McAfee Channel Blog: Stealing A Page From Cisco Systems

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First, the background: Former McAfee Channel Chief Alex Thurber exited McAfee last week to join TripWire. New Channel Chief Gavin Struthers is relocating from Australia to Silicon Valley to head up McAfee’s partner team. Struthers is a 10-year McAfee veteran who has extensive experience in Australia, new Zealand and developing markets. Stepping into a global role was a next natural career move, he told The VAR Guy today. As a former sales leader, Struthers said he brings “rigor and execution” to the channel chief post.

McAfee’s Channel Blog

McAfee Channel Blog

To spread the word about the new channel chief, McAfee opted for social media — rather than traditional PR newswires — as the primary information pipeline. Struthers blogged about his new role and his personal business philosophy on the McAfee website. It was strikingly similar to Cisco Systems’ channel strategy — which often involves blog-centric updates from Keith Goodwin, Edison Peres and other Cisco channel leaders.

A case in point: When Cisco ended its channel partnership with Hewlett-Packard, Goodwin broke the news in a blog and video — allowing Cisco to control the messaging from the get-go.

Now, McAfee is using its blog to disclose big channel news. That’s hardly surprising. Former Cisco Channel Evangelist Lang Tibbils now drives many of McAfee’s channel marketing and communications efforts. Could Tibbils have managed today’s blog communication from Struthers to readers? The VAR Guy sure thinks so.