AWS Transforms the Partner Experience to Drive Greater Customer Value and Partner Profitability

This is the first blog in the series of updates to the AWS Partner Programs, AWS Marketplace, and AWS Partner Central.

By Priya Bains, Principal, Brand and Content Strategy – AWS Partner Network

Customers’ needs are constantly changing, and as part of their evolution our partners have shared that they want more efficient ways to drive greater value for their customers and a more predictable profitable growth. The transformation of the AWS Partner experience is a response to this evolution.

We’re excited to share a preview of the enhancements we’re making to the partner programs and tools to deliver greater customer value and partner profitability. We’re investing in a simple, personalized, value-driven experience to help you win more, win bigger, and win faster.

The Opportunity is Now for AWS Partners

The opportunity to help customers transform using the cloud is greater than ever. McKinsey projects $3 trillion in opportunity up for grabs for companies that go beyond adoption, with enterprises aspiring to have 60% of their investment in the cloud by 2025. The AWS Partner Network (APN) and AWS Marketplace are a demonstrated pathway to help you capitalize on this opportunity.

Based on the Global Partner Ecosystem Multiplier study by Canalys conducted across 9 countries, partners with a breadth of offerings and deep AWS engagement can achieve a $6.40 multiplier per $1 AWS sold (view multiplier by country). Additionally, the Total Economic Impact (TEI) Partner Opportunity Analysis by Forrester suggests that customers spend 80% more on third-party ISV applications through AWS Marketplace. Independent software vendors (ISVs) close a higher percentage of deals (27%), with 40% faster sales cycle time and 20% incremental sale pipeline when transacting in AWS Marketplace. The GLG study also indicates that ISVs using AWS Marketplace accelerated time-to-profitability by more than 20%, and reduced cost-per-user by 17% and customer acquisition costs by 15% on average.

These studies show that the biggest barriers for AWS Partners to realize their full potential—whether SIs (system integrators), channel partners, or ISVs—is having limited breadth of services, cloud maturity, or not selling through AWS Marketplace. We continue to see a shift toward business outcome solutions being driven by line of business buyers, with customers more likely to purchase solutions that impact their top-line.

Our mission is to accelerate your engagement with Amazon Web Services (AWS) by making it easier than ever to work with us, so that together we can deliver maximum value to you and your customers. Using insights from these studies, we have identified areas where you can be most profitable.

The AWS Partner experience transformation is aimed towards helping you deliver different levels and types of value to customers—driving greater growth and profitability.

Programs and Tools Aligned to Your Business Models for Greater Profitable Growth

We’re making it easier to leverage programs and tools that deliver profitable growth for your unique business models. The AWS Partner Paths, launched in early 2022, was our first step to support your multiple offerings. Next, to help you achieve higher profitable growth ($6.40 multiplier as identified by the Canalys study), we introduced the AWS Partner Profitability Framework at re: Invent 2022—the organizing construct of our programs, tools, and benefits across all partner business models: resell, services, managed services, technology solutions, and business outcome solutions.

Figure 1 — AWS Partner Profitability Framework.

Over the next year, we’re merging similar programs and related requirements to make it easy to utilize benefits that help you move up and/or across the Profitability Framework growth motions of build, market, sell, and grow to better support your unique business models. For example, we’ll consolidate our differentiation programs—AWS Competency, Managed Service Provider, Service Delivery, Service Ready—into one AWS Specializations umbrella program with consistent benefits, requirements, and partner experience. Current program achievements will simply transition to specializations such as Managed Service Provider Specialization, Data & Analytics Specialization, etc. In January, we reduced requirements for the differentiation programs by 57% that has in turn reduced your application preparation time by 25%—resulting in operational efficiencies and accelerating your total time to market. Going forward, it’ll be easier to understand which requirement can be applied to additional specializations, so you’ll know exactly where to start and what resources to utilize for your business model.

