Zoom Vet Laura Padilla to Shape Airtable's Channel Strategy, Partner Program
Airtable presents a "huge" opportunity for channel partners.
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Channel Futures: Why did you want to take this role with Airtable?
Laura Padilla: One of the main reasons I wanted to join Airtable is due to the rapid rate of acceleration that is happening in the digital economy. Companies, now more than ever, are looking to adopt more SaaS applications to automate workflows, and increase productivity and efficiency across the organization.
Airtable is a powerful application engine that is perfectly positioned to meet this demand. It empowers workers in virtually any business function – from marketing to product, to operations to finance, to HR and beyond – to build the workflows that perfectly fit their needs, help automate work, and make organizations more efficient. Airtable has hit on something big. More than 300,000 organizations, including 80% of the Fortune 100 and brands like Amazon, Nike, LVMH and Intuit, use Airtable to build customized applications that previously required deep technical skill or significant IT investment. This is a really powerful thing, and I’m excited to be part of a team that’s helping to put the power of software development in the hands of more people.
I’ve also been really impressed with Airtable’s ability to connect information, and align people and teams. At the heart of every digital transformation is a golden data set, the central place everyone rallies around for shared information. Through low- /no-code, Airtable wants to give teams the power to design their own processes through software so they can develop their own golden data sets and one reliable source of truth that protects the integrity and accuracy of the data. When people can create applications without code, teams and information are connected.
CF: What does Airtable have to offer the channel?
LP: This all adds up to a huge opportunity for partners. Airtable customers will look to partners to help them maximize their Airtable deployments through integrations and services, and get even more value from the platform. We’ve just scratched the surface on developing this ecosystem, and I’m excited to work with our partners to create it.
CF: How will your previous experience with Zoom, Nutanix and more come into play in this new role?
LP: My experience building out partner programs and ecosystems at four industry-leading companies from pre-IPO to public company gave me not only a deep understanding of the business impact partners can have, but also insight into how channel programs can best serve both our partners and customers. With a formal partner program in place, our customers will have more services and support resources available to them to ensure they’re getting the most value possible from Airtable. Airtable will drive growth for our partners as they’ll have access to our global set of customers and the opportunity to build lifetime relationships with them as they help make Airtable an integral part of their most critical workflows. Airtable has the opportunity to leverage partners to drive massive growth for the company, and I’m excited to take what I’ve learned from my previous roles to help rapidly scale Airtable’s partner program.
CF: What’s your take on Airtable’s current channel strategy?
LP: Airtable already has a strong following of consultants who love the product and see the power of its platform. It will be critical to leverage their feedback and learnings as we build out a more formal partner program that will scale globally to thousands of partners worldwide.
CF Will you be building a new partner program?
LP: We’ll be building a formal services and product program for SIs, VARs, consultants, developers and ISVs. These partnerships will be mutually beneficial as we take advantage of the strong communities they’ve built and help them accelerate their business growth as well.
CF: What’s at the top of your to-do list?
LP: First, we are defining our channel strategy and developing programs to maximize value and impact for our partners and customers. After that, we will design training/certification paths for service partners for them to become formal delivery partners. We will also be working on a partner portal, and sales and marketing incentives. We are also working closely with our friends in product management to have a set of APIs and SDKs that ISVs can integrate into to build seamless workflows for their customers.
CF: What’s at the top of your to-do list?
LP: First, we are defining our channel strategy and developing programs to maximize value and impact for our partners and customers. After that, we will design training/certification paths for service partners for them to become formal delivery partners. We will also be working on a partner portal, and sales and marketing incentives. We are also working closely with our friends in product management to have a set of APIs and SDKs that ISVs can integrate into to build seamless workflows for their customers.
Zoom vet Laura Padilla has joined Airtable, an enterprise software company, to formalize its channel strategy and partner program. We broke the news on Friday and follow up here with an in-depth interview.
Padilla is Airtable‘s vice president of partners. She led Zoom’s channel for more than four years as head of global business development and channel. Before that, she was Nutanix’s senior director of business development and alliances.
Airtable’s Laura Padilla
Padilla was part of our Top Gun 51 in 2020.
Airtable’s valuation reached $11 billion in December.
The Airtable connected apps platform enables teams to modernize their business processes. The company continues to expand its enterprise sales, success and support functions to fuel a growing number of large deployments.
In February, Airtable announced its expansion to EMEA with the opening of its first international headquarters in London.
Scroll through our slideshow above for a Q&A with Padilla on her Airtable channel strategy plans.
Want to contact the author directly about this story? Have ideas for a follow-up article? Email Edward Gately or connect with him on LinkedIn. |
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