission can be set granularly, according to the role an individual has in your organization. Take somebody in a support position, she might need to manage customers, request support on behalf of a customer or change customers’ subscriptions. Whereas some-one from your finance department might not require access to customers. He can be given access to the incentives part, to view and claim incentives, edit bank and tax details and access support.

https://partner.microsoft.com/commercial

https://partner.microsoft.com/

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/create-user-accounts-and-set-permissions

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/permissions-overview

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Gaining insight into your organization’s performanceAnother opportunity for Microsoft CSP partners in Partner Center is the new Insights dashboarding and re-porting. Insights is a relatively new part of Microsoft Partner Center, launched in early 2020, for a partner’s analytical needs. In it Microsoft combines data from several sources to give its partners a 360-degree view of their company’s performance, trends and opportunities around Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s).

Insights provides a quick overview based on dashboards and various graphs, with more intelligence still being integrated. For instance, Insights can be used to view customer propensity, the predicated chance of a customer’s position in their buying cycle.

The underlying raw data used for the various graphs can be download as tab-separated value (TSV) for further analyses, and Microsoft is working on opening up the data further for integration with various ana-lytical software.

We’ll mention specific Insights functionality in more detail in the chapter 4, when talking about competen-cies and benefits, and in chapter 6 when we will talk about go-to-market, funding and sales initiatives.

2.2 Transformation Readiness Assessment

The Transformation Readiness Assessment is a benchmarking tool. It’s a self-assessment meant to de-termine your organization’s digital transformation readiness. Specifically, where it is in the cloud lifecycle management. It can provide your organization with next steps to undertake.

Figure: Self-assessment benchmarking with Transformation Readiness


https://profitabilitybenchmark.microsoft.com/

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Transformation Readiness lists about a dozen or so questions per category, divided into six categories: cloud strategy, sales&marketing, business model, cloud services, solutions area focus and cloud tooling. Through it you can create a benchmark of your organization’s business and technical capabilities com-pared to other organizations within your solution area. This includes your business model and chosen strategy, organization’s staff skill and expertise levels, go-to-market activities and the tooling you use.

Figure: Transformation Readiness benchmark score example

Based on your answers the Transformation Readiness tool provides you with customized recommenda-tions and resources to guide you on the next business development and go-to-market steps to take. These are of course completely optional, but the value of the tool is in gaining some insight into where Micro-soft’s resources, tools and opportunities can help your organization grow.


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2.3 Microsoft Solution Workplace

The building stage is all about going from an idea to a solution that is ready to be marketed and sold. Dur-ing the building stage you develop your organization’s app, build your solution on Azure or, for instance, implement your managed services on top of Microsoft 365.

To support CSP partners during the building stage, Microsoft has created a tool called Solution Work-place. It is a self-service online wizard that generates a customized checklist, personalized to your organi-zation’s specific needs.

Solution Workplace starts with a questionnaire that is split up into four parts: your solution basics, a short description, the solution area it will be active in and the Microsoft cloud services it will be built on top of.

Figure: Select the solution areas for your new solution in Solution Workplace

Enter your solution detailsOnce you are signed into the Solution Workplace, the first thing you need to do is the name you solution and choose whether you are developing an app or creating a (managed) service. After that you choose when to launch this solution and add a short description. Next you decide which of Microsoft’s solution ar-eas your solution will address. These are the apps & infrastructure, data & AI (both combined under Azure here), business applications or modern workplace & security. Each is further divided into about a dozen topics, such as Internet of Things, supply-chain management and securing remote work.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-nl/solutions/my-solutions

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-nl/solutions/my-solutions

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Finally, you decide which Microsoft cloud services your solution will be built on top of on. Your options are Azure, Dynamics 365 or Microsoft 365, with each further divided into topics such as Migrate (to Azure) or Microsoft Teams.

To create a solution together with fellow employees you can use the Contacts option, available after the first four steps are completed. You can also collaborate with external partners this way, as long as they are registered Microsoft partners. Finally, in some cases your organization may work with a Microsoft Product Development Manager (PDM). In that case, the PDM may set up a solution for you to evaluate.

Checklist, tasks and resourcesBased upon your input, Solution Workplace generates a customized checklist of resources and actionable tasks.

Each task in the customized checklist comes with its own set of tasks. Each task lists a set of resources that go along with that specific task. Resources include playbooks, on-demand webinars, assessments, tem-plate and various other resources for building and business cases, marketing and selling your solution.

We will discuss the marketing and selling part in much further detail in chapter 5. Note that all these tasks are optional and based on your input. You can use the Solutions Details to edit your solution or start over with a fresh one.

Figure: customized build checklist with links to resources


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2.4 Cloud Profitability Scenarios

To help partners determine the likely profitability of their app, solution or (managed) service, and help you compare various business scenarios going forward, Microsoft has created a list of Cloud Profitability Scenarios. These resources, such as a customer lifetime value model, can be used to identify which Microsoft cloud services, devices and other products can help your organization create and sustain a profitable business. They can support with creating business cases, ‘what if’ scenarios, and help projecting customer lifetime value and profitability.

This website offers resources such as financial models (Excel files) and value propositions (PDF files) for most of Microsoft’s cloud services, which includes Azure, Dynamics, Microsoft 365, and the Enterprise Mobility Suite. Each comes with its own set of scenarios, such as providing disaster recovery using Azure or increasing sales productivity by providing customers with a CRM. There are also solution area focused financial models and value propositions, including an ISV model, ModernBiz campaign, and education and hosting scenarios.

2.5 Cloud Enablement Desk

The Cloud Enablement Desk (CED) is a program aimed at unmanaged partners (those without a Microsoft Product Development Manager). CED supports high potential Microsoft partners, working on repeatable, scalable cloud solutions build on Azure, with accelerating their cloud business. For instance, CED can get you direct access to marketing consultants and technical presales experts and deployment guidance to win opportunities. According to Microsoft, partners that engage with the technical experts see an increase of up to six times more Azure consumed revenue compared to other Microsoft partners.

By joining the Cloud Enablement Desk program your organization gets access to two services:

1. Practice building acceleration: support with activating benefits, path to attaining competencies, commercial marketplace listing, building marketing capabilities, referral engine optimization. This can be during a period of up to 9 months of engagement. 2. On-board to co-sell ready status: support with profile creation, co-sell solution set-up, validation of solution requirements, on-boarding and walk through of tooling available.

The program is open to a limited number of Microsoft partners per geographical region per time period. CED participation requires a MPD ID and an Action Pack, or silver or gold competency. Partners also need to meet the co-sell requirements for the second co-sell related service.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/solutions/cloud-profitability-scenarios

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/solutions/cloud-profitability-scenarios

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-NL/campaigns/ced-landing

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2.6 Partner-to-partner resources

Collaborating with other Microsoft partners is one of the important ideas behind Microsoft’s strategy. Espe-cially so with the launch of the new commerce experience and the opportunity for ISVs to have Microsoft CSP partners sell their solutions via Azure Marketplace and AppSource (more on that in chapter 5).

We have already briefly mentioned the opportunity to build solutions together with other Microsoft partners in the Solution Workplace. Microsoft actively encourages partners to work together, and to col-laborate where necessary to meet customer needs. That is why the Build partnerships website includes a listing of partner-to-partner resources, such as conversation preparation and partnering Bill Of Materials templates.

To find relevant Microsoft partners to collaborate with, you can search the Microsoft Solution Provider database. Or interact with other Microsoft partner via Microsoft’s communities and Yammer groups. For more info on those, see chapter 6.

2.7 ISV Connect

While technically out of the scope of a guidebook about the Microsoft CSP program, Microsoft also offers a program for Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) called ISV Connect that is worth mentioning here. If your organization works with Dynamics 365 or PowerApps customers, and it does software development: building apps and software solutions, this program might be worth a look at.

Your organization can purchase Dynamics 365 and PowerApps through the CSP program and participate in the ISV Connect program to benefit from development tooling, technical consultation, tech event access, on-boarding support, go-to-market consultation and resources, and more.

2.8 Customer co-creation

Finally, if your organization is interested in supporting Microsoft improve the cloud services your organi-zation is using for and selling to your customers, you might be interested in signing up for the Customer co-creation initiative. It is a program with the intent to better shape the Microsoft product roadmap. It is aimed at individuals within companies with a role in using cloud technology, who can be connected with Microsoft engineers in the development process of new solutions. By signing up you can be invited to participate in surveys, 1-on-1 conversations or even focus groups to help Microsoft better understand business challenges, areas of opportunities and possible new solutions.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/connect/build-partnerships

https://www.microsoft.com/en-nl/solution-providers/home


mailto:https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/solutions/business-applications/isv-overview?subject=

https://customercocreation.microsoft.com/

https://customercocreation.microsoft.com/

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3. Learning, knowledge, skills and certifications

This chapter is all about learning and acquiring new knowledge and skills. To qualify skills and expertise, Microsoft has created Microsoft certifications. These are based on real-life job roles people need to have during their careers. In this chapter, we will not just talk about these certifications, although they are a cornerstone of the Microsoft learning experience. We will also mention the myriad other learning opportu-nities available to Microsoft CSP partners who are intent on acquiring knowledge and expertise.

3.1 Certification benefits

Microsoft certifications are individual based. Anyone can learn the gain the required knowledge and skills and take the (paid) exam to attain a specific certification. Microsoft certifications and Microsoft competencies tie in together. To attain Microsoft competencies your organization needs to have a certain number of employees with specific Microsoft certifications. These competencies are then tied to certain benefits. We’ll discuss these organizational competencies, their requirements and benefits, in more detail in chapter 4.

Since certifications are based on individual skills, knowledge and expertise, most of the benefits associ-ated with gaining Microsoft certifications are for the individual. These vary from increased employability to receiving higher than average financial compensation. However, employing individuals with Microsoft certifications is also beneficial for your organization, in the following ways:

• Acquire new knowledge and skillsets: with the current pace of digital transformation it is impor tant to invest in continuous learning with the aim of acquiring new knowledge and attaining new skills. Microsoft’s training and certification options standardizes this into real-world skills needed for actual job roles, with easily available and scalable training and certification options. • Save on recruitment: finding the people with the right set of skills and experience outside of your organization takes time, effort and money. Especially in a job market where good people are hard to find. Investing in training existing in-house talent can actually lower your cost, while also having people with the required skillset available more quickly. • Improve efficiency and productivity: training for a Microsoft exam ensures individuals within your organization have the right set of skills to properly and efficiently implement, use and support Microsoft’s cloud services and Azure.• Provide proof: each certification comes with its own certification badge, a digital representation of this achievement. Having certified individuals within your organization proofs your organization’s skillset and experience, and can help with new customer acquisition. • Increase monthly recurring revenue: by training and certifying your staff, your organization has the knowledge and skills to properly support and promote Microsoft cloud services. This drives customer adoption and increases usage which both maximize your monthly recurring revenue and increase the amount of rebates you are eligible for. • Increase rebates: once you acquire certain (sets of) certifications your organization can attain Microsoft competencies, These come with rebates, and a set of other benefits (see chapter 4).

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• Stay competitive: Microsoft keeps launching new cloud services (such as Windows Virtual Desktop and Microsoft Teams) and adding new functionality. Microsoft is also increasingly asking its part ners to add-value on top of its cloud services. So, your organization needs to keep up by adding new skills and expertise to properly support your customers, or risk losing some or all of their business to your competition. Some Microsoft partners do this by specializing, others extend their portfolio with new (managed) services. Training and certification enables your organization to add new cloud services, and support customers in using new functionality.

3.2 Fundamentals, role-based and specialization certifications

Microsoft certifications and exams can be split into Fundamentals, Role-based and Specialties:

FundamentalsThe Fundamentals certifications and exams are meant for anyone starting with a certain solution area, such as Azure, to gain the foundational knowledge. This could be job seekers or students, but also for employees in non-technical roles such as sales or account management. There are currently eight differ-ent Fundamentals courses.

Role-based certificationsRole-based certifications were first introduced during Microsoft Ignite back in 2018. Before their intro-duction, certifications and exams had a more technology focused approach. By switching to role-based certifications, Microsoft shifted the focus to actual job roles people perform in the real world. For example, the old ‘Developing Microsoft Azure Solutions’ was replaced by the new ‘Azure Developer Associate’.

There are currently 17 defined job roles, ranging from app maker to data analyst, and business owner to solutions architect. For individuals in these job roles there are currently over 30 role-based certifications, split into Associate certifications (intermediate level) and a few Expert certifications (advanced level).

The Expert certifications are the hardest to obtain, they require an individual to first obtain one or more Associate level certifications. For example, the Microsoft 365 Certified: Enterprise Administrator Expert certification requires either: • Microsoft 365 Certified: Modern Desktop Administrator Associate• Microsoft 365 Certified: Security Administrator Associate• Microsoft 365 Certified: Messaging Administrator Associate;• or the Microsoft 365 Certified: Teams Administrator Associate certification.

SpecialtiesTo make things a bit more complex, Microsoft also still has Office Specialist certifications, which are geared more towards the end-user, showing the user has the required skills to optimally use an Office solution such as SharePoint or Excel.

