Best of LinkedIn: Channel Marketing & Partner Ecosystem CW 39/ 40

00:00:00: Provided by Thomas Allgaier and Frennus, based on the most relevant LinkedIn posts about channel marketing and partner ecosystem in calendar weeks twenty-nine and thirty.

00:00:09: Frenness is a B to P market research company that supports enterprise marketing teams in unlocking full potential of their customer data with help from AI.

00:00:17: You can find more info in description.

00:00:19: Yeah so we're going look at why.

00:00:21: well why seventy percent tech partnerships are currently effectively dead

00:00:26: Which is crazy number

00:00:27: It really is.

00:00:29: More importantly, we'll get into why your next multi-million dollar co-sell deal might actually be rejected by an AI bot before a human at your partner company ever even sees it.

00:00:39: Wow!

00:00:40: Yeah... We're exploring the massive shifts happening right now in channel marketing and you know, partner operating models.

00:00:46: Right And mission for this deep dive is to really just cut through absolute noise that usually surrounds partner ecosystems.

00:00:52: Oh there's so much noise

00:00:54: So much Like days of showing on board are slide packed with I don't know, a hundred partner logos to prove you have strategy.

00:01:01: Those days are totally over!

00:01:04: Today we're looking exclusively at the mechanisms that drive actual measurable revenue and real partner activity based on what data from past two weeks is actually telling us.

00:01:14: Which means...we really need start with foundational shift in how these programs even being structured right?

00:01:19: Yeah let's start there

00:01:21: Because for a long time, the prevailing wisdom in the channel was basically just to cast the widest net possible.

00:01:26: You just sign up as many partners as you can... Build a

00:01:29: massive portal!

00:01:29: Exactly

00:01:30: build a massive Portal and just assume The Revenue will eventually follow the volume.

00:01:34: But data showing that approach is actually well it's toxic to profitability.

00:01:38: now Let's look at financial reality of what happens when a company truly flips that model.

00:01:44: Siva Rajamani brought an incredible case study regarding Okta.

00:01:48: Oh right

00:01:49: Yeah.

00:01:49: So three years ago, Okta was posting roughly eight hundred and fifty million dollars in annual operating losses.

00:01:55: Wow!

00:01:56: And fast forward to last year...and they swung that over seven-hundred sixty million in operating income.

00:02:02: I mean..that is a staggering turnaround for an enterprise tech company.

00:02:06: It's massive.

00:02:07: The main lever they pulled together there were making the entire organization partner first.

00:02:13: They reported that ninety five percent of their top one hundred deals involved a partner.

00:02:17: That almost all

00:02:18: them Right.

00:02:19: But to understand the significance of that we have to look at the mechanics of how they actually achieved it.

00:02:23: because you know You can't just send out a corporate memo declaring Hey, we are now partner first and expect your direct field sales teams to suddenly change their behavior.

00:02:32: Hold on let's push on that for a second Because direct sales reps or essentially coin operated right

00:02:38: pretty much.

00:02:39: Yeah

00:02:39: Their entire professional existence is based on hitting there individual quota.

00:02:44: So if an account executive thinks bringing a partner into a deal is going to like complicate the sales cycle or worse,

00:02:50: cut into their commission.

00:02:51: Exactly!

00:02:53: They will aggressively block the partner from the account won't they?

00:02:57: Yeah that is the exact friction point that ruins most partner programs.

00:03:01: I mean if a direct-account executive gets penalized for collaborating The ecosystem just dies on the vine.

00:03:07: What Okta did was completely redesigned their internal incentive structures.

00:03:12: So,

00:03:18: they removed the penalty?

00:03:20: Yes.

00:03:20: They removed the financial penalty for collaboration which instantly changed the field's behavior.

00:03:26: The partner program stopped being this like siloed department and became actual vehicle to hit their numbers.

00:03:33: That makes a lot of sense But it brings up really tough reality about resource allocation.

00:03:39: David Tavelaro hit on this perfectly when discussing the shift from quantity to quality.

00:03:44: Oh, yeah?

00:03:44: The MDF issue Yeah

00:03:45: He made a case that having very small number of highly qualified partners Partners who actually have real access your ideal customer profile.

00:03:55: That drives vastly more revenue than maintaining massive unengaged ecosystem.

