Customers are demanding more support from their partners and vendors to accelerate their digital transformation and solve specific challenges for their business. These transformative projects are becoming more complex, and it is rare that any single provider can fully execute end-to-end. Customer requirements are shifting from single-point technologies to complex solutions where value is based on the delivery of positive business outcomes. Having an established network of trusted partners that operate in a customer-first approach enables the speed of delivery, quality of service and ultimately a high-degree of customer satisfaction.
An ecosystem is a network of cross-industry players who work together to define, build and execute market-creating customer and consumer solutions. Ecosystems are defined by the depth and breadth of potential collabouration among a set of players: each can deliver a piece of the solution, or contribute a necessary capability. The power of the ecosystem is that no single player needs to own or operate all components of the solution, and that the value the ecosystem generates is larger than the combined value each of the players could contribute individually. Let’s look at five inherent benefits of building an ecosystem.
Your customers come to you to solve specific business problems. You have earned their trust through your quality of service and knowledge. Acting as an ecosystem aggregator for your customer can develop a trusted relationship with your client. Tapping into a deep network of service providers, integrators, and consultants showcases your willingness to solve complex problems and not just generate opportunistic pipeline for your own benefit. If you approach partnerships with a customer-first mindset, you can't lose.
As your ecosystem grows and trust is earned, the ability to reach more customers, new markets and geographies also increases. Expectations among ecosystem members are established at the onset of the relationship so there should not be any confusion as to the role each partner plays. Reciprocal opportunity sharing will occur naturally through open and candid strategy discussions amongst the partners. Even when two parties have competing services, the partnership can grow and flourish as the foundation of trust keeps everyone focused on their main responsibility.
You have made it easy and seamless for your customer to source new services and solutions. Ideally, your customer will re-engage with you and your partner ecosystem as new needs or challenges arise. Having an established network already in place will save your customer time, effort, and risk to their business. Your client should not have to spend the resources in finding the right provider, vetting capabilities, contracting and hoping the chosen partner can deliver on what they promised. You will benefit by removing competing providers from selling their solutions to the same client.
As your ecosystem matures, partners will identify new opportunities through co-developing and co-selling new solutions and offerings. Building complementary solutions can further solve your joint customer challenges and spur on additional opportunities. By working together, the partners can share resources and expertise to develop new products, services, and offerings that they may not have been able to create on their own. This collabouration can lead to faster and more efficient innovation. In addition, there is a benefit of shared risk and costs with new ventures which can reduce the financial burden on each respective company.
Don’t underestimate the brand strength of your partner community. By working with reputable partners, you can leverage the strength of the respective brands and credibility to boost the overall awareness of the ecosystem. Publishing success stories and use cases should be welcomed by member partners showcasing the joint capabilities, messageing and stronger-together approach.
Building your partner ecosystem often starts from a point of addressing a specific need for a client. The business requirement could be as simple as procurement of cloud licencing or something even more complex like delivering a managed service. Regardless of the requirements, SoftwareOne and its network of over 2,000 providers worldwide have the capabilities and expertise to meet the customer’s needs.
SoftwareOne’s Partner Connect is a global programme that offers a contractual agreement supporting reciprocal partnering to deliver comprehensive IT solutions to the end user. Our non-competitive structure has clear rules of engagement that ensure we keep the client's needs first. The referral programme helps reduce risks from competitive solutions while forging long-term customer relationships. With profit-sharing contracts in place, both parties participate in sales success and encourages ongoing collabouration and innovation.
Contact us to get more details on starting your own next level partner ecosystem via SoftwareOne’s Partner Connect programme.
Contact us to get more details on starting your own next level partner ecosystem via SoftwareOne’s Partner Connect programme.