Additionally, Microsoft also offers two Specialties on top of the role-based certifications. Both of these still have a technology focus: Azure for SAP workloads Specialty and Azure IoT Developer Specialty. These are meant to deepen an individual’s knowledge and technical skills in specific industry solution.


https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/browse/?type=fundamentals

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/browse/?resource_type=certification&type=role-based

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/browse/?resource_type=certification&type=role-based&levels=intermediate

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/browse/?resource_type=certification&type=role-based&levels=advanced

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3.3 Available certifications and exams

Below we have included a table showing the certifications currently available. As mentioned before, certi-fications and exams are regularly reviewed and updated. Be sure to browse the certifications and exams database, use the Microsoft Cloud Society wizard to tailor your learning path, or check the Microsoft Certification poster for updates, additions and changes.

Fundamentals

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AZ-900 Azure

AI-900 Azure AI

MB-910 Dynamics 365 Customers Engagement Apps

DP-900 Azure Data

AZ-104 Azure Administrator

AZ-500 Azure Security Engineer

AI-100 Azure AI Engineer

DP-300 Azure Database Administrator

AZ-204 Azure Developer

DP-200+DP-201 Azure Data Engineer

DO-100 Azure Data Scientist

DA-100 Data Analyst

AZ-600 Azure Stack Hub Operator

AZ-400 DevOps Engineer

AZ-303+AZ-304 Azure Solution Architect

AZ-120 Azure for SAP Workloads

AZ-220 Azure IoT Developer

MB-901 Dynamics 365

MB-200+MB-210 Dynamics 365 Sales Functional Consultant

MB-920 Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations Apps

MB-300+MB-320 Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management, Manu-facturing Functional Consultant

MB-200+MB-230 Dynamics 365 Customer Service Functional Consultant

MB-200+MB-220 Dynamics 365 Marketing Functional Consultant

MB-300+MB-500 Dynamics 365 Finance And Operations Apps Developer

MB-300+MB-310 Dynamics 365 Finance Functional Consultant

MB-200+MB-240 Dynamics 365 Field Service Functional Consultant

MB-800 Dynamics 365 Business Central Functional Consultant

MB-300+MB-330 Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management Functional Consultant

MB-700 Dynamics 365 Finance and Operations Apps Solution Architect

MB-600 Dynamics 365 + Power Platform Solution Architect

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MS-900 Microsoft 365

MS-600 Developer

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MD-100+MD-101 Modern Desktop Administrator

MS-203 Messaging Administrator

MS-700 Teams Administrator

MS-500 Security Administrator

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MS-100+MS-101 Enterprise Administrator

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PL-900 Power Platform

PL-100 Power Platform App Maker

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PL-400 Power Platform Developer

PL-200 Power Platform Functional Consultant

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DA-100 Data Analyst

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MB-600 Dynamics 365 + Power Platform Solution Architect

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https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/browse/

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/browse/

https://cloudsociety.microsoft.com/

https://aka.ms/traincertposter

https://aka.ms/traincertposter

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3.4 Certification exams

To acquire a Microsoft certification, you first have to pass the accompanying exam. There are three general ways to prepare for an exam:

1. Free online learning paths. These paths consist of a list of modules, with separate units for each module. Basically, each module has a learning objective, with text, videos and activities to attain the required knowledge for that learning objective. The obvious benefit, besides the cost, is the opportunity to start training when time is available, and to split-up training modules in a convenient matter. 2. Training events: local, online or hybrid events, combining presentations and demonstrations with Q&A and assignments. These scheduled events can usually be found using the Microsoft events finder tool.3. Instructor-led paid training courses. These training courses are given by Microsoft Certified Trainers. The downside is the cost that comes with these training courses, however the investment required can vary quite a bit depending on the type of training and training partner you choose. The benefits include the ability for more interactive learning, with training specifically tailored to your organizational needs. This option can also significantly decrease the amount of training time needed before an exam, since training partners know exactly how to optimally prepare individuals for an exam. We will talk a bit more about training partners later on.

Exam participationWhen fully prepared you can sign up and have an exam date scheduled. Prices vary per country, and per exam. The MS-900 Microsoft 365 Fundamentals exam for example sets you back 99 USD, whereas the MS-100 and MS-101 exams required for the Microsoft 365 Enterprise Administrator Expert certification cost 165 USD per exam. That does not include the prerequisite Associate exam you will have to pass of course.

Exams can be taken at special testing center locations, most training partners have these, or from home. To prevent fraud, certification exams have very strict policies. For instance, you will have to sign an NDA and provide identification. Microsoft takes this very seriously, and for good reasons.

In case you are not 100% confident about your knowledge and skills, or perhaps simply a little exam-shy, you can purchase a test-exam. Additionally, ‘Exam replay’ is also on offer. This gets you a voucher for taking a certification exam and the option to retake that exam in case you fail to pass the first time. You can even purchase a combination of both.

Finally, please also note that certification exams change on a regular basis. Current exams are reviewed every two months. If small changes are needed the exam gets a refresh. For major updates a new exam is created and the old one is retired. For example, the old AZ-100 and AZ-101 Microsoft Azure Administrator exams were replaced by the AZ-103 exam, which was later replaced by the current AZ-104 exam. In cases like these the old exam can still be taken, but only for another 90 days.


https://events.microsoft.com/


https://www.mindhub.com/microsoft-certification-practice-tests-and-study-guides-s/64.htm

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Funding certification training and examsAs a Microsoft partner your organization is entitled to incentives, in the form of rebates and co-op funds (depending on the amount of revenue you generate). These co-op funds can be used to cover Microsoft exams and tuition fees. Claiming co-op funds for this purpose requires proof of attendance and comple-tion and a third-party invoice.

Annual renewalOnce you pass a certification exam and become a certified professional your certification will stay valid for one year. To keep that certified professional status, you will need to pass a renewal assessment each year. Microsoft decided to have one-year certification validity because of the rapid pace of development of their cloud services, and the new functionality that gets added to them.

3.5 Learning partners

To support Microsoft CSP partners (and their customers) Microsoft has created a global network of well over 350 learning partners. These partners offer training courses for the Microsoft certification exams, usually combined with other training courses. Training courses are given by Microsoft Certified Trainers, who themselves have to pass rigorous exams.

LocationDepending on the learning partner, training courses can usually be taken on-site (at the learning partner’s location or at your company’s office), online (via Microsoft Teams or otherwise) or in a blended / hybrid mode. Learning partners might provide a set schedule for training courses and/or sometimes offer on-de-mand, customized solutions.

PricingPrices vary and can start as low as a couple hundred euro for an online, one day training course taken with a group of other attendees, to thousands of euro for a week-long, on-site training course. The cost is usu-ally depended on the type of training , the number of participants, the location, the length and depth of training required, and other factors. Some learning partners guarantee that attendees will pass the exam and will cover the cost of re-taking the exam in case of failure to pass, which of course is factored into the price as well.

End-user trainingFinally, some learning partners also offer end-user training, for instance on the use of solutions like Micro-soft 365 or Microsoft Teams. This means you can partner up with learning partners and add value to your proposition by offering end-user training to your customers.

To get you started we have created a list of local learning partners in a number of European countries. For a complete and up to date overview please use the Microsoft Learning Partner by country tool to find a learning partner with Microsoft Certified Trainers.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/certifications/partners



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Austriappedv

BelgiumRealdolmen Education

BulgariaITCE

CroatiaAlgebra

Czech RepublicGOPAS

Denmark4D

FinlandSovelto

FranceEduGroupe

Germanybrainymotion

GreeceICTC

HungaryTraining360

IcelandPromennt

ItalyPCSNET

NetherlandsDidacticum

Norwayglasspaper

PolandAltkom Akademia

PortugalRumos

Romaniabittnet

SlovakiaGOPAS

SloveniaKompas Xnet

SpainPUE

SwedenLearning Tree

SwitzerlandDigicomp

United Kingdom365 Talent Portal


https://ppedv.at/

https://education.realdolmen.com/nl

https://education.realdolmen.com/nl

https://www.itce.com/

https://www.algebra.hr/

https://www.gopas.eu/

https://www.4d.dk/

https://www.sovelto.fi/

https://edugroupe.com/

https://www.brainymotion.de/

https://ictc.gr/

https://www.training360.com/

https://www.promennt.is/

https://www.pcsnet.it/

https://didacticum.nl/

https://www.glasspaper.no/

https://www.altkomakademia.pl/

https://www.rumos.pt/

https://www.bittnet.ro/

https://www.gopas.eu/

https://www.kompas-xnet.si/

https://www.pue.es/

https://www.learningtree.se/

https://www.digicomp.ch/

https://training.365talentportal.com/

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3.6 Microsoft Learn

Microsoft Learn is in some ways the successor to other Microsoft learning platforms, such as the Microsoft Virtual Academy (MVA) and Microsoft Learning & Development. It is available for free, with hundreds of training courses available in 23 languages.

Learning resources are built into a hierarchy. At the top are the Microsoft certifications we discussed earlier in this chapter. Preparations for certification exams are split up into learning paths. For example, the AZ-900: Microsoft Azure Fundamentals certification has six learning paths in Microsoft Learn.

Each learning path consists of a number of modules. For instance, the Azure Fundamentals part 1: De-scribe core Azure concepts learning path is made up of three modules, each of which takes about 30 minutes to complete:1. Introduction to Azure fundamentals;2. Discuss Azure fundamental concepts;3. Describe core Azure architectural components.

Finally, each module is broken down into separate units. These are the learning building blocks, such as articles, case studies, videos, knowledge checks and exercises. The exercises use a sandbox environment in Azure, that works the same way subscriptions work in Azure. Meaning it emulates real-world conditions.

You can browse all learning paths and modules and filter by job role, product/solution or level of exper-tise. Each learning path, module and unit can be taken at any time. If you are logged in with your MPN ID, all progress is saved.

Learn TVFinally, Microsoft Learn also includes a feature called Learn TV, a (live-)streaming service for digital content. This includes updates on the latest announcements, features, and products from Microsoft. Part of schedule is pre-recorded, part of it live, with the option to interact with the presenters and other participants.

3.7 Get Licensing Ready

Get Licensing Ready was originally created with licensing programs in mind (think SPLA). Get Licensing Ready can be an interesting resource for anyone looking to gain more expertise in Microsoft’s licensing options.

More software licensing business will become part of the Microsoft CSP experience, such as on-premise perpetual software licenses, which were added in early 2021. So taking a deep dive into licensing can be interesting for Microsoft CSP partners to learn more about licensing options.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/browse/

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/learn/tv/

https://www.getlicensingready.com/

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Figure: On-premise product training modules in Get Licensing Ready

Get Licensing Ready offers 50 training modules, on Azure, Dynamics 365, on-premises solutions, online services (Microsoft 365) and Power Platform. Each module comes with online training resources, an on-demand exam and a certificate on completion of the exam. Bear in mind, these are different from the Microsoft certifications mentioned previously in this chapter. All resources and exams are available for free for Microsoft partners.

3.8 Cloud Champion

Cloud Champion is a partner program for training and learning provided and sponsored by Microsoft in several European countries. The core content is webinars, provided by Microsoft and selected partners. Subjects vary from beginner to in-depth, and are categorized into technical, sales, marketing or business (development) related. All webinars are recorded and stay available to watch on-demand, so the Cloud Champion platform has hundreds of training courses, webinars and learning paths available for both start-ing and experienced CSP partners.

Cloud Champion is currently available in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.


https://www.cloudchampion.at/

https://www.cloudchampion.be/

https://www.cloudchampion.dt/

https://www.cloudchampion.fi/

https://www.cloudchampion.ie/

https://www.cloudchampion.it/

https://resello.cloudchampion.nl/

https://www.cloudchampion.no/

https://www.cloudchampion.pt/

https://www.cloudchampion.es/

https://www.cloudchampion.se/

https://www.cloudchampion.ch/

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Figure: Cloud Champion’s training calendar for February 2021.

3.9 Other learning resources

Microsoft still has many other learning resources available that can proof beneficial to Microsoft CSP partners. Sometimes these share content with other learning platform, such as Learn TV.

Virtual Microsoft training sessionsVirtual Trainings Sessions provided by Microsoft. Either interactive webinars, with the opportunity for chat-based interaction with instructors, or prerecorded training sessions. All with a technical focus on Azure, Business Applications and the Modern Workplace & Security.

Microsoft Transform CloudpartnersMicrosoft Transform Cloudpartners is a website chuck full of information and resources around the Mod-ern Workplace & Security solution area. This includes benefits and partner opportunities around

Cloud services (Microsoft 365, Windows 10 and Enterprise Mobility + Security) and specific solution prac-tices (for instance, end-point management and frontline workers), partner success stories, sales & licensing resources per SKU and links to product deployment information. Links to other workshops, events and the Tech Hub are also available.

