Credit: Salesforce
Salesforce is placing big bets on growing its partner ecosystem capacity and capability, ensuring the right partners are investing in the right clouds.
This is according to Salesforce vice president of alliances and channels in Australia and New Zealand (A/NZ) Tara Ridley, who spoke with ARN about the growth potential in the market across Australia, New Zealand and her recently added remit of ASEAN.
Ridley said one of the strategic priorities this year was bringing Salesforce, Tableau and Mulesoft partners together into one program.
This came into effect on 1 February, whereby partners now have one contract and one portal as opposed to multiple touchpoints.
“For the first time we have single accountability and ownership and we’re removing duplication,” she said. “Our teams are representing the entire Customer 360 portfolio across every single cloud we have. So when a partner enrolls, they’re engaging the full suite, making us easier to do business with, which is a strategic priority.
“This gives our partners the opportunity to really drive customer success by uniting the entire data platform across every single cloud.”
Ridley highlighted customers were seeking out deep domain expertise and this is an area partners can continue to lean in.
“Whether it's an industry or a specific cloud, or both, customers really want that deep domain expertise,” she said. “We'll continue to have a big focus on growing the ecosystem capacity and capability, ensuring that we've got the right partners investing in the right clouds.
“We're getting a lot more specific on where we want to play together and I think that is for everyone's advantage.”
Salesforce has experienced great growth among its partner ecosystem with credentials and it’s an area it will continue to focus on along with opportunities in its Data Cloud platform, she continued.
“Partners are what make Customer 360 a reality for our customers. They're the ones that bring it to life and drive that customer success,” Ridley added.
Within A/NZ, Salesforce goes to market by industry and Ridley said it was seeing continued growth and opportunity in financial services, public sector, retail, consumer goods and communications and media.
In Asia, Salesforce’s go-to-market strategy is by country, with Singapore playing a very strong part in the region along with a huge growth potential in Thailand.
Ridley hinted Indonesia was the next target market and it was currently mapping out the strategy and partner plans.
In February, Salesforce launched a partner console on its AppExchange where partners can improve their listing and highlight their specialisation – whether it’s a cloud or an industry.
“We’re seeing a lot of traditional system integrators moving into the app space,” Ridley said. “This console helps to get their app listed, track the approval and gives them transparency as to what stage they’re at, flexibility with how their listing is shown and what they want to promote.
“We're seeing where you've got an ISV [independent software vendor] and a system integrator working together, it delivers much more value for the customer, a much richer engagement, more long term customer success, less attrition and faster time to value.
“We’re actively promoting and providing more opportunity for ISVs and traditional consulting partners to mix and collaborate.”
