EM Marketplace Blog
Cloud and distributor marketplaces have changed how customers think about and transact thousands of IT services.1 By offering a streamlined and frictionless buying experience, they provide a more immediate and efficient way for customers to find, try, and consume cloud and ISV solutions. So much so that throughput from these marketplaces is predicted to increase to $100 billion by 2026.2 This widespread adoption underscores a shift in customer buyer preferences and has introduced an important route to market for technology providers to consider.
Unique Customer Benefits
Customers of every size are embracing the marketplace model, leading many hyperscale cloud providers and distributors to create their very own e-commerce platforms. But today’s marketplaces are more than just digital storefronts; they are vast, on-demand ecosystems for accessing and managing a wide array of third-party solutions.3 They can also offer rich customer benefits and incentives.
Billing, renewal, and subscription management are all integrated into a single experience, accelerating procurement and approval cycles through a predictable buying process. Eligible marketplace transactions can be applied to cloud consumption commitments, enabling customers to deploy the solutions they need while fulfilling existing contract obligations. Customers can even take advantage of spend-based or resource-based discounts, negotiate specific pricing and terms directly with third-party service providers, or access custom-built partner solutions—while still enjoying a standardized purchasing and solution management framework.
It’s these driving forces that have contributed to the prevalent marketplace adoption across all industries and made it a critical component of future go-to-market (GTM) strategies.4
Prepare for Marketplace Success
Achieving success through cloud marketplaces requires a well-defined and deliberate strategy. Without it, you may struggle to gain traction or adequately stand out from the crowd. However, with a thoughtful and comprehensive approach, you can accelerate growth while capitalizing on this new route to market. Here are some tips that can help you maximize your cloud marketplace GTM efforts:
Tip 1: Crawl, Walk, Run
From the industry’s top cloud providers to prominent technology distributors, there are plenty of marketplaces to choose from—each targeting different buyers and segments. However, supporting these digital marketplaces is not a turnkey endeavor. Significant investments are needed to integrate product offerings, synchronize backend management systems, and effectively launch your listings in market. Prioritizing which digital platforms to adopt and when can help ensure ample resources are in place while providing a proper on-ramp to enable stakeholders and generate demand in market.
Tip 2: Build a Partner-Friendly Practice
Co-sell and marketplace strategies often go hand-in-hand and require buy-in from partner sales teams. While customers may be intimately familiar with the benefits of digital marketplaces, taking time to educate partners on how it benefits them can create more alignment with your GTM motions and help remove marketplace hesitation. This can include collaborating with channel partners to reinforce deal registration processes, protected margins, and ownership of customer relationships. Introducing exclusive SPIFFS and incentives, comprehensive trainings, and joint-marketing opportunities can also help create a more partner-friendly marketplace practice that encourages greater participation from the channel.
Tip 3: Showcase Your Solutions
Digital marketplaces have brought thousands of third-party offerings directly to customers’ fingertips. This can make differentiating yourself a critical element to success. Leveraging your marketplace listing to showcase your solution’s value can help capture buyer attention and attract new prospects navigating the platform. Be sure to incorporate the latest product collateral, customer reviews, high-quality media assets, and keyword-rich titles to improve your solution’s marketplace search ranking and keep engagement fresh. Augmenting your approach with paid advertising efforts, sponsored content, and promotional marketplace tools, such as featured listings, can also enhance the visibility of and traffic to your listings. Best practices also suggest incorporating marketplace call-to-actions for all relevant content to help further generate awareness and drive more organic traction.
In short, cloud marketplaces have become a transformative force and are an essential avenue for winning in today’s evolving IT landscape. With a deliberate and strategic GTM approach, you can maximize your efforts, meet buyers where they are, and achieve sustained success in the cloud.
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- IDC, The Future of Distributor Marketplaces, Mar 2024
- Tackle, State of Cloud GTM 2023, 2023
- TechTarget, How Tech Vendors Can Embrace the Digital Marketplace Reset, May 2023
- Forbes, Leaders Using Cloud Marketplaces To Futureproof Their Business Models, Apr 2023