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-US/training/virtual-training-series#/

https://cloudpartners.transform.microsoft.com/

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ExpertZone for sales and tech support professionalsExpertZone is a Microsoft training platform for sales reps and tech support professionals. The platform is specifically designed for retail and sales professionals employed by a retailer, distributor, or reseller that offers Microsoft products and services. But anyone, in sales, support or otherwise is free to sign up and use the training courses. The platform uses some form of gamification, however actual rewards are only available for employees of selected Microsoft partners.

FutureProof Azure certification wizardFutureProof is an initiative by 30+ Microsoft learning partners, to provide learning paths towards Microsoft Azure certifications. Basically, the website is a wizard you can use that starts with a job role (for instance developer or IT Architect) or job function (marketing or sales) that then tells you which certifications and which training courses apply for that role/function. You can use the website to select one of the 30+ learning partners, or use the certification advise and choose a local learning partner by using the Microsoft Learning Partner by country tool.

Microsoft Skills ForwardSkills Forward is another Microsoft initiative, with a certification and learning path wizard similar to the FutureProof one, only this is one filters on products and interests. It also includes the full set of Microsoft’s cloud services, not just Azure. Skills Forward also has a series of blogs with insights into tech audience skilling that some Microsoft CSP partners might find useful.

Microsoft Cloud SocietyMicrosoft Cloud Society is yet another initiative like Skills Forward of FutureProof. This learning initiative focuses on Azure, and the App & Infrastructure and Data & AI solution areas. Through its learning paths, certifications and exams for developers, administrators, solution architects, data engineers and data scientists are available. The website also has links to events and webinars that are relevant for technical learning.

Microsoft OpenHackOpenHack is a developer-oriented community that connects developers and development teams with experts and Microsoft technical staff. OpenHack provides real-world challenges around topics such as containers, DevOps, migrating Microsoft workloads to Azure and modern data warehousing, via virtual and in-person events and webinars.

Channel 9Channel 9 is an online platform run by developers and IT-professionals within Microsoft, for other devel-opers and IT-professionals. The site offers a very large catalog of videos, webinars and shows. All content is non-commercial, aimed at sharing content and simulating conversation.

Microsoft Events CatalogFinally, we will discuss Microsoft events in more detail in chapter 5, but for now it is worth mentioning the Events Catalog. It lists thousands of on-demand and upcoming events organized and hosted by Microsoft and its local teams.


https://expertzone.microsoft.com/

https://future-proof.net/



https://pulse.microsoft.com/en/category/skill-forward-en/

https://pulse.microsoft.com/en/category/skill-forward-en/

https://cloudsociety.microsoft.com/

https://openhack.microsoft.com/

https://channel9.msdn.com/

https://events.microsoft.com/?timeperiod=all&isSharedInLocalViewMode=false&query=new&startTime=&endTime=

Partner status, competenciesand benefitsC

HAP

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274 INTERESTED? CONTACT US VIA [email protected] OR +31 88 002 8200

4. Partner status, competencies and benefits

Microsoft competencies define your CSP partner status. Microsoft has three types of partner status for its CSP partners. The first one is the entry level partnership your organization gets by joining the Microsoft Partner Network. The second and third tier partner status are called silver and gold.

To become a silver Microsoft partner or a gold Microsoft partner your organization needs to attain silver or gold competencies. The number, names and types of competencies continues to change. Updates are usually announced at Microsoft Inspire. For instance, during Inspire 2019 Microsoft announced the new Microsoft Security competency.

In this chapter we will talk about what competencies are available, we will dive into the requirements and discuss the benefits of attaining silver and gold competencies.

4.1 Silver, gold, or both?

Microsoft competencies come in two kinds, silver and gold. Each Microsoft competency comes with its own set of requirements and benefits. We have already talked about a specific requirement, attaining Microsoft certifications, in the previous chapter. Gold competencies have stricter requirements and come with better benefits for your organization.

SilverA silver competency shows to your (potential) customers that you have demonstrated consistent capability and commitment in a particular area. For instance, by attaining the Cloud Productivity silver competency you demonstrate that your organization’s knowledge and area of expertise is in Microsoft 365 and the Modern Workplace.

GoldA gold competency tells your leads and customers that you have demonstrated to Microsoft that you have best-in-class capabilities within a particular solution area. For instance, by attaining the Cloud Business Applications gold competency you demonstrate that your organization’s knowledge about and expertise with Dynamics 365 makes you a leader in the field of supporting your customers with this particular solution.

Your organization can actually gain multiple silver and gold competencies. For instance, your organization might attain a silver Datacenter competency and a gold Cloud Platform competency. Once you have attained a silver competency, and also manage to meet the requirements for the gold competency, your organization will retain all the benefits of the silver competency and gain the added gold benefits.

Your organization can actually gain multiple silver and gold competencies. For instance, your organization might attain a silver Datacenter competency and a gold Cloud Platform competency. Once you have attained a silver competency, and also manage to meet the requirements for the gold competency, your organization will retain all the benefits of the silver competency and gain the added gold benefits.


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4.2 Action Pack

To bridge the gap between a standard Microsoft partnership, and the silver and gold partnership level based on attained competencies, Microsoft has an offer called Action Pack. It gives Microsoft partners access to a select set of benefits. These are similar to the benefits associated with silver and gold compe-tencies. Unlike the competency benefits, these are not included at zero-cost for the partner. Action Pack comes with an annual fee, and the benefits your organization gain through it are more limited compared to silver or gold competencies. Below is a generalized overview of these benefits. Do note that some bene-fits, such as go-to-market resources, are available to all on-boarded Microsoft partners, with or without an Action Pack or competency.

Basically speaking Action Pack is best suited for Microsoft partners who, for whatever reason, cannot attain a silver or gold competency at any given time, but would still like to access some of their associated ben-efits. For instance, let’s say your organization just started as an Indirect Reseller. Your colleagues haven’t passed the required Microsoft certification exams yet. Action Pack might be a suitable option to bridge the time between now and attaining the required competencies.

Your organization can access product licenses to try out cloud services, such as Microsoft Teams or Azure. You can already show potential customers your Microsoft partner logo on your website. And you can use technical presales to get you started on customer projects. All while your colleagues take the necessary time to learn, train and pass the certification exams.

Partner Directory

Benefit

Listing

Action Pack adds

Priority listing + referrals

Silver competency adds

Priority listing + referrals + co-sell

Gold competency adds

Go-to-market - Additional resources More additional resources

Microsoft partner logo Logo builder access Logo builder access Logo builder access

Technical enablement Virtual trainingsessions

Virtual trainingsessions

Virtual trainingsessions

Technical presales 5 hours Unlimited + 20 advisory hours

Unlimited + 50 advisory hours

Product licenses Limited Additional licenses Extensive

Product support 10 incidents 15 incidents 20 incidents

Cloud support - 5 / unlimited incidents 10 / unlimited incidents


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4.3 Available competencies

There are currently 18 different competencies, all of which are available in silver and gold varieties. Micro-soft has split their competencies into four solution areas:

Apps and infrastructureApps and Infrastructure focuses on app development, infrastructure, Azure, and the relationship between on-premises and the cloud.

Datacenter“Transform datacenters to become

more flexible, scalable, and cost- effective with solutions that bridge

on-premises and the cloud.”

Application Development“Highlight your expertise in

providing development services on an enterprise-proven platform.”

App Integration“Seamlessly integrate applications and data and automate business processes across the enterprise.”

Cloud Platform“Help customers modernize their infrastructure and migrate applications and data to the cloud.”

DevOps“Manage the process, people, and

technology to get powerful apps into customers’ hands.”


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Data and AIData and AI focuses on big data, machine learning, Azure and Power BI.

Data Analytics“Deliver customers actionable

business insights they can use to transform their businesses.”

Data Platform“Enable customers to harness big

data and analytics on-premises, in the cloud, and in hybrid environ-

ments.”

Business ApplicationsBusiness Applications focuses on Dynamics 365 as an ERP or CRM solution, Project and Portfolio for pro-ject management and PowerBI and the Power platform.

Cloud Business Applications“Demonstrate your expertise as a

Dynamics 365 partner and leader in delivering business-ready apps and

services.”

Enterprise Resource Planning“Help your customers make data-driv-

en decisions with global visibility, scalability, and digital intelligence.”

Project and Portfolio“Deliver complete project and

portfolio management solutions built on our leading platform.”


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Modern Workplace and SecurityModern Workplace and Security focuses on communication, collaboration, productivity, and security. With devices and Windows 10, Microsoft 365, Exchange, Teams and SharePoint.

Collaboration and Content“Deliver SharePoint solutions and take

advantage of a fast-growing market opportunity.”

Communications“Demonstrate your expertise in

delivering solutions that use Skype for Business in both hybrid and cloud

environments.”

Cloud Productivity“Showcase your expertise in delivering

Office 365—the leader in commer-cial-grade productivity solutions.”

Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM)

“Help customers address important compliance issues and emerging

security threats.”

Messaging“With a competency in Exchange and Exchange Online products, you can help bring customers the collabora-

tive tools they need.”

Security“Validate your capabilities to deliver security solutions on the Microsoft

platform and help customers guard against threats, protect data, and

maintain compliance.”

Small and Midmarket Cloud Solutions

“Empower SMB customers to work from anywhere with best-in-class

productivity and security.”

Windows and Devices“Help your customers unleash the

power of Windows, from deployment to delivering state-of-the-art devices.”


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4.4 Competency requirements

Each competency has its own set of requirements, split into a requirements for silver and for gold. The specific requirements for each competency can be found on the Microsoft Partner Network website. Competency requirements will have to be met every year. Competencies also require an annual fee. Generally speaking, the requirements fall in one of two general categories:

Knowledge and experience targetsFor all competencies a certain number of your employees must pass an exam and/or become Microsoft certified. By passing the exams and acquiring certifications your organization shows it has a set of employees with a certain level of knowledge about and experience working with Microsoft’s various cloud services. For example, the silver Security competency requires one individual to pass either the MS-500 Microsoft 365 Security Administration, or the AZ-500 Microsoft Azure Security Technologies exam.

Sometimes these same individual also needs to pass other exams or assessments. For example, the same two individuals need to pass either the Microsoft Certified: Azure Developer Associate or the Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate and the Microsoft Certified: DevOps Engineer Expert for your organization to attain the silver DevOps competency.

In other case the same individual needs to pass all exams of a set of role-based exams. For instance, to attain the gold Cloud Platform competency two individuals need to pass all exams associated with the Developer role (Microsoft Certified: Azure Developer Associate) , Administrator role (Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate), Architect role (Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert) or the Data Engineer role (Microsoft Certified: Azure Data Engineer Associate).

Performance targetsSome competencies also require your organization to proof it is capable of meeting certain performance targets, or KPIs if you will. Besides demonstrating your organization has the knowledge and experience to support customers with certain Microsoft cloud services, these business targets demonstrate your commitment. They proof your organization is capable of implementing solutions and running managed services for your customers.

Depending on the competency, these targets might be part of the requirements:• Azure customer consumption: a set amount of Azure customer consumption is USD. The amount varies per competency, and whether your organization is operating in developed markets or developing markets. Bear in mind this needs to be customer consumption, your own organization’s Azure consumption doesn’t count.• Revenue: depending on the competency: a set amount of revenue gained from selling software licenses, such as Windows Server, Windows 10 or Office 2019, from New Billed Cloud Revenue for Dynamic 365 solutions or from Surface devices sold.• Deployment: deploy at least a certain number of PowerBI seats.• Active usage: a calculation per month of the unique number of users taking an intentional action on a specific service such as a Microsoft 365 workload. In some cases, your organization also needs to add a certain number of new customers or increase your customer base by a certain number over the past 12 months. In other words, you need to proof that your organization is actively selling the solution and proof that you are driving user adoption: your customers are actually using the Microsoft solution you have sold them.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-US/membership/competencies

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4.5 Competency benefits

Each competency comes with its own set of benefits. These benefits help your organization throughout the entire customer’s journey. Benefits help with creating solutions and services with added value to reach your target audience and to create additional demand. They help you get sales leads. And once customers are on-boarded, further benefits support your organization and your customers. Although the specific ben-efits vary per competency, they fall in the following general categories:

Acquiring new business opportunitiesAttaining a silver or a gold competency gives you the option to have your organization listed in the Microsoft partner directory. This directory lets customers search for a Microsoft partner in their specific geographic area who can provide them with the solutions and expertise they need.

Figure: Microsoft partner directory listing for partners in New York who sell Office 365 to customers

The directory is the customer facing part. Your company listing can also be used by Microsoft’s own inter-nal sales agents, when they look for qualified partners to refer customers’ requests towards. Additionally, the info can also be used by Microsoft sellers who have gathered customer requirements and are search-ing for a Microsoft partner that meets their needs.


https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/solution-providers/home

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To start receiving customer referrals and sales leads you will need to create a business profile listing via Partner Center for all the geographic regions your organization serves. Each business profile can show the solutions your organization offers. These business profiles are then used for the partner directory and available leads will be shown via the referrals tab in Partner Center.

Additionally, once your organization is listed, you also qualify for co-sell opportunities. These are sales opportunities where multiple Microsoft partners work together to meet a customer’s requirements to solve the problem they are having by providing them with various Microsoft cloud services and expertise. By collaborating this way each partner can expand their solution and service offering and reach customers whom they would otherwise have to turn down. You can read more about co-selling and sales opportuni-ties in chapter 5.