00:04:00: Right because it really comes down to hidden operational cost Of every single partner you sign.

00:04:05: Let's break that for people might not you know, manage a partner P&L every day.

00:04:10: When you sign in new logo to your partner program what is the actual burden there?

00:04:15: Well... Every signed agreement requires enablement resources technical training dedicated account mapping time and most importantly marketing development funds or MDF,

00:04:26: right?

00:04:27: Mdf is essentially the budget a vendor gives to a partner.

00:04:29: To help them generate leads and you know run joint marketing campaigns.

00:04:33: So if you have five hundred partners And your spreading your mdf and your channel managers time across all of them

00:04:39: it's braid way too thin.

00:04:40: Exactly The partners who actually have the capability to drive massive pipeline are being starved Of the resources they need to win.

00:04:48: You're diluting your own impact by trying to support the dead weight and there was a lot of deadweight Right now.

00:04:55: Jay McBain shared research showing that sixty-five percent of partners are currently running flat to negative operating profits.

00:05:02: Sixty five percent?

00:05:04: That's brutal!

00:05:05: It is

00:05:05: The majority the channel under immense margin pressure

00:05:08: And it gets even more severe when you look at partner retention.

00:05:12: Omer Koreshi put a specific number on this recently.

00:05:14: He found seven in ten technology partners either walked away from vendor last year or just quietly stopped selling for them.

00:05:22: Seventy percent.

00:05:23: Wow So, are most enterprise partner programs just operating like a bad gym membership?

00:05:30: Gym membership.

00:05:32: Yeah!

00:05:32: Like the vendor counts the initial sign-ups so that program looks successful to the executive team but quietly.

00:05:38: they know this.

00:05:38: seventy percent of these people will never actually show up to sweat.

00:05:43: That's a brutally accurate way to look at it.

00:05:45: Assigned partner agreement is really just a hunting license.

00:05:48: It doesn't guarantee you'll actually catch anything, right?

00:05:51: So the billion dollar question Is how do you get that top thirty percent to actually show up and sweat on a daily basis?

00:05:58: Well I imagine The traditional answer has always been the quarterly business review Right the QBR

00:06:03: Which is exactly what the most successful ecosystem leaders are abandoning right now.

00:06:07: Really

00:06:08: Yeah, Rob Moyer provided a very practical operational framework for replacing the QBR because the classic QBR is backward-looking.

00:06:15: You know you get everyone in a room once every three months stared at pipeline spreadsheet

00:06:19: Celebrate one deal that actually closed.

00:06:22: yeah and then Everyone goes back to ignoring each other For another ninety days.

00:06:25: it doesn't Actually drive revenue.

00:06:28: I've sat through those calls.

00:06:30: they definitely feel more like compliance meetings than actual sales Meetings.

00:06:34: so what Is The alternative That Works?

00:06:37: Moyer points to the weekly cross-company pod.

00:06:40: Instead of a quarterly, massive meeting you have a strict group of four or six people.

00:06:45: it's AEs and channel managers from both the vendor And they meet for exactly one hour every single week.

00:06:52: but The agenda is completely different.

00:06:54: They are not looking at historical data.

00:06:56: They focus exclusively on specific active accounts.

00:07:00: asking where can we change the outcome today?

00:07:02: What is blocking progress right now?

00:07:04: who was doing what by next Tuesday?

00:07:07: See in reality getting a busy enterprise AE to give up an hour of their week for a partner meeting sounds like pulling teeth.

00:07:13: How do you actually enforce that kind of attendance?

00:07:16: You don't enforce it.

00:07:18: You make it financially undeniable.

00:07:21: Right.

00:07:22: if an AE knows that by attending this one-hour pod the partner is going to unblock A procurement road block on a million dollar deal That affects there.

00:07:30: Q three commission.

00:07:31: they will be the first one on the call.

00:07:33: yeah, that makes sense.

00:07:35: It turns co-selling from this theoretical strategy into a weekly tactical habit.

00:07:40: Okay, so if the strategy is shifting toward these deep hypertactical relationships we need to look at the actual environment where these massive deals are being transacted because If we follow the data The absolute center of gravity right now Is the cloud marketplace?

00:07:56: Without a doubt!

00:07:59: Cloud Marketplaces aren't just an alternative route to market anymore.

00:08:03: For enterprise software, they are increasingly becoming the only route that matters.