Over the next 3 to 18 months, as we simplify programs and invest in an end-to-end curated experience, we encourage you to engage with the Partner Paths to unlock benefits and growth opportunities available today.

For example, migration continues to be a growth area for partners, with 90%+ customer workloads still not on the cloud. If you have a Services business model and do not already have a migration practice, you are missing a key offering in your services portfolio. You can leverage AWS Migration Acceleration Program (MAP) to develop migration capabilities and grow your business. Similarly, adding higher margin revenue streams to your offerings and diversifying your business models can help you increase your profitability. We know per the Canalys study that managed services generate 30-40% gross profit margins. Throughout the year, we will continue to add new initiatives and resources to support your managed services business—get started with the AWS Managed Services Provider (MSP) Program today, available through the Services Path.

If you offer technology solutions, AWS ISV Accelerate Program provides you co-sell support to generate new business and drive sales. As an accelerator for partner growth, creating a listing in AWS Marketplace can increase your customer reach and accelerates the sales cycle.

Scaling AWS Marketplace to Expand Your Customer Reach and Accelerate Sales

We’re investing in a scalable experience to help drive greater customer value through AWS Marketplace. ISVs realize 80% larger deal sizes and close a higher percentage of deals (27%) when transacting through AWS Marketplace (TEI Forrester study). To help you sell your offerings, drive visibility with customers, and generate greater revenue faster, we’re enhancing AWS Marketplace and AWS Partner Central.

Recent feature launches like search auto-complete allows customers to easily discover your product listing, AWS Marketplace Vendor Insights enables you to make security and compliance information available to buyers in AWS Marketplace, and SaaS Free Trials help you acquire new customers through free product evaluation for prospective buyers. With AWS Marketplace QuickSight Dashboards you can efficiently analyze, track key trends for your billed revenue, collections, and disbursements. The AWS Marketplace integration with Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (Amazon EKS) brings partner solutions to more customers directly in the EKS console. To support partners across the globe, we launched AWS Marketplace Seller of Records in Australia and Japan late last year, making it easier for buyers to receive region-compliant invoices and make payments in local currency to the seller.

We re-launched AWS Partner Central with new site navigation, faster page load times, and expanded user roles that include marketing and technical staff, to help you find relevant content faster based on your role. Additionally, to help you accelerate opportunity and lead sharing, we introduced the AWS Partner CRM Connector that integrates Salesforce CRM with Partner Central and automates your sales process to speed up operations. This is only the beginning!

Over the next year, we’ll continue to make iterative improvements to better align the Partner Central and AWS Marketplace experience and streamline related foundational elements such as onboarding, enablement, deal management, and technical validations (Foundational Technical Reviews and AWS Marketplace validations).

This simple, personalized, value-driven experience will help you capitalize on available opportunities to drive greater profitable growth and customer value. Leveraging the AWS Partner Profitability Framework, as you broaden your offerings and value offered to customers, you’ll be recognized for your overall engagement with AWS, inclusive of all of your offerings.

Looking Ahead

We know it’s important to have line of sight for predictable and profitable growth with us. As we streamline our partner programs and benefits, we’re increasing our overall investment in areas where it matters most to you and your customers. This will drive higher value exchange, while not reducing benefits you may receive today.

We also know there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to the partner journey. The AWS Partner Profitability Framework is your map to navigate your unique journey with AWS—helping you deepen your expertise and broaden the value across your specific business models to drive greater profitability.

Over the next 3-18 months, as we simplify and transform the partner experience, boost co-selling, and open doors to significant cloud migration opportunities, listening and working closely with you will remain our top priority.

In June, we’ll share details of the first phase of partner experience updates. While programs that you use today may evolve, we’ll give you plenty of runway to transition. And we’ll communicate these updates periodically and well in advance.

AWS is constantly innovating to help you deliver greater value for your customers. There’s more to discover and we’re excited to embark on this journey together. It’s Still Day One.

Learn More

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