Although Microsoft partners who purchase a Microsoft Action Pack can also get listed in the partner direc-tory, silver and gold partners receive priority listing.

Software for your own useAnother benefit of silver and gold competencies is the product licenses and Azure credit available for your organization to use. These Internal-Use Rights (IUR) licenses are meant for use within your own organiza-tion. They cannot be sold to your customers.

IUR software licenses can be used for creating POCs to try out new solutions, for ‘dogfooding’ software or simply to get the productivity, collaboration and development tools your colleagues need.

All competencies within each of the four solution areas (Apps & Infrastructure, Business Applications, Data & AI and Modern Workplace & Security) come with a shared set of software licenses (and Azure credit in the case of Apps & Infrastructure competencies). Each competency further adds competency specific soft-ware licenses. For example, attaining any Modern Workplace competency gets your organization 25 (silver level) or 100 (gold level) Microsoft Office 365 E3 licenses. Attaining the silver Small and Midmarket Cloud Solutions gets your organizations an additional 25 of those licenses.

Demonstrating your knowledge and expertiseEvery Microsoft partner is allowed to use a plain Microsoft Partner logo. To empower your organization to further demonstrate your knowledge and expertise, each silver and gold competency attained allows your organization to use this logo as a competency badge.

You have probably seen these Microsoft silver partner or Microsoft gold partner visual badges on various websites. Usually they list that organization’s competencies combined with the level, like this:


Figure: Various Microsoft gold partner competency badges

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/manage-co-sell-opportunities

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/manage-co-sell-opportunities

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Together with the certified letter you can download that verifies your competency, these badges enable you to differentiate your organization from your competitors (unless of course they also attain the same competencies), and act as a proof to showcase knowledge and expertise. These logos can be used on your website, on print materials, on event booths, digital advertisements and on presentations (made using PowerPoint of course).

To help you to use your partner logo with or without competencies, Microsoft has integrated a Logo Builder tool into Partner Center. It can be found under the MPN section, under Benefits. In case you happen to win a Partner of the Year Award, or attain an Azure Expert MSP status, the logos for these can also be downloaded using the Logo Builder tool.

Figure: The Microsoft Logo Builder tool in Partner Center

Go-to-market resourcesMicrosoft competencies offer access to a range of go-to-market resources that support your organization in marketing products and solutions to generate demand.

Most of these resources are available for all Microsoft Partners. Microsoft, and its marketing partners, have created a large number of marketing campaign materials, presentations, marketing and sales content, training, and more. All available on-demand. Most are of the self-service kind, meaning you can pick and choose which content to use from the resources available online.

Attaining a silver or gold competency further extends the amount of marketing resources available. These include the benefits from getting listed in the partner directory, discussed earlier, but also adds additional resources. For instance, with a gold competency you can receive Microsoft co-branded assets (one-pagers, case studies etc.). You can also provide details on a successful project you have done for a customer and have Microsoft write that out for you as a partner success story. Or you can get a custom quote from a Mi-crosoft executive for a press release. Basically, a gold competency gets you more official recognition from Microsoft that you can use demonstrating your skills and know-how to the rest of the world.There is a lot more to cover here, and we’ll talk about these and other options available in chapter 5.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/dashboard/mpn/membership/benefits/logobuilder

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/dashboard/mpn/membership/benefits/logobuilder

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Presales assistance and supportOnce your colleagues have gained the knowledge they need, you have a portfolio of products and services to deliver to customers and your marketing and sales team is busy acquiring more leads, you might also require technical presales, product and cloud support.

Luckily attaining Microsoft competencies gets your organization access to various kind of support options, ranging from on-demand technical courses to advisory hours and technical presales assistance:

• While every Microsoft partner gets access to on-demand technical content, such as playbooks and virtual training, partners with silver and gold competencies are also entitled to a number of product support incidents as part of Technical Support for Microsoft Partners. These are split into on-premise and Azure product support incidents, and cloud products support incidents via Signature Cloud Support. The latter is only available with the cloud competencies (Security, Cloud Business Applications, Cloud Platform, Cloud Productivity, Enterprise Mobility Management, Small and Midmarket Cloud Solutions).• Attaining a competency also gets Microsoft partners access to technical consultation. These advisory hours with a Microsoft technical consultant can be used for architecture and deployment assistance.• Partners looking for technical presale assistance can receive an unlimited amount of technical presales at no-cost, only available to partners with a silver or gold competency.

All these benefits are available via Partner Center for Microsoft Partners with silver / gold competencies.

4..6 Access your organization’s skills, competencies and benefits in Partner Center

As mentioned in chapter 2, the Insights part of Partner Center can be used to gain more insight via dash-boards and reporting on competency progress and attained benefits. It can also be used to gain insight into organizational skills, as we will discuss below.

Organizational skills and CompetenciesThe Organizational skills dashboard and the Competencies report provide insight into how your organ-ization’s employees are doing on trainings followed, exams completed and certifications gained. Since these are tied into your organization’s Microsoft Partner status and Microsoft competencies, they are a valuable resource to see opportunities to improve your organizations knowledge and skills and the status of your organization’s competencies.

The Organizational skills dashboard enables you to drill down into various detail. This includes organiza-tion-wide performance (when exams where passed and certifications gained) and any individual’s perfor-mance, enabling you to see how colleagues within your organization are performing on training, assess-ments, exams and certifications.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-NL/training/technical-presales-deployment-services


https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4020188/technical-support-for-microsoft-partners

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/3121537/using-technical-presales-and-deployment-services



https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-training-dashboard

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-competencies-report

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You can also use this dashboard to view your organization’s progress on the Microsoft Learn platform. That way you get an overview of the number of trained individuals, as well as modules and learning paths completed. Since training can be vital to differentiate your organization from your competitors, this over-view provided valuable insight into how your organization is doing overall and can be used to compare both individuals’ progress as well as organization wide progress versus the catalogue of available learning.

Figure: Learning paths completed for Azure and by role (with faked data)

The Competencies report also shows you which competencies are at risk next year, meaning which competencies are about to run out based on the requirements. Since competencies are tied to benefits provided to you by Microsoft, this provides you with insight into which benefits might be at risk.

Figure: Competencies dashboard showing various Microsoft competencies (with faked data)


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BenefitsAs mentioned above on the Competencies report, Microsoft partners gain certain benefits, including software licenses for your own organization, rebates and access to go-to-market resources, when their organization acquire certain competencies. The Benefits report can be used to view which benefits your organization has been granted, and which of the benefits your organization is already using.

With it, you can spot the resources and opportunities still available to your organization. For instance, your organization might have Azure consumption left, which can be used to set-up a PoC, run internal apps, or just try out new features on Azure.

4.7 Advanced specializations

Besides competencies, advanced specializations are available for a select group of Microsoft partners. These partners need to have in-depth capabilities in specific solution areas within Azure or the Modern Workplace and Security.

The specific advanced specializations change over time, as they are based on the solution areas with the highest customer demand. For instance, currently there are several advanced specializations for Windows Virtual Desktop and Microsoft Teams due to their popularity and relevance. Security advanced specializa-tions have also recently been added due to the increasing relevance of cyber security and data protection.

RequirementsThe requirements vary per advanced specialization, and Microsoft partners looking to demonstrate their capabilities to attain one of these specializations need to gain aligned gold competency first:

1. Attain and maintain gold status in an aligned gold competency; 2. Achieve required performance thresholds; 3. Have a minimum number of individuals who pass specific certifications or exams; 4. Meet additional requirements that may include, but are not limited to: a. Verifiable customer references b. Public case studies c. Microsoft technology performance indicators d. Architectural review

BenefitsThe benefits of attaining an advanced specialization are similar to the benefits of competencies:

• Visibility: partners with an advanced specialization can use badges, similar to the silver and gold competency logos. These badges are shown in the Microsoft partner directory.• Credibility: an advanced specialization demonstrates to customers that your organization has a deep specialization and in-depth know-how and experience in a specific Microsoft solution area.


https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-benefits-report

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/membership/advanced-specialization

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Azure advanced specializations

Data Warehouse Migration to Microsoft Azure

“Validate your expertise in analyzing workloads, generating schema

models, and performing ETL opera-tions to migrate data to Azure.”

Kubernetes on Microsoft Azure

“Validate your expertise in deploying production workloads to the cloud us-ing containers and managing hosted Kubernetes environments in Azure.”

Linux and Open Source Databases Migration to

Microsoft Azure“Validate your expertise in migrating

and optimizing production workloads running on Linux servers and/or Mari-

aDB, PostgreSQL, MySQL, CassandraDB and MongoDB

databases to Azure.”

Microsoft Windows Virtual Desktop

“Validate your technical capability in deploying, optimizing, and securing

virtual desktop infrastructure on Azure with Windows Virtual Desktop.”

Modernization of Web Applications to Microsoft Azure

“Validate your expertise in migrating and deploying production web appli-cation workloads, applying DevOps

practices, and managing application services in Azure.”

SAP onMicrosoft Azure

“Validate your expertise in deploying SAP solutions on Azure.”

Windows Server and SQL Serv-er Migration to Microsoft Azure “Validate your expertise in migrating and optimizing Windows Server and SQL Server-based production work-

loads to Azure.”


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Modern workplace and Security advanced specializations

Adoption and Change Manage-ment Advanced Specialization

“Showcase your extensive experience

and proven success in providing adoption and change management services while driving Microsoft 365 usage and organizational change.”

Calling for Microsoft Teams Ad-vanced Specialization

“Prove your expertise in deploying and managing Microsoft 365 Phone System to drive customer business

value.”

Meetings and Meeting Rooms for Microsoft Teams Advanced

Specialization “Unlock a designation for your experience and proven success

delivering Meetings and Meeting Rooms services and solutions for

Microsoft Teams.”

Teamwork Deployment Advanced Specialization

“Earn recognition for your experience and proven success deploying Micro-

soft 365 Teamwork workloads.”

Identity and Access Manage-ment Advanced Specialization “Differentiate your technical capabil-ities in partnering with customers to

evaluate and deliver Microsoft Identity workloads with Azure Active Directory

by earning an advanced specializa-tion.”

Threat Protection Advanced Specialization

“Show customers you can help them protect against threats by validating your capabilities to deploy Microsoft Threat Protection, Microsoft Cloud

App Security, or Azure Sentinel work-loads.”


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4.8 Azure Expert MSP program

The Azure Expert Managed Services Provider program is for Microsoft CSP partners who are especially capable of providing managed Azure services to their customers. This elite program, if you will, is only open for service providers with a proven track record in managing Azure services. It requires a time and cost-intensive (on-site) audit, as well as meeting on-going requirements. The Azure Expert MSP program comes with a set of additional benefits to match though.

RequirementsBefore you can apply for an audit, you will have to do a pre-audit assessment:

1. Become an active CSP partner;2. Drive a level of Azure consumed revenue per month; 3. Attain the gold Cloud Platform competency;4. Have a set number of certified individuals;5. Have an MSP offer listed in Azure Marketplace or AppSource;6. Promote that offer through your website;7. Submit four customer references for that offer;8. Have an Advanced Support for Partners or Premier Support for Partners covering Azure in place.

Benefits Once your organization passes the audit, it will gain access to the following benefits:

1. Additional Azure Expert MSP badge, which can be shown through your own website and other channels, and is shown in the Partner Directory;2. Top priority in the referral engine;3. Prioritized for co-sell engagements and leads;4. Tech, sales and business development support for creating and selling new managed services;5. Invites to exclusive events;6. Access to monthly calls with Azure engineers.


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-NL/membership/azure-expert-msp

Go-to-market, grow and expand

CH

APTE

R 5

5


5. Go-to-market, grow and expand

This chapter is all about going to the market, creating awareness, lead generation, sales and expansion. This chapter is broadly split into three parts: available funding based on your Microsoft revenue, marketing resources and sales and market expansion resources.

The first part is about funds CSP partners can claim based on the amount of revenue they create from sell-ing Microsoft cloud services. CSP partners can then use these funds towards activities to start selling more cloud services as a Microsoft CSP partner.

After that we will discuss marketing resources made available by Microsoft for its partners. Marketing is all about defining markets and choosing target audiences, refining the message and story you want to tell and optimizing reach by choosing the best channels. We will talk about ways Microsoft resources, tools and programs can help to create brand awareness and brand equity among your target audience and generate a pipeline of marketing and sales qualified leads to follow up on. This includes free marketing campaign assets, as well as paid third-party resources.

Finally, we will talk about sales and other resources to expand your business. As IT moves to the cloud, XaaS subscription models redefine the sales cycle from one-time big decision moments, to more regular touchpoints with the customer. CSP partners need modern sales techniques, such as social selling, to maximize their Microsoft CSP sales. Here we will look at ways Microsoft resources help support customer acquisition, means to further drive adoption and ways to increase usage of Microsoft’s cloud services. This part also deals with growing your business, including expanding beyond geographical borders.