00:08:08: Yeah Matt Yanchushin shared some data on The AWS marketplace That really contextualizes this scale here.

00:08:14: Over ninety-nine percent of the top one thousand AWS customers had at least One active software subscription running through the marketplace last year.

00:08:22: Ninety nine percent

00:08:23: Yeah, and it's not just the legacy giants winning there either.

00:08:26: Startup partner sales through the marketplace grew over one hundred percent year-over-year.

00:08:31: It's totally leveling of playing field.

00:08:33: but here is the catch.

00:08:35: Just listing your software on AWS or Azure doesn't mean anyone Is going to buy?

00:08:40: You have to physically align your organization To how the cloud provider actually sells right.

00:08:44: Roman Kersanov highlighted a brilliant structural move by Brace The customer engagement platform to solve this exact problem.

00:08:52: Brays fundamentally reorganized its own internal sales team by industry vertical.

00:08:57: Meaning they shifted from selling by geographic territory to selling by industry?

00:09:02: Yes!

00:09:03: Why would a company upend their entire sales org just to accommodate a partner?

00:09:07: Because AWS organizes it's sellers by industry-vertical.

00:09:11: Oh, okay...

00:09:12: Imagine the scenario before this change.

00:09:14: You have a Brays account executive who handles all of Northern California and they are trying to co-sell a deal into a major healthcare provider.

00:09:21: They try find their counterpart at AWS, but AWS has dedicated Healthcare & Life Sciences Rep—a different rep for financial services —and another one retail.

00:09:30: And all overlapping in California?

00:09:32: Exactly!

00:09:33: So the braze rep doesn't know who to call... The incentives misalign….

00:09:37: …the deal motion completely stalls out due organizational friction.

00:09:41: So trying to co-sell without mirroring your partner's org chart is kind of like trying to plug a USB C cable into an old USB A port.

00:09:49: Totally, Like

00:09:50: you can force it all you want but because the physical shapes of the organizations don't match The data and the deals just won't transfer.

00:09:57: that Is the perfect way to visualize?

00:09:58: It by reorganizing to match AWS vertical structure braze eliminated the friction.

00:10:04: their health care rep talks directly To the aws.

00:10:07: healthcare up.

00:10:08: the shapes match.

00:10:09: Wow.

00:10:10: And that specific structural alignment drove so much marketplace volume.

00:10:13: That Brays actually secured a three-year strategic collaboration agreement, an SCA with AWS which brings in dedicated funding and direct incentives for AWS sellers to push Brays into their own accounts.

00:10:26: I see the logic there but it brings us back to The Human Element doesn't It?

00:10:30: You can change the org chart and build a perfect Marketplace listing But Justin Salcido pointed out A massive roadblock.

00:10:38: Yeah He noted Marketplace adoption frequently fails because the account executives on the ground are simply never taught when or how to actually use it during a sales cycle.

00:10:49: This is a massive gap in sales enablement.

00:10:50: right now, your reps absolutely need to understand the concept of cloud commits.

00:10:55: Let's pause and unpack that.

00:10:58: What exactly is a cloud commit?

00:11:01: And why does the software AE need to care about it?

00:11:04: Okay, so when a massive enterprise signs the contract with AWS Microsoft or Google They usually agree to spend a massive amount of money over few years say fifty million dollars in exchange for steep discounts on their cloud infrastructure.

00:11:17: That fifty million is they're commit.

00:11:20: now if your AE is trying to sell a five hundred thousand dollar software platform To that same enterprise going through standard procurement means fighting the CFO for new budget.

00:11:29: We're just always a nightmare.

00:11:30: Exactly, but if your software is in the cloud marketplace The enterprise can often buy your software and have that five hundred grand count toward burning down their existing fifty million dollar cloud commit.

00:11:41: Oh wow So you are bypassing the fight for new budget by tapping into money?

00:11:46: The company has already contractually agreed to spend

00:11:49: exactly.

00:11:50: But if your AE doesn't know how to ask about the buyer's Cloud commit during the discovery phase they missed up fast track completely

00:11:57: Right, because the buyer might not bring it up.

00:11:59: The buyer may actually want to buy through the marketplace and hit their quota with a cloud provider but the AE has to know how to facilitate that multi-party conversation

00:12:07: And Because of this motion is proving so lucrative?

