What is 'Digital Transformation' & What Is It Doing to the Channel?
People have been talking about digital transformation and the way it would revolutionize all things channel for years without finding any clarity. Exactly what does ‘digital trasformation’ mean? What will it look like? And when the ‘transformation’ is over—if that ever happens—will tomorrow’s channel look anything like the channel of yesteryear?
There aren’t a lot of solid answers to those questions, but we can say definitively that whatever’s happening, it’s changed the way we sell, market, and distribute technology. Customers are driving trends rather than vendors pulling their strings out of sight of the average consumer. The cost of tech has drastically dropped, and yet the speed of innovation and adoption has never been faster.
At Channel Partners Evolution this year, we asked a few members of the Channel Futures Think Tank some baseline questions about digital transformation and its impact on the IT channel. Click through the slideshow to see how Jim Chow, Head of Global System Integrator Partnerships at Google Cloud; Dawn Lindsey, Head of Partner Marketing and Programs at BigCommerce; and Sandra Glaser Cheek, Brocade’s Vice President of Global Channel Sales & Marketing define digital transformation, and what they think it means for partners.
“’Digital transformation’ is one of the most overused and meaningless terms. To me [at Google], it’s how customers like to interact with you, your services, and products—especially with the emergence of consumer-rich digital lives through platforms like Netflix and Facebook. How do we offer services and products that resonate with where customers want to go?”
Jim Chow, Google Cloud
“In the worlds I play in, we see a lot of partner triangulation where many partners come together for one customer. One partner we have that’s successful switches roles; they’re the deal integrator in one, a referral in the next. There’s gray area in what partnerships mean. One of our most prolific partners is a two-man team in Sedona specializing in this niche cowboy-chic boutique industry, with services. Maybe that’s the partner of the future. They’re not huge organizations, but tech lets us work from anywhere. You can look different today.”
Dawn Lindsey, BigCommerce
“We have to wrap our heads around what we define as the channel. We’ve pigeon-holed it into reseller or service models, but we need to expand the idea of what the route to market means in the channel. A lot of programs we’ve developed as vendors won’t have legs for much longer. We must embrace new partner types.”
Sandra Glaser Cheek, Brocade
Chris Palermo, founder of Global Communications Networks (GCN), said his business grew by distinguishing between “hunters” and “farmers” on its sales team. While the hunter searches for and tackles leads, the farmer specializes in account management.
Palermo said his original team relied predominantly on the hunter, who didn’t know how to sell deeper into an existing customer.
“The hunter is off to the races. They’re looking for the next thing. They’re not interested in cultivating these slices. So our base was starting to languish,” Palermo said.
GCN brought in more “farmers,” who knew how to cultivate and grow accounts. As a result, GCN developed more trust with its customers and grew its base.
“Look at the value you add. If you’re a more traditional one-stop shop, the opportunity is IoT with hardware-edge, cloud-edge and cloud-core solutions that you tie together to add value. Where the channel and resellers are going in the next decade is services, and it’s less about configuring technology. It’s building industry processes into tech solutions. That’s where AI is a big play. For Big Data, how do you take it and apply it to specializing in an LOB? SaaS has been around for 10 years. If you want to just be a reseller, you can do that and stick around for a while if you take a horizontal focus.”
Jim Chow, Google Cloud
“Look at the value you add. If you’re a more traditional one-stop shop, the opportunity is IoT with hardware-edge, cloud-edge and cloud-core solutions that you tie together to add value. Where the channel and resellers are going in the next decade is services, and it’s less about configuring technology. It’s building industry processes into tech solutions. That’s where AI is a big play. For Big Data, how do you take it and apply it to specializing in an LOB? SaaS has been around for 10 years. If you want to just be a reseller, you can do that and stick around for a while if you take a horizontal focus.”
Jim Chow, Google Cloud
What is 'Digital Transformation' & What Is It Doing to the Channel?
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