5.1 Co-op funds

As partners grow their Microsoft CSP business and sell more cloud services, Azure Marketplace offers and Azure usage, they are entitled to incentives. These are split into rebates (60%), where you automatically receive a percentage of the billed revenue by Microsoft from your sales, and co-op funds (40%), which you will have to apply for.

Co-op funds enable Microsoft CSP partners to conduct marketing and sales activities that can increase brand awareness and drive sales pipeline growth. A partner may invest co-op funds in activities to facili-tate readiness, develop specializations, or attain Microsoft certifications (see chapter 3) that foster focused solution practices and create so called ‘Centers of Excellence’. That is Microsoft’s way of saying a partner specializes in certain areas.

Co-op funds offer important benefits for partners: • Extend existing budgets: add new funds to your marketing and sales budgets to ensure adequate levels of Microsoft-focused marketing and readiness activities.• Increased profitability: earnings reinvested as increased marketing and sales budgets into your business. This leads to more sales, which lead to more co-op funds which starts the circle again.• Drive business growth: rather than being included in the company’s general account, incentive earnings are allocated to increase sales pipeline and build focused business practices.

On the next page we have listed the current eligible co-op funded activities. For more detailed informa-tion, please read the incentive resources for Microsoft partners assets, our Microsoft Co-op Incentives - QuickStart guide and/or the Partner Incentives Co-op Guidebook that is available via the Microsoft Partner Center (under incentives).


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-NL/membership/partner-incentives

https://storage.googleapis.com/resello_website_cms_production/filer_public/c8/6f/c86f0622-ba14-468b-8578-c057913fe28c/resello_-_microsoft_co-op_incentives_-_quickstart_guide.pdf

https://storage.googleapis.com/resello_website_cms_production/filer_public/c8/6f/c86f0622-ba14-468b-8578-c057913fe28c/resello_-_microsoft_co-op_incentives_-_quickstart_guide.pdf

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Demand generationMarketing and advertising to drive demand and promotion of Microsoft offerings:

Print advertising in magazines, news-papers, outdoor advertising, catalogs

and brochures. For example: flyers for a Microsoft themed event you are sponsoring.

Digital advertising online on search engines, email newsletters and other

websites. For example: Paid advertisements

placed besides Google search results.

Social media marketing, online advertising on social media networks.

For example: sponsored updates on LinkedIn.

Direct mail, email, and SMS, commu-nication that is (digitally) delivered to

a targeted audience database. For example: sending a sponsored

mailing to event attendees.

Website optimization and SEO, web-site / web shop creation and improve-ments made to increase its ranking in

search engines. For example: having a third party cre-ate a keyword optimized micro-site for

launching a new customer solution.

Microsoft syndicated content placed on your website to promote.

For example, placing a banner-set made by Microsoft that leads to a

product page.

Migration services to Azure for compute workloads, IP solutions and

software. For example: an online tool with documentation and an (online)

demonstration partially developed by a third-party.

Solution building with third parties: build and promote solutions build on

Microsoft technology together with third parties.

For example: an ISV converts your software into SaaS and helps make it available via the Azure Marketplace.

Best practice development, for your value proposition build on top of

Microsoft technology. For example: a customer experience

center, showing off your custom solution.

Multi-touch digital campaigns are a combination of the above in one

campaign.For example: a marketing agency runs

a social media and search engine lead gen campaign and sends out a

newsletter to an acquired database to promote your new customer

proposition.

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Market developmentMarketing and sales activities to create awareness, brand preference and sales leads:

Telemarketing to call (potential) cus-tomers to build a sales pipeline.

For example: using a third-party call center to cold call an acquired data-

base with a special trial offer.

Customer seminars and bootcamps, digital or on-site events for (potential)

customers with the aim to inform, educate and train.

For example: a ‘how to collaborate more efficiently using Microsoft Teams’’

webinar.

Customer offers in the form of give-away items to generate awareness or

demand or reward sales performance. For example: give away a special Azure

t-shirt in return for signing up for an email newsletter about your

Windows Virtual Desktop implementation service.

Tradeshows and expositions, sales event you participate or organize

yourself. For example, event sponsorship with a Microsoft oriented booth at a cloud

themed conference.

Internal incentives and SPIFFs to award sales staff for reaching prede-fined KPIs relative to a peer group.

For example: setting up a sales target for sales teams with Microsoft Surface

Books as the possible reward.

On-site champ to reach clear busi-ness development results.

For example: hiring an external partner to lead and coordinate a time-

limited sales campaign with the goal of x-percent sales uplift on Microsoft

365 E3 and E5.

Proof of concept set up to create a working model of the solution, meant

for demonstration and evaluation purposes.

For example: creating a PoC on Azure to demonstrate the roll-out of a custom

build app developed for a customer.

Employee purchase web set up for customers to purchase Surface and

HoloLens devices. For example: create a self-service web

shop where your customer can pur-chase Surface Books.


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Partner ReadinessActivities to train sales and tech support to increase sales, decrease churn and customer lifetime value.

MPN participation annual enrollment fees for the Microsoft Partner Network.

Internal training and floor days to develop sales, marketing, customer

relationship management and/or technical skills on-site.

For example: an external sales con-sultant skilled in Microsoft software

coaches your sales-team.

On-demand training in virtual format to develop sales or technical skills.

For example: attending an online train-ing course hosted by Microsoft about technical support for Windows Virtual

Desktop.

Microsoft exams and tuition for attaining Microsoft certifications.

For example: follow an online train-ing course from a Microsoft Certified Learning Partner and pass the exam for the AZ-900 Azure Fundamentals

certification.

Microsoft hosted conferences, attending Microsoft events.

For example: funding your registra-tion, airfare and hotel reservations for

Microsoft Inspire.

Product seeding / Demo units to present to (potential) customers.

For example: handing out laptops with Windows Virtual Desktop on a trial

basis to a customer to evaluate.

5.2 Smart Partner Marketing

The Smart Partner Marketing hub is the central place to get started and expand on your organization’s Microsoft themed marketing activities.

Your organization’s marketing maturitySmart Partner marketing splits up organizations marketing maturity into three phases of marketing so-phistication: 1. Starting: your organization does not have a dedicated marketing employee, or perhaps one or two, and you are just beginning to take serious steps in creating awareness and generating leads. Microsoft calls this ‘Getting established’. 2. Expanding: your organization’s marketing staff has grown to about 3 to 5 employees, and you are actively marketing your Microsoft CSP business. Now is the time to further amplify your messaging, increase the number of marketing qualified leads and expand your sales pipeline. Or as Microsoft calls it, ‘Boosting impact’.3. Maximizing: your organization’s marketing staff numbers 6 or more employees, and they are quite capable of reaching your target audience via all the relevant marketing channels, with the right messaging, at the right time. This is the time to deepen customer relationships, and further grow cloud services adoption, usage and your organization’s recurring revenue. Or as it is called by Microsoft ‘Building loyalty’.

These phases are of course generalized. The number of marketing employees differs per organization, industry, market maturity and the extent to which you out-source marketing activities with third-party marketing agencies. It does provide a general context to learn how mature your organization’s marketing activities are, and where to go next.

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/smart-partner-marketing

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Principles, strategies and tactical stepsThese next steps are divided in Smart Partner Marketing into:1. Marketing principles: learn about the principles of differentiation, messaging, channels and targeting.2. Go-to-market strategies: decide on the strategies going forward, the choice of market, audience segments, channels, stories and assets.3. Tactical measures: deep dive into channels and find ways to maximize KPIs such as relevant audience size, number of social media followers, email open rates, search engine ranking, etc.

Each step comes with its own set of resources, including podcasts, webinars, sales and marketing assets, blogs and training courses. This also includes the latest market research from Microsoft, in partnership with IDC (a large global provider of market intelligence), and other research firms. And finally, success sto-ries from other Microsoft partners.

One-page marketing planTo help your organization in taking the next step in its marketing activities, Smart Partner Marketing also provides a 1-page marketing plan template. This document can be useful to articulate and specify your target audience, the messaging and channels to use, all the way to capturing leads and sales conversion. The template comes with a guide an ‘how-to’ explanation that is pretty much self-explanatory.

5.3 Partner Network resources

The Partner Network resources site is a huge content library filled to the brim with Microsoft branded content. Well over 5.000 pieces of content are available, including slide decks, brochures, technical train-ing videos, customer pitches, case studies, datasheets and various other types of content. This also in-cludes complete marketing campaigns, 89 of which are currently available. For example, the ‘Security for SMB (Modern Workplace)’ campaign features 12 assets, including a tele sales battle card, customer pitch deck, various infographics and other content. All content is available at no cost, for any Microsoft CSP partner.

Content can easily be filtered on solutions area, industry, asset type, product area and subject area. Or use the asset campaign collection, for instance on ‘Cloud Platform’.

The Partner Network resources content is also available in various languages. Be sure to visit the location selection page and select your target audience’s geographical region to browse both English content and content available in the local language. For instance, the Dutch version has 186 Dutch assets on top of the English assets, while the German version adds 261 additions assets in German.

Image galleryLooking for product visuals, stock photos or other images to use on your website or marketing- and sales campaigns? Microsoft has a large image gallery available online, with images ranging from Surface PCs to event photos and product logos to industry themed visuals.


http://aka.ms/1pagemarketingplan

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/asset#/

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/asset#/?type=marketing-campaigns

https://partner.microsoft.com/nl-nl/localeselection

https://partner.microsoft.com/nl-nl/localeselection

https://partner.microsoft.com/nl-nl/asset#/

https://partner.microsoft.com/de-DE/asset#/

https://news.microsoft.com/imageGallery/

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Additional marketing resources available via Partner CenterIn addition to the publicly available marketing assets, free to use by any Microsoft partner, your organi-zation can also get access to additional marketing resources via Partner Center. The marketing resources available depend on your organization’s attained Microsoft competencies, as mentioned in chapter 4. If this applies to your organization, you can find these marketing resources, along with other benefits, under MPN > Benefits > Go-to-market. Available marketing resources can include:• Co-Branded Marketing Assets (one-pager, presentation, social media visuals);• A quote from a Microsoft executive you can use in a press release;• Partner success story (published on Partner Success Stories site);• Customer case study (Customer Success Story site)• Marketing & referral management consultation;• Partner-to-partner marketing assets.

5.4 Qorus Content Hub

The Qorus content hub offers a portal to access Microsoft branded sales- and marketing content, such as PowerPoint presentations, Word documents and content collections, and to help you build customer ready proposals. Basically, it overlays a portal with added search, create and edit functionality on top of number of large content libraries available throughout Microsoft’s various websites and online initiatives.

Figure: The Qorus Hub Central portal

Microsoft 365 integrationAvailable content can be downloaded and shared with teams in Microsoft Teams. Or use the add-on inte-gration for Outlook, Word, PowerPoint and Excel to search, edit and include content into your emails and documents. This makes creating customized sales pitches and proposals quicker and more efficient.

Available content comes from the Microsoft Partner Network and other content libraries. This includes Microsoft branded slide decks, infographics, FAQs, quick start guides, one-pagers, use cases, email tem-plates, and a whole range of other documents for marketing purposes and sales enablement.

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/reach-customers/qorus-content-hub

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5.5 Digital Content Marketing OnDemand

Digital Content Marketing OnDemand, or DMC, is a marketing automation platform, build specifically around Microsoft branded content. It’s available for Microsoft CSP partners and can be used to create mar-keting campaigns around Microsoft cloud services to create awareness and generate leads. The platform is available at no cost.

Figure: The Digital Marketing Content OnDemand after first signing up

Partners using the Digital Content Marketing OnDemand platform reported a 40% increase in sales. Your organization’s results may obviously vary depending on the level of marketing activities it is already run-ning, but DMC can be a valuable place to start with online content marketing, or a good addition to your own marketing initiatives.

DMC allows for some branding. You can add your logo, banners, contact and company information to things like email and your microsite. The content is Microsoft branded, but this way you can still market the campaign as part of your own marketing efforts.

Decide on assets to useUsing DMC, you can choose from preconfigured marketing campaigns, or create your own using Microsoft branded content assets. Content is available in Dutch, English (US and UK), German, French, Portuguese and Spanish. This includes a microsite, social media updates, blog posts and other marketing assets. You can also use landing pages with registration forms for so called ‘gated content’, such as a whitepaper, to generate leads. DMC tracks and monitors all activity, and ranks contacts based on their interaction with the marketing campaign and content.

For instance, say your goal is to generate leads for your new managed Windows Virtual Desktop service. You can choose a pre-configured campaign with Microsoft branded content that explains what Windows Virtual Desktop and Virtual Desktop Infrastructure are, what its benefits are, such as multi-session & multi-user and more.


https://www.contentmx.com/microsoft/

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Schedule your campaignsCampaigns can then be configured and planned, so you can decide what content is to be shared in which week. This allows you to set-up a multi-week schedule, multi-channel online campaign. Each week you can decide to share the content yourself, or use the automatic option and let DMC automatically share the content at the dates and times you have set.

