EnGenius Continues to Enhance Its Elite Partner Program

EnGenius Technologies is a company long known for its line of managed and unmanaged wireless network solutions for small and medium-size businesses (SMBs). With the 2019 launch of EnGenius Cloud, the company broadened the path for its future. To make sure partners are on the same path, EnGenius continues to beef up its Elite Partner Program.

The serverless EnGenius Cloud uses AI to manage wireless networks for SMBs and enterprises. Last week, the company introduced three new features for the EnGenius cloud-based network management platform.

EnGenius’s Amanda Blasnick

EnGenius top channel executive Amanda Blasnick met with Channel Futures to update us on the company’s Elite Partner Program as well as partner opportunities. Blasnick joined EnGenius in 2016. She is the company’s channel marketing manager and is responsible for messaging, branding, putting together the partner program, resources and execution. Prior to joining EnGenius, Blasnick worked for more than five years at Ingram Micro.

Channel Futures: Who are EnGenius channel partners and how much business goes through the channel?

Amanda Blasnick: We have about 4,500 partners in North America. These partners are primarily VARs, MSPs, system integrators and installers. A partner for us is not someone with an e-commerce store on their website. We want the VAR who is adding value to the solution. That’s where partners get the added benefits from our program as well.

Partners drive at least 80% of the company’s revenue. We do have some business that takes place on the Amazon e-commerce site. But as a company we’re a B2B company.  Having that channel team, that channel connection that’s what our business thrives on. That’s where our focus is and that’s where we make our investments.

At the end of the day, Amazon is actually a competitor to our channel partners. So, we put as much focus as possible on the channel, exclusively.

CF: EnGenius targets the SMB market?

AB: The reason I say that we target the SMB is because our products could be used in enterprises in some cases but in a saturated market it’s good to have a defined market. It helps us tailor our messaging and content to support and drive the specific need from SMBs. When we talk about SMB, we’re saying that we have enterprise-class features that [partners’] customers may be asking for that Cisco brings to market. However, our solution overall — and we don’t lead with cost — our solution happens to be one of the more affordable solutions in the channel.

We not only offer hardware that is comparable to enterprise-level products, but we also offer the software and support. Our management software license is free. Partners can charge for services, adding more to their bottom line. We’re not taking that money.

While SMB is our target market and where our partners sell today, we’re also moving into the markets like hospitality, hotels, multidevelopment units and assisted living, and we have a strong outdoor solution for campgrounds and marinas, and large venues like stadiums. As we’ve expanded to cloud — that was the one thing missing from our portfolio until last year.

Once we brought that cloud solution to market, it enhanced the partner opportunity and the resources we provide to them. We’re slowly expanding to meet that midmarket and lower-tier enterprise market. We’re going to give the larger more well-known networking vendors a run for their money in the next few years. We’re a primary manufacturer so we have a direct line of sight to our engineers to make changes customer want.

[Senao Networks is EnGenius’ parent company. Senao is a Taiwanese manufacturer of data networking and telephony products marketing under the EnGenius and Senao brands.]

CF: Tell us about the partner program that you inherited when you joined EnGenius and how it’s changed.

AB: I inherited a program when I joined the company. And we saw areas where it needed improvement. I changed the program to adhere to meeting the new needs in the market. Then we continued to add more benefits and enhancements.

The old program was the Empower Partner Program. The new program is the Elite Partner Program. I changed the name but also program elements like support, the approach…

…and the promotion. We also launched a new partner portal.

Going out there with a new partner program, a new approach, new messaging for the support and services that we had was designed to attract a new audience in such a saturated market.

CF: Is Elite a global partner program?

AB: The program that I run is for the Americas — the U.S., Canada and Latin America. We have a partner program within Europe, and Singapore and Asia (Taiwan area). The program is technically global because we all leverage the same partner portal, tools and resources. However, the monetary benefits may differ.

One of the key benefits to our program is the margin advantage. We guarantee an added margin for our partners.

We have a lot of unique tools in the market, such as a free network design tool called ezWiFi Planner. Elite partners can design, analyze and optimize their Wi-Fi projects with this tool. This along with our dedicated support at no cost. And, the quality hardware that we’re known for.

CF: Is the partner program tiered?

AB: The difference between register partners and Elite partners is based on revenue. And the benefit for more revenue is more fiscal rewards. We do not penalize any of our partner levels on enablement. That’s because we know that enablement is what’s going to get EnGenius out in the market.

And, unless you’re a partner, and approved as a cloud partner in our partner program, you can’t sell our cloud solution. Because it’s such a strategic solution in the market, we want to keep it off Amazon as long as possible.