00:12:09: The major players are consolidating their programs to force behavior.

00:12:14: Heather Mason pointed out that Salesforce's agent exchange for private offers now spans over one hundred partners which allows customers burn down their salesforce commits in very similar ways And Reese Berry noted that Microsoft is actually retiring their legacy ISV success and marketplace rewards programs.

00:12:31: Really?

00:12:32: Yeah, they're rolling them into one single unified machine called Frontier Accelerate to push everything toward the Marketplace.

00:12:39: The market is telling us very clearly learn to transact in these marketplaces or just prepare be locked out of enterprise procurement entirely.

00:12:47: By the way if you are finding this breakdown of GTM Mechanics helpful make sure hit subscribe on your app right now.

00:12:53: We are constantly tracking how these massive shifts in enterprise sales are playing out and you really won't want to miss where this goes next.

00:13:01: Speaking of, we have to talk about the disruption that is fundamentally changing.

00:13:06: who's driving deals on market place highways.

00:13:08: The AI piece.

00:13:10: Right!

00:13:10: Artificial intelligence no longer just a feature.

00:13:13: use cell.

00:13:13: it has actively taken over the partner go-to-market motion itself.

00:13:17: This part of research that legitimately stopped me.

00:13:20: Trinol B shared details on how AWS is currently managing COSEL opportunity sharing.

00:13:26: AWS has deployed AI agents to conduct the first screen on COSELE opportunities submitted by partners.

00:13:32: The implications of this are just wild.

00:13:34: If you're a partner and submit a shared opportunity into the AWS portal, an AI agent evaluates it.

00:13:41: Abot?

00:13:41: Abot!

00:13:42: if that bot determines the opportunity lacks sufficient propensity or doesn't match required intent signals automatically rejects the deal, a human at AWS never even lays eyes on it.

00:13:54: Wait I need to make sure i fully grasp this.

00:13:57: B-to-B enterprise sellers are now officially pitching to bots.

00:14:00: yep.

00:14:01: so if i'm a channel manager my first hurdle isn't convincing a cloud rep.

00:14:05: that might be good.

00:14:07: its convincing an algorithm.

00:14:08: yes The hyperscalers are dealing with just way too much volume and have humans evaluate every single lead.

00:14:14: partners throw over the fence.

00:14:15: So if your partner tech stack isn't meticulously capturing in passing along pristine intent data, If you're blindly submitting low-quality leads hoping AWS will do heavy lifting then bot will shut down at gate.

00:14:29: You essentially don't exist to their sales org.

00:14:32: That is terrifying for anyone with a messy CRM

00:14:36: Truly

00:14:36: But the reward for passing that AI gatekeeper is apparently astronomical.

00:14:42: Mark Horanis highlighted an interview with the AWS AI chief, who cited a seven X multiplier on AWS spend.

00:14:49: four partners on every single AI sale of

00:14:52: Seven X multiplier

00:14:54: meaning For Every Dollar A Customer Spends On The Partners AI Solution They Pull Through Seven Dollars Of AWS Infrastructure Spend

00:15:02: which is exactly why the major AI players are aggressively building out their own partner networks right now.

00:15:07: Look at The Clawed Ecosystem, Mattias Scott shared that the consulting firm SIA has become a preferred partner and Pertik Saxana and Petra Hural noted that App Inventive & Revenue Hub are deeply embedding into that same network too.

00:15:21: but the detail about SIA is what really matters here.

00:15:24: they have five hundred forward deployed engineers embedded directly with clients.

00:15:29: Let me stop you there because that feels counterintuitive.

00:15:32: If Claude is this incredibly advanced AI, that's supposed to automate everything... Why does SIA need to deploy five hundred highly paid human engineers?

00:15:41: make it work for a client?

00:15:42: Because of the data!

00:15:43: AI models are useless without clean structured proprietary data-to-train on.

00:15:49: Think an enterprise AI agent like a master robot chef.

00:15:53: You can buy the most advanced robot chef in the entire world.

00:15:56: But if your kitchen is a disaster, If the flour is mixed with salt The meat is rotting on counter and nothing's labeled.

00:16:03: That Robot Chef will just stand there holding a spatula Completely incapable of making a meal.

00:16:09: So those five hundred engineers are basically acting as prep cooks.