Share the content via your channelsContent can be shared via your social media channels, your blog and website, via email, and a variety of other channels. RSS-feeds are available to make it easier to share content via as many channels as possi-ble. You can also connect DMC with some of the well-known third-party SaaS-solutions, such as HubSpot, MailChimp, and range of others.

Finally you can use DMC as a tool to send mailings for your organization, with testing, email list, tracking and reporting options. This is obviously not as extensive of fully featured as a dedicated third-party email solution such as Constant Contact or Vertical Response. It can provide a convenient alternative or easy way to set up email marketing to get your organization started.

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5.6 Microsoft partner directory

The Microsoft Solution Provider database, or Microsoft partner directory, is a catalogue listing Microsoft CSP partners. Customers can use this catalogue to find and contact solution providers in their geograph-ical area that match their specific requirements. This means the tool connects potential customers for Microsoft cloud services to Microsoft CSP partners who can provide, support and/or manage these cloud services.

Visitors can filter on location, their organization’s employee count, and a product/service, skill, industry or other keyword. For instance, an enterprise customer from Belgium might be looking to implement Dy-namics 365 as their ERP solution and is searching for a Microsoft CSP partner with the skills to support the implementation and to train employees who will be using it.

Figure: CSP partners in Belgium who offer Dynamics 365 Enterprise listed as Solution Providers

Show off your competenciesAttained Silver and Gold competencies are also shown and CSP partners with relevant competencies get priority listing. Furthermore, visitors can filter to only show CSP partners with relevant competencies, advanced specializations and, if required, on Azure Expert MSPs.



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Get listed and generate leadsTo get listed in the Microsoft partner directory you need to create a business profile in Partner Center. If your organization is active in multiple countries or geographical areas, you have to create multiple busi-ness profiles, one for each country or region. Note that this information is also used to fill business profiles for Microsoft’s own internal partner directory. This gets used by Microsoft sales staff and service employees to match incoming customer request with partners who match the customer requirements. This means getting listed with a business profile can also help Microsoft sales generate leads for your organization.

5.7 Offers and free trial periods

Microsoft occasionally has free trial period or runs promotions on certain cloud services or SKUs.

Free trial periodsA free trial period provides you with an easy way to convince potential customers to try before they buy, helping with lead generation and easing sales. As a CSP partner you can offer your customers 30-day free trials for cloud services such as Teams and Microsoft 365.

Each customer can use a free trial once for every SKU that has a trial. For instance, a customer can try out Microsoft 365 Business Basic first, and then move on to a Microsoft 365 Business Premium trial, but not a second Microsoft 365 Business Basic trial period.

Trials are always provided as a 25 licenses bundle, whether your customer needs all of those or not. If your organization is a CSP Indirect Reseller these trials will be available via your Indirect Provider. If your organ-ization is a Direct Bill Partner you can access them via Partner Center, or via the (third-party) automation platform that uses the Partner Center API.

PromotionsMicrosoft also occasionally has promotions available for its CSP partners. These promotions are usually focused on the newer additions to the CSP program. For instance, to further drive the adoption of Teams, Microsoft announced promotional discounts on Microsoft 365 Audio Conferencing and Microsoft 365 Busi-ness Voice SKUs.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/create-a-marketing-profile

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/offer-your-customers-trials-of-microsoft-products

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/offer-your-customers-trials-of-microsoft-products

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/promotions

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5.9 Microsoft Digital Commerce & Campaign Network

The Microsoft Digital Commerce & Campaign Network, or DCCN, is a free-to-use platform for creating digital sales campaigns, using Microsoft branded content. It is meant to drive awareness, generate demand and increase sales in a modern sales world, where a large portion of the buyers journey is achieved via digital experiences.

Figure: Microsoft Digital Commerce & Campaign Network

Using DCCN you can create campaigns around Microsoft cloud services, using Microsoft branded dynamic content. Available campaign topics are centered around Microsoft products. This includes Office, Windows 10, Windows Server, IoT solutions and Support Solutions. So, while it is not a complete set of solutions available to Microsoft CSP partners, you can still use it for solutions such as Microsoft 365, Windows 10 Enterprise and Windows Server.

Available content includes banners and banner sets (available in all market standard sizes, and custom sizes) that you can include on your website. There’s also other high value content, such as whitepapers, market research or offers, that are locked behind lead registration forms. For each piece of content you select, you can include a custom URL that redirects customers.

For instance, you can send customers to your product page. Alternatively, you can automatically add a product to the shopping cart of your web shop. Or send the customer to a lead generation form, so your sales can follow up on the customer requests.


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Figure: Microsoft 365 Business Standard campaign content example

Each piece of campaign content chosen generates a custom code. This can be embedded in your website, web shop and blog, or you can have it published on special landing pages and targeted microsites. That way, DCCN can automatically publish your selected content on your website.

5.10 Co-sell with Microsoft and the commercial marketplace

Co-selling with Microsoft is framework for the collaboration between Microsoft and its partner network. It is a set of programs, channels, through which you as a Microsoft CSP partner can:

1. Resell Microsoft cloud services (Microsoft 365, Microsoft Teams etc.).2. Sell solutions, apps or services built on top of Microsoft cloud services embedded within the four solution areas that Microsoft defines (Business Applications, Applications & Infrastructure, Data & AI, and Modern Workplace & Security). 3. Sell other partners’ solutions (for instance, an MSP selling a SaaS-solution running on Azure build by a third-party ISV).4. Collaboratively sell solutions, apps or services built on Microsoft solutions together with other Microsoft partners (for instance, a collaboration between with an MSP who specializes in Azure and an MSP who specializes in end-user tech support to offer fully managed and supported Windows Virtual Desktop as a solution).5. Sell through Microsoft sales channels.6. Have Microsoft sales divisions sell your solutions.

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-NL/membership/co-sell-with-microsoft

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The benefits of co-selling with Microsoft for your organization this way include additional customer reach, the possibility to quickly scale your solution portfolio, the ability to offer added value to customers, build-ing trust with the Microsoft brand, and the ability to offer tailored solutions based on customer demand.

Figure: building, co-selling and go-to-market with Microsoft

New commerce experienceAt the heart of co-selling with Microsoft is the Microsoft commercial marketplace, which is part of what Microsoft calls the new commerce experience. Through it, Microsoft aims to simplify the purchasing process for customers, by phasing out all partner-oriented agreements and all customer-oriented agree-ments by combining these into just two agreements. One for all types of partners, and one for all types of customers. The customer is then free to purchase through the channel(s) of his choice.

Figure: The Microsoft new commerce experience


https://blogs.partner.microsoft.com/mpn/getting-started-with-the-microsoft-commercial-marketplace/

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At the same time Microsoft is also limiting the number of sales channels, for instance by phasing out the Open License programs in favor of the CSP program. At the same time it is expanding the existing ones, for example by adding on-premises perpetual software licenses to the CSP program.

The new commerce experience limits the number of channels to:

1. Microsoft led: these are Microsoft’s own sales divisions, which can sell your services, solutions and offers in the same way they sell Microsoft’s own product offers. For instance, back in 2019 Microsoft’s inside sales team generated and passed on to Microsoft partners more than 250.000 customers leads.2. Partners: customers can purchase via over 90.000 partners active in CSP program in 141 geographies.3. Self-service: in-product purchase experiences, AppSource or the Azure Marketplace. Microsoft CSP partners can also purchase solutions, services and offers on behalf of their customers. We will discuss these channels next.

The commercial marketplace allows your organization to offer services and solutions via any and all of these channels. That means you can have Microsoft sales divisions selling your product offering, or you can enable other Microsoft CSP partners to transact your offering.

As a Microsoft partner you can use Partner Center to publish your offer, decide on your pricing model, set-up contracts and billing and decide which of these three channels to enable. You might, for example, empower Microsoft sales staff to sell your solutions, and enable customers to purchase via Azure Market-place, but not allow other CSP partners to resell it.

5.11 Azure Marketplace

The Azure Marketplace is part of the self-service sales channels available as part of the Microsoft commer-cial marketplace. Together with AppSource it is part of Microsoft’s response to an emerging trend called the ‘consumerization of IT’, where the trend for IT solutions is to become more designed and marketed towards the end-user, the consumer of the solution. Developments like Everything-as-a-Service (XaaS), subscription business models, cloud-based applications, shadow IT, changing customer buying cycles and sales touch points are all part of, or effects of this trend. Hence also the focus on the CSP program, and its cloud-based, subscription model versions of cloud services like Office 365, Windows 10 and Windows Server.

The Azure Marketplace is split into two basic offer types: Apps and Consulting Services. There currently over 25,000 apps (including all the different SKUs) and over 10,000 consulting services on offer via the Azure Marketplace, and this number is still growing rapidly. As a Microsoft CSP partner you have two ways of benefiting from the Azure Marketplace:

https://azuremarketplace.microsoft.com/en-gb/marketplace/

https://azuremarketplace.microsoft.com/en-gb/marketplace/apps

https://azuremarketplace.microsoft.com/en-gb/marketplace/consulting-services

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Promoting and selling through the Azure MarketplaceThe first option is for your organization to be the seller of apps, services or solutions. You can gain ac-cess to global distribution of your solution and find a new customer audience. This also provides current customers with a convenient way to purchase your offers. Together with AppSource the Azure Marketplace currently has over 4 million monthly active users, with 99% of the top Azure customers using the Azure Marketplace.

Figure: SaaS-solutions available via the Azure Marketplace

The rapid growth and accelerated usage of the Azure Marketplace creates a valuable opportunity if your organization is an ISV, and offers a SaaS-solution, developer tools, or other solutions in one of the many app categories available. If your organization is a Silver or Gold Microsoft Partner, or an Azure Expert MSP, you can also offer consultation services through the Azure Marketplace.


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Microsoft partners who want to sell through the Azure Marketplace have four options:

1. Contact me: generate leads for your organization to follow up on. Nothing is purchased or deployed, it is basically a contact form. 2. Offer trials: deploy your solution to Azure on a trial basis. This lets potential customers try out your solution first before purchasing it.3. Bring-your-own-license (BYOL): deploy a solution through the Azure Marketplace, where customers purchase the necessary software license key via an alternative channel (for instance via your website).4. Transactions: purchase and deploy a solution through the Azure Marketplace.

For each option you decide on a customized pricing model (depending of the solution type, can be flat rate, per user, consumption based, metered billing etc.), duration / renewal period, contract type and more. If your solution needs even more customization, for instance with negotiated pricing and specialized configuration, you can apply for the ‘private offers’ option.

Partners who promote and transact through the Azure Marketplace also qualify for go-to-market services and Marketplace Rewards. The type and amount depend on the offer type you choose, and the amount of revenue generated based on sales or seats sold. For instance, your organization can receive free Azure usage for testing and trial sandboxes, be promoted in Microsoft blogs and email newsletters or be featured on the Azure Marketplace homepage.

So, by adding your organization’s solution(s) to the Azure Marketplace you open up an additional promo-tional, lead generation and sales channel for your organization.

Purchasing for and consulting customersWith over 9,000+ publishers offering over 2,000 transactable apps and a further 18,000+ contact me, trial and BOYL offers, the Azure Marketplace can be both a rich ecosystem and a daunting place for customers to decide which of the apps they need. Not all customers are tech-savvy enough, or have the time to decide which solutions to purchase.

So, the second way your organization can benefit from the Azure Marketplace is consultation, transaction and (managed) services. Your organization can be the purchasing or transacting party, as you purchase and deploy software for your customers, and invoice them for the software and hours supporting them.

This provides your organization with the opportunity to consult on which solutions to purchase, and to support partners in the transaction and usage of the solutions chosen. Any solution transacted this way accelerates your customers’ Azure usage, and third-party software gets incentivized on your existing Azure bill. This means you benefit from incentives if you transact solutions for your customers via the Azure Marketplace.

If your organization is a CSP Indirect Reseller, and you purchase Microsoft CSP solutions via and Indirect Provider, you might need to contact them first to see how purchasing via the Azure Marketplace works in conjunction with your normal purchasing and billing flow.

https://aka.ms/marketplacerewards

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5.12 AppSource

AppSource is similar to the Azure Marketplace, another self-service channel for Microsoft customers. Whereas the Azure Marketplace is a sales-channel for apps deployed on Azure, AppSource is a sales chan-nel that focusses on business apps, Software-as-Service, and add-ons for Microsoft cloud services. This includes Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, PowerBI and the Power Platform, as well as web apps. AppSource offers over 20,000 apps (including all the various SKUs).

Figure: IT & Management Tools available via AppSource

In a similar vain to the Azure Marketplace, consulting services are also available via AppSource. This means the opportunities for you as a CSP partner are also similar to those offered by Azure Marketplace: create of-fers via Partner Center and promote and sell your own solutions and consultation services via AppSource or consult on and purchase apps for your customers. If the primary product of your consulting service is Azure, it will be listed on the Azure Marketplace, otherwise it will be listed on AppSource. Some solutions, such as SaaS solutions, can be promoted and sold via both the Azure Marketplace and AppSource.


https://appsource.microsoft.com/en-us/

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5.13 Global Expansion Readiness

If your organization is doing well in its home country, and you are looking to expand beyond geographical borders, the Global Expansion Readiness assessment can be useful. It’s a self-service online assessment provided by Microsoft in partnership with AIM International, a strategy consultancy firm. It’s a resource to determine your organization’s readiness to cross borders and expand into new geographical areas.

