Microsoft to launch influencer program for resellers 15 March, 2007 By Patricia Pickett

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The program, to be launched March 28 in the U.S., is geared toward tracking smaller resellers' influence in volume licensing sales, said Mike Haines, general manager of partner strategy for the Redmond, Wash. software giant's U.S. partner group.

Of Microsoft's volume licensing options, two of them -- Enterprise and Select agreements -- which involve 200-plus seats and are geared toward the mid-market and above, are transacted by one of 18 large-account resellers (LARs) in the U.S. However, "we have thousands of partners working with customers to put together solutions to solve business issues, and among those solution elements is Microsoft software," Haines explained.

"We have identified a model by which, without a lot of administrative burden and using regular procedures, we can capture the influence (of those partners) in those fields."

When Microsoft approached its LARs about an influence program, 14 of them agreed to participate. Thirteen of them are already fully tested and ready to start the program, while the last one is ironing out some final issues. "The bulk of those large-account resellers understood that this was an opportunity for them to drive partner collaboration," Haines said.

Under the program, smaller partners such as independent software vendors (ISVs), system integrators (SIs) and value-added resellers (VARs) will connect with a participating LAR of their choice through the Microsoft Partner Portal and work together on opportunities. "When the LAR closes the deal and sends us the order, they will (include) the partner's ID number," Haines said. Microsoft will capture that information in a reporting engine and will share it with field managers so they can get a better idea about which partner influenced which deal, and for how much.

The program will initially launch with Gold and Certified partners, of which there are currently about 10,000. Of its 130,000 U.S. partners, not all play in the upper mid--to-large market, so Microsoft estimates that another 20,000 registered partners will express interest in the program. Haines noted that the vendor wants to roll out the program in stages. Nevertheless, "if they're influencing, there is nothing to keep LARs from reporting them."

Partners that serve small and medium businesses often end up selling licenses through the Open volume licensing agreement, which generally caters to customers buying five to 250 seats. Partners buy those licenses from distributors and resell them, so in those cases they don't need their IDs tracked, since it's already attached to the order, Haines explained.

Haines said Microsoft has dabbled with influencer recognition in the past, identifying partners that influence very narrow segments of the business, such as ISVs or Dynamics resellers. However, this is the first time the vendor has built a program that identifies influencers in a broad, non-product-specific fashion, he said.

When setting up an influence program, defining impact is always a tricky task, according to Diane Krakora, president and CEO of Amazon Consulting in Mountain View, Calif. "Is (influence) recommending a brand preference or identifying a potential solution.... or when my brother-in-law tells someone that Microsoft Small Business Server is the best thing since sliced bread? It's different for every vendor," she said.

Getting influence dollars to flow down to a specific salesperson who influenced a transaction can also get complicated, Krakora said. Instead of cash compensation, many vendors are moving toward other types of benefits, such as offering more training, better leads, additional marketing dollars, or briefings with customers or executives. "It helps the (reseller's) sales person get cash the way they're supposed to: from their company," she said. "It turns the spotlight on (the reseller), helping them be more successful in the marketplace."

Microsoft's influencer program will do just that, said Haines. Partners will receive "soft benefits" such as the ability to better plan out their sales strategy, and access to marketing programs. For fiscal 2008, the vendor is hoping to hammer out specific Microsoft Partner Program-related benefits as well as ones related to recognition, he added.

Microsoft is working with its worldwide partner organization to define an overall influence strategy. "This program will be one element considered in that," Haines said. The nice thing about the U.S. program is that it is built around standard operating models in Microsoft. "That way it can be replicated by any other regions in the world" if so desired, he said.