Registered Partners

Ed Moltzen, of CRN, facilitated our Channel conversation and gathered further insights into what Partners are looking for in Dell’s PartnerDirect program. While I tried to answer the various comments over on CRN, I thought this blog would provide additional value.

To further the conversation posted by Daniel over at CRN, I wanted to let our Partners know that Dell does offer Marketing Incentive Funds (MIF) that return dollars based on set quarterly business growth targets.

Two high level, program qualifications are:

• Must be a U.S. Dell Registered Partner to participate
• Total Solution Provider Direct (SPD) segment spend of $400K over the previous 4 Quarters or $100k in the immediately preceding Quarter

While it does require an application for submission, I’m being told that if a Partner has signed up already in the last year then they do NOT need to do it again!

If you achieved the goals noted above in the Solution Provider Channel Segment you are automatically enrolled in the program.

If you’re interested in MIF program details or want to work to get to the right level for inclusion, you can contact your Sales Rep directly for more information.

In a recent article on SearchITChannel.com, Colin Steele questioned the progress of our PartnerDirect program. I really like Colin and respect his fair coverage of Dell’s channel strategy -- in particular, he's reinforced the value of our social media initiatives and how we're giving Partners a voice in all of our decisions. However, this article also emphasized the need for improvement in our partner training programs, along with other "complaints" popping up in our partner communities. These definitely need to be addressed and we’re doing exactly that.

First off, a Dell Partner noted that our online training and testing was "laborious." This is the second time I’ve read a comment like this, so I’m curious: What would the ideal training program look like? We are always looking for Partner perspectives on how to make our training a better experience. If you have any thoughts on this, please comment here!

In addition to training programs, Colin mentioned the problems being discussed across our online communities (our PartnerDirect forum, Channel blog and PartnerStorm). But this is the risk we take in seeking partner feedback in a public forum. It's inevitable that issues are going to come up -- no one is perfect. Through interactive exchanges with our partners, Dell is able to find out exactly what we need to do to improve our program.

Basically, the Dell channel program is a work in progress, and we're excited to see all the talk about it within our own forums and across the IT marketplace. We've learned a lot in seven months, and look forward to seeing what the future brings.

Over the past several weeks, our PartnerDirect forum has been very active with conversations regarding Dell’s online pricing fluctuations. After looking into these questions and trying to understand root causes, we have determined that some of the differences are driven by freight cost.

To avoid any confusion, Dell wants to take action and drive price parity. Starting yesterday, June 30^th, our PartnerDirect program will match SMB in freight charges for consistency across Dell’s online stores and orders taken by our sales team.

If you have questions concerning your account, please contact your sales representative. If you have a question that can be shared with our partner community, feel free to post it here.