Figure: Global Expansion Readiness self-assessment

The assessment itself is split up into four parts: Planning, Preparation, Entry and Expansion, with a dozen or so questions per part. While the results are obviously only as good as your input, the tool does provide you with a sense of direction and the kind of topics your organization might need to tackle first before entering new geographical markets.

https://www.crossborderexpansion.com/

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Microsoft Geo Expansion ProgramAfter you complete the Global Expansion Readiness assessment you will also receive an invitation to join the Microsoft Geo Expansion Program. This is what Microsoft calls a ‘self-guided expansion journey into international markets’, meaning you will gain access to digital and on-demand resources, such as webinars. To make the most out of this program you will be required to fill out a form with detailed information on your organization’s status, such as your co-sell status (see the part about co-selling in this chapter), the Microsoft solution area your organization is most aligned with and your target audience and target country/countries.


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5.14 Third-party paid services

Microsoft has more services it recommends for you as a CSP partner to improve or expand your go-to-market strategy, your lead generation and sales engagement. These are all in co-operation with specially selected third-party agencies and consulting firms. They specialize in fields such as value proposition generation, online marketing or digital and social selling. Please note that some of these organizations only operate in certain countries or regions, while others work globally with Microsoft partners all around the world. Below we have listed a few of these third parties that Microsoft have chosen to work with.

Third party

Online marketing, SEO, SEA, SEM, paid advertising, web- and graphic design, conversion optimization.DigitalStride (CXGlobals)

Digital Selling, social selling, sales engagement, assessment, coaching, (on-site) training of sales staff.Tricycle Europe

Azure sales acceleration, secret shopper sales experience, Azure solution mapping and training, Azure target audience profiling.AlineaPartners

Core Consulting

Genzium Consulting

Cadence Preferred

Make Marketing Magic & Boost Your Business

The York Group

ResourceIT

Ultimate Partnerships

Right on the Line

Smart Profile

Lepaya

Co-selling, go-to-market plans, program and competency consul-tation, marketing strategy consultation.

Partner 2 Partner go-to-market, coaching, workshops, technical strategy consultation, campaign management.

Marketing content creation, go-to-market workshops, sales train-ing, digital campaigns.

Marketing strategy development, content creation, digital cam-paigns, lead generation.

Business model workshops, channel roadmap, partner recruit-ment, partner management, international sales expansion.

Channel marketing, channel programs, marketing services, digi-tal services.

Channel development, partner engagement, co-marketing, co-selling.

Content creation, marketing and sales consultation, promotions and events.

Market research, data quality check, go-to-market strategy, lead generation, telesales, social and email marketing.

Marketing training, soft-skills & hard-skills development.

Services include

https://digitalstride.cxglobals.com/

https://www.tricycle-europe.com/microsoft-partner-program-offering/

https://alinea-partners.com/azure-acceleration-programmes/

https://coretoyou.com/

https://www.genzium.com/microsoft-p2p

https://www.cadencepreferred.com/

https://www.makemarketingmagic.com/

https://www.bybwithmicrosoft.com/online-presence-assessment

https://theyorkgroup.com/

https://www.resourceit.net/

https://ultimatepartner.net/microsoft

https://www.rightontheline.com/

https://www.smartprofile.io/

https://lepaya.com/en/modernmarketingacademy/

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Figure: Insight Customer dashboard (with faked data)

You can use this data to watch for trends, for instance see whether the summer vacation period actually leads to a lower net number of new customers added, or to see whether a marketing campaign or sales push for certain products or SKUs is paying off.

Subscriptions, licenses and Azure usage soldThe Products dashboards adds to the Customers dashboard, enabling you to dive deeper into Subscriptions, Licenses and Azure usage, each of whom has its own dashboard.

You can use the Subscriptions dashboard to get an overview of subscriptions you are selling to your customers, as well as usage analytics for cloud subscriptions. Currently this includes Office 365 / Microsoft 365, Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS), Dynamics 365, Power BI and Azure.

5.15 Access sales insights in Partner Center

As mentioned in chapter 2, the Insights dashboards and reporting in Partner Center can be used to gain valuable insights into the results of your sales activities. This includes customer on-boarding and activity, churn, Azure usage and customer opportunities.

Your customersThe Customers dashboard offer you insights into customers added, churn, products and types of products per customers, customer distribution and distribution trends. In short, this dashboard can be used to see who your customers are, where they are located and what products they are buying from you.


https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-product-subscriptions-report

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-product-licenses-report

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-azure-usage-report

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-customer-report

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Subscriptions added and churned can be filtered by geographic location, by products and product SKUs. You can see the state of subscriptions (active, disabled etc.), view product trends and view the distribution of subscriptions.

Figure: Insight Azure usage dashboard (with fake data)

You can use the Azure usage dashboards to view Azure usage by region and Azure utilization. This last option enables you to see month over month Azure consumption revenue. This way you can drill down through all the various Azure SKUs to see which ones are driving revenue for your organization. Plus you can use the growth rate to see which ones are trending up or down. Combined with business develop-ment data (customer growth, product launches, new feature added to software or apps etc.) this provides you with insights into how your organization’s projects are resulting in Azure usage and consumption revenue.

Opportunities for your organizationAnd finally, the Customer Opportunities dashboard provides propensity data from the CloudAscent Pro-gram. Through it, this dashboard shows you how likely your customers are to purchase Microsoft prod-ucts, ranging from Azure to Microsoft 365 and Surface to Dynamics 365.

The predicted likelihood of purchasing, and the likely sales and marketing initiatives needed to get the customer to buy from you, are based on machine learning algorithms. Microsoft collects data from hun-dreds of sources, including its own sales data, social data (data from LinkedIn, blog posts, job postings etc.), firmographic data (company size, growth etc.) and more and feeds this into an algorithm to create these predictions.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/partner-center/pci-customer-opportunities

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Figure: Customers by SMC type (with faked data)

According to Microsoft these top and medium sized business offer the best opportunities for partners in terms of customer life-time value. This includes both organizational growth, for instance employee growth resulting in added Microsoft 365 licenses. And the potential to up and cross-sell, for instance up-selling to more expensive Microsoft 365 subscriptions that include Microsoft Teams.

The graph provides you with insight into how your organization is doing in each of these segments. For instance, if your organization mainly serves Small Businesses, but your market position is targeted towards mid-sized companies, this graph tells you your strategy and your marketing and sales might not be work-ing as well as it should.

Finally, the Customer propensity overview gives you opportunities based on the machine learning algo-rithms predictions. You can use this overview to see where your customers are in the buying cycle. Plus it provides you with an insight into what actions best meet customers, ranging from educating your custom-ers on available products and benefits to sales interactions intent on finalizing the purchase process.

The overview also provides predictions on customer account fit; how well a certain product matches the customers predicted needs, and customer intent; how likely a customer is to purchase that product. All this data can then be used to target groups of customers with marketing campaigns, or to get (renewed) one-on-one interactions started with your sales- and account management teams.

The Customers by SMC type graph segments your customers into top (300+ employees), medium (25 – 300 employees) and small sized businesses (< 25 employees). The top segment is further split into ‘Com-pute based’, showing the number of your customers with an Azure potential of > 10K USD.


Following the latestdevelopments

at MicrosoftCH

APTE

R 6

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6. Following the latest developments at Microsoft

This final chapter is all about keeping up with the rapid development taking place at Microsoft. As a very large organization it has leading products and services in several solution areas. With Windows 10 as the default OS and Office 365 as the default productivity suite for most organizations. With one of the major ERP and CRM systems available. With the second largest cloud computing platform, and Azure datacenters and locations in 60 regions.

All of these products and services, as well as all of the certifications and competencies and all of the tools, platform and programs are updated and upgraded frequently. To do so Microsoft employs 150.000+ peo-ple worldwide, with offices in or near most major markets. And Microsoft CSP partners can sell in a stagger-ing 246 countries and regions.

All this means two things:

1) There is a lot of development going on, at a rapid pace, which as a result can make it more difficult for partners to keep up with.2) Microsoft tries to compensate by creating a large amount of resources and using a large number of channels to keep partners up to date with all of these developments.

Add to this the regular development of Microsoft’s core strategies, its corporate structure and employee roles and its resulting changes in programs, structures and processes. You end up with a complex situa-tion. To make things less complex we have listed various resources and channels that you, as a CSP part-ner, can use to stay up to date on relevant information.


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Figure: Microsoft 365 as part of the CSP program in the Product Terms website

6.2 Social and other news channels

Microsoft uses social media extensively to keep its partners up to date on the latest developments. Below is a list of Yammer communities and social media accounts that can help your organization stay up to date. Some of these can also be used to interact with Microsoft employees or other Microsoft partners.

6.1 Microsoft Product Terms website

If you ever feel the need to look up specifics of, and changes made to, the product terms for Microsoft cloud services, the Microsoft Product Terms website is the go-to resource. It provides a rich set of infor-mation on availability, use terms, and privacy/security commitments for Microsoft Products and Services. The information is available in 30+ languages. You can also use the calendar option to show terms as valid for a previous period.


https://www.microsoft.com/licensing/terms

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YammerPlease note some of these Yammer communities are open to select Microsoft partners only.• Microsoft Cloud Yammer Community• Microsoft US Partner Community • Western Europe Hosting Community • Microsoft 365 Partner Community • Microsoft Partner Network (NL)• Microsoft Education Partner Network External Network• Microsoft Partner Network - Belux External Network• IAMCPOrg External Network• Microsoft-Partner Community Deutschland External Network• Microsoft Partner Network - Switzerland network• Microsoft Australia Partner Network• Microsoft Deutschland Partner Netzwerk• Microsoft Partner - Norway External Network• Microsoft Partner - France External Network• Cloud and Datacenter Advisors network• Microsoft Partner Network Sverige network

Twitter Various local Microsoft teams maintain Twitter profiles to keep local Microsoft partners up to date:• Microsoft Partner (main, non-local account)• Microsoft Partner DE• Microsoft Partner France• Microsoft Ireland• Microsoft Partner UK

LinkedInShowcase pages for:• Microsoft Partner Network• Microsoft 365• Microsoft Cloud Platform• Dynamics 365• Microsoft developers• Microsoft Learn• Microsoft Security• Power Platform


https://www.yammer.com/cloudpartnercommunity/

https://www.yammer.com/msuspartner

https://www.yammer.com/westerneuropehostingcommunity/

https://www.yammer.com/office365partners/

https://www.yammer.com/mpnnederland/

https://www.yammer.com/MEPN/

https://www.yammer.com/mpnbelux/

https://www.yammer.com/iamcporg/

https://www.yammer.com/msdepartner

https://www.yammer.com/mpnswitzerland/

https://yammer.com/mpn-aus

https://www.yammer.com/sharepointsalespartnergermany

https://www.yammer.com/msnopartner

https://www.yammer.com/mpnfrance/

https://www.yammer.com/canddadvisors/

https://www.yammer.com/mpnsverige

https://twitter.com/msPartner

https://twitter.com/mspartnerde

https://twitter.com/mspartnersfr

https://twitter.com/Microsoftirl

https://twitter.com/mspartnersuk

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-partner-network/

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-365

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-cloud-platform

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-dynamics

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-developers

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoftlearn

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-security

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/microsoft-power-platform

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Other newsletterThere are a number of other periodic Microsoft newsletters you or your colleagues might find useful:

Azure AI Newsletter: receive the latest updates and developments about artificial intelligence and Azure.

Dynamics 365 newsletter: product news, announcements, customer cases and upcoming events.

Microsoft Learn newsletter: program updates, announcements on training and certifications.

PowerBI insights: tips and tricks from experts.

Office Insider: updates on new Office features.

US SMB Partner Insiders: strictly speaking for Microsoft SMB partners in the US, this newsletter has the option to choose your coun-try on the form, so Microsoft recognizes the information might be useful for partners outside the states.

6.3 Local partner hubs and newsletters

Local partner hubs function as a central hub for all content, trainings and webinars, news and other updates available for Microsoft partners in your region. Note that most local partner hubs also offer a periodic newsletter, usually once per month. This can be another good way to get relevant information pushed towards your inbox.

