Partnership: Together we can do more
I’ve worked in the channel for more than 20 years, and if there is one thing I’ve learned it’s that the success of your channel program starts with your partners. And, it’s not just who you choose to work with but how you work with them.
Our channel partners are part of the extended Cyxtera family. Because we’re a high-touch channel organization, we are deliberate in determining who we work with. This is important because we want more than just a profitable relationship, we want a complementary one, one that’s beneficial and fulfilling to all parties. Only by ensuring our goals are aligned can we forge a strong channel partnership.
Challenges breed opportunity
The past year brought with it tremendous challenges, but also tremendous opportunities for growth. Post-COVID, many enterprises found themselves facing budget constraints and are having to re-prioritize their projects and plans for 2021. Challenging? Definitely. But this has also presented opportunities for our partners to leverage Cyxtera’s expertise and solutions to help their customers in their efforts.
When, following the abrupt move to work from home, organizations had to ramp-up quickly and pull in their MSPs and other providers, we were able to offer them the flexibility they needed to weather the storm. In fact, we spent the past 13 months working closely with our channel partners to identify and understand the unique challenges they’re facing and, in turn, develop specific use cases for how our joint solutions — specifically, those centered on data center migration, cloud repatriation, and future-proofing hybrid IT — could optimize their businesses and those of their customers.
Now, more than a year later, we’re seeing a significant shift toward future-proofing and OpEx solutions. Thankfully, our size allows us to be nimble while still offering our channel partners the depth and breadth of world-class solutions.
More than a transaction
We understand the power of the channel, and the fact that we are putting even greater resources into our programs and people is a testament to this belief.
We continue to expand our channel program with additional core routes to market and are building out our channel support team to help our partner ecosystem thrive. We’ve enhanced our market development fund and rebate models to provide more options and incentives for our partners, and we’ve optimized our partner experience via the Cyxtera Partner Portal for a better user experience and greater enablement assets.
We have seen double-digit channel growth and doubled channel revenue as a percentage of our overall revenue since we started these initiatives, confirming we seem to be focused in the right areas.
We understand that partners want to drive revenue, but they also want to be involved in the decision-making process. To that end, each partner has an assigned Channel Director that works with them every step of the way, ensuring our partners understand they are an integral part of our overall sales ecosystem.
So far, I’ve talked a lot about what our partners are, but I also want to touch on a few things they aren’t. Our channel partners aren’t just a transaction or a name beside a checkbox. Nor, are they simply someone who re-sells our solutions. We want to create partners for life and set them up for further success and revenue.
Partners are at the core of our go-to-market strategy. Whether you partner with us to sell our services, or simply because you’re looking for a trusted provider to whom you can refer customers, you can be confident in our robust portfolio of flexible products that fuel innovation, growth, and resiliency. Together, we can -- and will -- do more.
For more information on our channel program, please visit: https://www.cyxtera.com/about-us/partners.
This article is the first in a series, spotlighting our partner programs. Stay tuned for the next installment, which will take a look at some of the unique go-to-market programs we’ve developed with our channel partners.
Views and opinions expressed in our blog posts are those of the employees who made them and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Company. A reader should not unduly rely on any statements made therein.
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