00:16:13: They're organizing the kitchen so that AI actually does its job

00:16:16: Precisely.

00:16:17: And this data readiness problem is becoming the primary driver of partner strategy.

00:16:22: Mark Relf noted that AWS Is rapidly expanding its data competency program specifically because over seventy five percent Of organizations are realizing they have to prioritize getting their data AI ready before They can buy any of these advanced tools.

00:16:36: and the database companies know This puts them in a massive position of power.

00:16:40: Erica Valini shared that MongoDB considers Their partner ecosystem entirely non-negotiable now.

00:16:46: They are aggressively embedding their intelligent data platform directly into what she called the agentic stacks of major system integrators like Accenture and Deloitte.

00:16:56: We should probably clarify, What an agentic stack actually is because you're going to hear that term constantly over next year.

00:17:03: Good idea

00:17:04: It refers to the architecture required to support autonomous AI agents.

00:17:08: These are programs that don't just answer questions, but actually take actions across different software applications on your behalf.

00:17:15: for those agents work they need seamless connections to the underlying data layer which is why MongoDB's making sure They Are The Default Foundation Those System Integrators Build Upon.

00:17:25: You can see that exact same integration play happening at the workflow layer too.

00:17:29: Michael Park and Tarek Shamuni pointed out that ServiceNow's new Flow Platform launched with over a hundred connectors on day one, they're trying to ensure when an AI agent needs to trigger business work flow it flows seamlessly through their partner ecosystem.

00:17:43: So how do you actually synthesize all of these shifts from octas incentive changes to marketplace commits to pitching deals to AI bots?

00:17:51: Barrett King provided framework which ties this entire evolution together.

00:17:54: What's the framework?

00:17:55: He argues that partner strategy is actually a stack made up of three distinct layers, path motion and dynamic.

00:18:03: Walk us through how those three layers interact in the real world.

00:18:07: Okay so The PATH is the actual technical and commercial surface you use to reach market an API as a path.

00:18:13: the AWS marketplace has a path.

00:18:16: Got it!

00:18:17: The MOTION is the human behavior You execute Through That Path like a co-sell motion or referral motion and the dynamic is who actually captures value at end.

00:18:28: King's critical insight, that technical path ultimately constrains human motion.

00:18:33: Meaning if you don't have the technical plumbing in place your sales reps physically cannot execute strategy no matter how good they are

00:18:41: Exactly.

00:18:42: And this brings us to a massive technological shift happening right now.

00:18:46: We are seeing the emergence of entirely new technical paths built specifically for AI, things like model context protocol or MCP servers.

00:18:55: Let's translate that from non-engineers listening.

00:18:58: What does an MCP server actually do in the context of partnerships?

00:19:02: Think about it as universal translator.

00:19:04: It allows an AI agent securely access external data sources and tools without human needing to click around user interface.

00:19:12: Oh wow.

00:19:13: Yeah, if your partner technology provides an MCP server and AI assistant can seamlessly pull data from your app run a process and push it back out It is a brand new path And it is completely raising the floor in customer sophistication.

00:19:27: So If you're software company still relying on old-school partner portals and manual deal registrations while your competitors are exposing Direct MCP paths for AI agents to interact with their platform seamlessly Your sales motion is gonna eventually break Right?

00:19:42: Because you were competing on an outdated technical path.

00:19:47: Yeah, You will just become invisible to the AI agents that are increasingly orchestrating enterprise workflows.

00:19:53: It is a complete ruthless maturation of the partner ecosystem.

00:19:56: I mean from realigning direct sales incentives To matching org charts for marketplace co-selling right down to structuring your data.

00:20:03: so An AI algorithm doesn't reject Your pipeline.

00:20:06: If you enjoyed this episode, new episodes drop every two weeks.

00:20:10: Also check out our other editions on Field Marketing, MarTech AI and B to be go-to market ABM and social selling.

00:20:18: Thank you so much for listening And don't forget to hit subscribe So you catch our next deep dive into the data.

00:20:25: We talked today about AI screening co-sell opportunities at the gate, but what happens in two years when your enterprise AI agent is negotiating the terms of a deal directly with your partner's AI agent?

00:20:35: If you're foundational data model and technical paths aren't flawlessly clean today.

00:20:39: Your future partnerships might be over before human even gets chance to say hello.

00:20:43: Definitely something I think.