Austria Belgium Denmark Finland France

Germany Ireland Italy The Netherlands Norway

Portugal Luxembourg Spain Sweden Switzerland

UnitedKingdom


https://info.microsoft.com/ai-newsletter.html

https://dynamics.microsoft.com/en-us/newsletter/

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/learnnewsletter/

https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/newsletter/

https://insider.office.com/en-us/newsletter

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/marketing/smb-insiders-signup

https://partner.microsoft.com/de-at/marketing/austria-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-be/marketing/BeLux-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-dk/marketing/denmark-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-fi/marketing/finland-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/fr-fr/

https://partner.microsoft.com/de-de/

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-ie/marketing/ireland-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/it-it/marketing/italy-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-nl/marketing/netherlands-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-nl/marketing/netherlands-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-no/marketing/norway-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/pt-pt/marketing/portugal-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-be/marketing/BeLux-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/es-es/marketing/spain-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-se/marketing/sweden-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-se/marketing/sweden-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/de-ch/marketing/schweiz-partner-hub

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-gb/connect/local/uk-partner

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-gb/connect/local/uk-partner

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6.4 CSP Spotlight and license updates

CSP Spotlight is a monthly webinar series on behalf of Microsoft, presented by Louise Ulrick, former Mi-crosoft employee and founder of the Licensing School. During these hour-long webinars you’ll be updat-ed on all important changes to the Microsoft CSP program. The CSP Spotlight webinars can be relevant for both CSP Direct Bill Partners as well as CSP Indirect Resellers.

Licensing School also organizes a different monthly webinar series called ‘Licensing updates’, which go be-yond just updates to the CSP program, and also include Microsoft licensing updates to all other programs and agreements (think EA or SPLA). If your organization is still buying via other license programs, this might be a series to follow besides the CSP Spotlight webinars. Be aware that, since these are also hour-long and on a monthly basis, the amount of information on CSP program updates gets condensed to leave room for other updates.

Both the CSP Spotlight and the License Updates webinars take place on a monthly basis, and each usually has 3 versions during the day, so CSP partners from different time zones across the world can follow them at a convenient time. You can also subscribe to the License School’s webinar mailing (choose either CSP updates and/or Licensing Training).

6.5 The big-three conferences

Each year Microsoft organizes a whole series of events, conferences and other get-togethers. There are three major annual conferences to keep an eye on as a Microsoft partner that take place on a regular schedule each year. Even in 2020, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, these conferences were deemed important enough to take place as virtual events, with participants taking part from all over the globe.

The big three are:1. Microsoft Build, held in May.2. Microsoft Inspire, held in July. 3. Microsoft Ignite, usually held in September.

Microsoft BuildMicrosoft Build usually takes place in Washington DC, or earlier on in San Francisco. It is very much a development centered event, aimed at software engineers, developers, and other partners working with Microsoft’s technology. Build sees releases and updates for its range of products and tools, changes to things like GitHub, Visual Studio and Microsoft Graph, and other developer-focused content.

With thousands of developers attending Build, sessions usually take a deep dive into specific technology or solution areas. Most often these are presented by Microsoft’s developers and technical staff themselves. Most sessions are available on-demand after the event has concluded.

For CSP partners such as ISVs, or those working with Azure, Microsoft Build gives insights into Microsoft’s key areas of further technical development, as well as a great opportunity to learn about new tech and deep dive into current ones.


https://commercial_licensing.eventbuilder.com/YearToDate_ALL

https://www.licensingschool.co.uk/

https://us8.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=94c33f065375a190bd766eed4&id=45c735b075

https://mybuild.microsoft.com/

https://mybuild.microsoft.com/sessions

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Microsoft InspireMicrosoft Inspire usually takes place in Las Vegas, with tens of thousands of partners from all over the world attending. Inspire starts Microsoft’s new fiscal year, which runs from July till June of the next year. Inspire is a partner centered event, aimed at partners working in commercial roles and C-level positions, including sales and business development. Even though its current line-up of products and services are on display, you usually don’t find many new product updates and upgrades or introductions here.

The focus is much more on Microsoft’s strategy for the next 12 months and beyond. It is where changes to programs, incentives and competencies are announced. It is where key areas to focus on as a partner become clearer. For instance, in 2020 Microsoft focused specifically on inclusiveness and sustainability in its keynote speeches. It is also where changes to the CSP program for the upcoming fiscal year are an-nounced. For instance, in 2020 Microsoft announced it would further expand the CSP program by making perpetual licenses available to CSP partners.

Microsoft Inspire is also the place to meet key Microsoft employees, such as account and product manag-ers, as well as meet up with other Microsoft partners. Most local Microsoft offices organize get-togethers for partners in their country, such as for partners who do business in The Netherlands or Germany.

Attending Microsoft Inspire can be expensive, tickets cost about 2.000 USD, not including travel and ac-commodation. However, your organization can use co-op funds for the tickets for Microsoft Inspire.

Even if you can’t make it in person, it is still worthwhile to watch the keynote speeches, by Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella, Judson Althoff (Executive vice president of Microsoft’s Worldwide Commercial Business organization) and Gavriella Schuster (Microsoft One Commercial Partner Corporate Vice President). These keynotes are broadcasted live around the world. Furthermore, almost all other presentations are also available on-demand after the conference has ended.

Microsoft IgniteMicrosoft Ignite is very much Microsoft’s annual technology centered conference, aimed at a mixture of attending CxOs and senior decision makers, business development managers, Developers, IT Profession-als and Architects. Like Inspire, it offers a wide range of keynotes and presentations and ‘ask the expert’ sessions, areas to meet Microsoft employees and talk about Microsoft’s products and services.

Ignite took place in Orlando, Florida the last few years, and it is the Microsoft conference where a lot of new product features and releases are launched, as well as another new innovation get showcased. For instance, in 2019 the company announced Azure Arc during Ignite.

Microsoft Ignite is also the only of the big three to have local versions organized in dozens of countries around the world each year. These local Microsoft events include versions in Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen, London, Madrid, Milan, Paris, Prague, Stockholm, and Zurich. In 2020 most of these events unfortunately had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Figure: Microsoft Ignite Local Tour locations 2020


https://partner.microsoft.com/en-US/inspire/

https://myinspire.microsoft.com/sessions

https://myignite.microsoft.com/

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/events


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6.6 Other events

Besides Build, Inspire and Ignite, Microsoft organizes a whole series of other events, ranging from small ‘invite only’ local events, to larger, more focused conferences. For instance, Microsoft organizes a Microsoft Business Applications Summit focused on Dynamics 365 and Power Platform.

Be sure to regularly check Microsoft’s Event Catalog, listing thousands of events in the near future. Filter by country or region, language, product/solution areas/job type, or view which are available online or on-demand. There is also an Azure Events calendar, listing Azure specific events, which also includes a large webinar archive.

Another resource for webinars, ‘ask-me-anything’s’ and other events is the Microsoft Partner Community Events listing. Although nowhere near as extensive as the Event Catalog, it still provides interesting and relevant events for Microsoft partners.

Figure: Microsoft Events Catalog filtered by language, product and job type

6.7 Organizing your own events

A little interesting side-step here is the ability to co-operate with Microsoft on organizing events. Perhaps your organization also organizes its own events, webinars or seminars that are Microsoft-focused and customer oriented. In that case Microsoft also offers several opportunities to make these more attractive. Let’s take a look at three of your options:

1. Organize an event at a Microsoft location2. Promote your event3. Claim expenses using co-op funds



https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/businessapplicationssummit

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/businessapplicationssummit


https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/community/events/?EventType=webinar

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/overview/webinars-search/

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Community-Events/bd-p/Community_Events

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Community-Events/bd-p/Community_Events

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Organize an event at a Microsoft locationAs a provider of Modern Workplace & Security solutions, Microsoft’s offices mostly embody the digital transformation ethos. Both in its set-up and layout of places to work, collaborate and relax, and also in the way its technology is used. Some of its local offices are open to partners as a customer experience, and partners can use its office as a location to organize Microsoft-focused events. Options and possibilities differ per location and may depend on your Microsoft partner status.

If you’re interested in organizing a Microsoft-focused event be sure to contact your Microsoft account manager to check what might be possible.

Promote your eventThe Microsoft Event Finder tool is a great resource to get your own Microsoft related event listed. The list-ing is a free opportunity for Microsoft partners. Even if your organization is just thinking about organizing an event or webinar, the Event Finder tool can be a good resource to gain inspiration, or to check up on what your competitors are doing.

Claim event expenses using co-op fundsAs mentioned in chapter 5, part of the incentive program for CSP partners comes in the form of co-op funds. These funds can also be used to claim expenses made by organizing events, webinars or seminars.

Please note that claiming funding for your event requires you to meet a set or requirements. For instance, events must be partner-led, Microsoft-focused and you are required to provide proof-of-execution in the form of invoices, photos and/or other documents.

If your event meets these requirements you can even claim expenses on the cost of giveaways, printed materials and the cost of fees for speakers. Even catering (excluding alcohol) can be included. Please read the latest version of the ‘Partner Incentives Co-op Guidebook’ for exact information on requirements.

6.8 International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners

The International Association of Microsoft Channel Partners, or IAMCP, while strictly not a Microsoft or-ganization, can be a good way to meet up with other Microsoft partners and discuss what is happening at Microsoft. Its mission is “dedicated to helping companies and individuals in the “Microsoft ecosystem” to broaden their base of business opportunities through partnering with other IAMCP members”.

The IAMCP has local chapters in 30 countries in the EMEA region, with the Dutch, German, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish and UK chapters as the most active ones. Local chapters regularly organize events, pro-viding ample opportunity to network with other Microsoft partners. The IAMCP also has a strong presence during Microsoft Inspire.


https://www.microsoft.com/en-ie/campaign/Partner-Cloud-Event-Finder/

https://partner.microsoft.com/asset/collection/co-op-funds-resources#/

https://www.iamcp.org/

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6.9 The Microsoft Partner & Tech Communities

Finally, another good resource to stay up to date on developments at Microsoft, especially those that are relevant for Microsoft partners is the Microsoft Partner Community. As a mixture of forum, resource listing, event calendar and more, it allows Microsoft partners to interact with Microsoft employees and other Microsoft partners.

The communities section offers links to various subject-related topics, as well as country-based commu-nities where local Microsoft employees post new content. Here’s a non-exhaustive listing for countries in the European Microsoft region, not all countries have communities available (yet):

The Microsoft Tech Community is similar, only obviously more technology orientated, with opportunities to collaborate as well blog posts, ‘ask-me-anything’s’, and news on the latest developments at Microsoft.

Austria Belgium Denmark & Iceland Finland Germany

Ireland Italy The Netherlands Norway Portugal

Luxembourg Spain Sweden Switzerland UnitedKingdom

Figure: The Microsoft Partner Community homepage


https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Communities/ct-p/communities

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Austria-Partner-Zone/ct-p/ATPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Belux-Partner-Zone/ct-p/BXPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Denmark-Iceland-Partner-Zone/ct-p/DKPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Microsoft-Suomi-Kumppanifoorumi/ct-p/FIPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/German-Partner-Zone-Auf-Deutsch/ct-p/German_Partner_Zone

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Ireland-Partner-Zone/ct-p/IEPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Italy-Partner-Zone/ct-p/ITPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Netherlands-Partner-Zone/ct-p/NLPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Norway-Partner-Zone/ct-p/NOPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Portugal-Partner-Zone/ct-p/PTPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Belux-Partner-Zone/ct-p/BXPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Spain-Partner-Zone/ct-p/ESPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Sweden-Partner-Zone/ct-p/SEPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/Switzerland-Partner-Zone/ct-p/CHPZ

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/UK-Partner-Zone/ct-p/uk-partner

https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/t5/UK-Partner-Zone/ct-p/uk-partner

About ReselloC

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We hope you have enjoyed reading this guidebook, and found its content useful. As a CSP Indirect Pro-vider it is our mission to make ‘as-a-service’ easy to understand, sell and manage. With the rapid pace of change and the increasing complexity of selling and provisioning cloud services, we deem this a vital aspect of the service and support we offer. This guidebook is part of our effort to do so, and part of how we support your organization in growing its Microsoft CSP business.

Accelerating digital transformationResello itself is a ‘cloud native’ distributor, a Microsoft CSP Indirect Provider, Authorized Acronis Cloud Distributor and Vade Secure for Microsoft 365 Distribution Partner. We are highly dedicated and specialize entirely on SaaS and IaaS solutions, including productivity, cloud hosting and computing, and security services. We do this by providing a robust platform that offers bespoke solutions, allowing our partners to orchestrate their entire cloud business from one single source. Founded in 2013, with offices in The Netherlands and Germany, Resello supports over 1.000 small, medium and large MSPs, IT-Resellers, VARs, hosters and IT-consultants in 100 countries worldwide.

Ready to accelerate your business? Contact us: [email protected] or 0031 88 002 8200. Learn more via https://www.resello.com/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/resello-bv/

Published by: Resello B.V., Ceintuurbaan 28 , 8024 AA Zwolle, The Netherlands, and Resello GmbH, Ludwig-Erhard-Straße 30-34, 65760 Eschborn, Germany.

Author: Martijn Couprie, Senior Marketeer at Resello: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martijncouprie/

Design: Marc Hoppen, Senior Designer at Resello: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marc-hoppen-9ab7a711/

This guidebook is provided “as-is”, its content are the author’s views and opinions. Information in this guide-book may change without notice.

7. About Resello



https://www.resello.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/resello-bv/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/martijncouprie/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/marc-hoppen-9ab7a711/

(c) 2021 Resello B.V.

Grow your Microsoft CSP business to the next level 2021 guidebook edition

https://www.resello.com

Documents

GUIDEBOOK - Resello