BMS Blog: SBS Consulting in the UK

You won’t want to miss this Live Meeting being presented by Dell Quinn:

Exploring the value of the Microsoft Partner Network for Small Business Specialists:

https://training.partner.microsoft.com/learning/app/management/LMS_ActDetails.aspx?UserMode=0&ActivityId=577757

Find out about all the MPN changes taking place and how they effect you as an SBSC partner and get your chance to ask the questions you need answers to. Sign up now!

***Link to the official info for this is now on the Partner portal*** 

After much speculation amongst the SBSC community the changes to the Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) have now been made public and will appear on the MPN SBSC portal today! You can download the official PowerPoint deck from my SkyDrive account until I update this blog post with the link to the SBSC portal.

So, first the good news. The SBSC “blue badge” is here to stay! You told Microsoft you didn’t want to lose your SBSC status in your hundreds and Microsoft listened. This is excellent news for the SBSC community and only helps to strengthen the commitment Microsoft has to the SBSC designation. I’m personally very happy with this move as we just had the SBSC blue badge put all over our new van.

Now the not so good news. If you were previously a certified partner and then qualified to become a gold certified partner (and I know several partners who are very close to doing this) there was no additional membership fee involved. The additional benefits that came with being gold certified were based purely on numbers of mcp’s, competencies etc. The changes mean that a Competency partner who has already paid a membership fee now has to pay again to be an Advanced Competency Partner – somehow that doesn’t seem right to me and I’ve yet to talk to anyone in Microsoft who can justify the reasoning behind the decision.

The actual cost of the membership fees has yet to be decided and there as been talk that it will be charged in dollars. I’m going to stick my neck on the line here and say I don’t think that will happen and we will be charged in good old pounds, shillings and pence!

Following on from my previous post about Microsoft’s vision for the future of business technology here is another video (only 2mins) about a SharePoint specialist called Black Marble.

These guys really get what Microsoft products are about and swapped from using competitive products. Well wouldn’t you if what used to take 8  days now takes 2!

It’s really obvious that consistency of the Microsoft development tools and the year on year improvements made to them make a real difference to their productivity and gives them a competitive edge. That’s what I was talking about before when I said Microsoft products provide a solid foundation to build your business on.

This sort of message convinces me even more that Microsoft are the right choice when it comes to the products and services we offer. It has also prompted me to get off my backside and go get some SharePoint training – particularly as most of our customers already have SharePoint services built in to SBS 2003/8 and don’t really make any use of it!

This short 6 minute video gives an interesting insight in to Microsoft’s thinking and where they see things in 3, 5 and 10 years.

I saw Stephen Elop deliver one of the keynote speeches at WPC09 and although he isn’t the most compelling of interviewees he does come across as being sincere, so it’s well worth a watch and will help you focus and define your own long term goals. As a Microsoft partner the key areas of investment Elop talks about are the same ones you should be thinking about investing in as well.

It’s interesting to hear that Dynamics CRM has seen a 40% growth year on year despite the recession although I’m surprised Stephen didn’t mention Sharepoint as I understood it was Microsoft’s fastest selling product to date? Never the less if you wanted to build on the Microsoft product stack you currently sell Dynamics CRM and Sharepoint are definitely the way to go. Particularly as both obviously lend themselves to the “in the cloud” model.

This video gives a slightly more toned down vision of the future compared to Steve Ballmer’s recent talk at Washington DC University and for the first time for a while the term software + services was mentioned again. I thought Microsoft had dropped that as it didn’t really seem to catch on and the new version was “we’re all in with the cloud”?

The good news is that the Microsoft vision for the future of business technology remains consistently grounded in research which, while it doesn’t always produce the most inspired products certainly helps to deliver strong technology foundations in the ever changing world of IT!

I know some Microsoft partners and IT managers are not looking forward to changing their business model to adapt to the new world of cloud computing and are looking elsewhere. Personally I’m happy to be “all in with Microsoft” as their long term strategy has a lot to offer.

As part of my Microsoft Partner Area Lead role we have been busy coming up with new ways to further the SBSC community and drive forward the commitment to the program and MS partners.

One of those ideas is showcasing a series of Small Business Specialist Champions who have improved productivity and profitability for their company by utilising the benefits of partnering with Microsoft.

The first of our Champions is Netlink IT and you can read about their story at:

https://partner.microsoft.com/UK/40134193

Do you have a story to tell about how your partnership with Microsoft has helped grow your business and revenue? If so why  not let me know and you could be our next Small Business Specialist Champion!

Last week, the Office 2010 Technology Guarantee was announced which allows consumers, who buy and activate Office 2007 between certain eligibility dates, to download Office 2010 when it is available - at no additional charge.

You can get more info on this offer at the Microsoft Office 2010 Engineering blog.

/RANT MODE ON

We took on a customer a while back that with hindsight I should probably have told to get lost. But sometimes you can’t see the warning signs.

This particular customer came to us because the previous support company were “incompetent and didn’t know what they were doing” we were told. On enquiring on who said company was it turns out they are a well respected Microsoft Gold partner. I guess the alarm bells should have started ringing then!

This company has been nothing but trouble. Have you ever had one of those customers who blames you every time something goes wrong, even though you never sold them the kit in the first place and the kit is old and frankly not fit for purpose anymore? Every little issue becomes “our fault” and when we don’t wave a magic wand and fix it at no expense we are evil people that don’t know what we are doing.

If you’re in the business of repairing car bodywork ad reading this and thinking “I think he’s talking about us” then you’re probably right. Hopefully you’ll be reading this just before the email hits your inbox that tells you we’ve terminated your contract for breaching several clauses including:

• Failure to allow us adequate time to resolve an issue
• Being abusive to our employees
• Failure to allow us to complete our commitments under the terms of your contract due to refusing access to your equipment at agreed times.

I could go on but frankly I have customers that:

a) understand what good customer service is when they see it
b) Pay us on time
c) Aren’t hell bent on self destruction

So if you are an IT company who gets approached by a car bodywork repair company in the next few weeks do yourself a favour – give me a ring first!

/RANT MODE OFF

EBS is dead. I’m sure you’ve all heard the news announced on the 5th March and seen the EBS blog.

To be honest it isn’t a big surprise to me and I can’t say I’m going to morn the loss for very long. We put a reasonable amount of time and effort in to incorporating it in to our portfolio of products but it never took off for us, or for Microsoft it would seem. Don’t get me wrong I think it was a good product but it was a victim of the change in the way we think about providing software and services these days.

One thing is for sure. If you doubted Microsoft’s commitment to cloud computing before, the culling of EBS should convince you they are deadly serious. For MS to take such a radical decision proves without a shadow of doubt that cloud computing is where they see the future.

The decision to kill off EBS comes just after Steve Ballmer’s speech on Microsoft’s cloud computing strategy at the University of Washington and for partners at least this has really driven the message home. Get with the cloud or go do something else.

The question being asked now of course is, “what about the future of SBS?” Well, I’ve been involved in some of the discussions with the SBS development team at Microsoft as to the route the development will take and although I can’t be specific as I’m under NDA I think it is safe to assume that SBS will be around for a while longer. The reason I’m confident of that is I suspect SBS will evolve to embrace the cloud rather than fighting against it which should help to secure its future in one way or another. Time will tell.

There has been a change of date for the March Business School:

Business School: Cost-effective digital marketing tips

Business Schools are a series of monthly Live Meetings specifically for the Small Business Specialist Community (SBSC) and Registered partners who specialise in targeting the small to medium size business market. Taking place on 25 March from 15.00-16.00 (GMT), the next Business School, will be presented by Alana Griffiths, Marketing Strategy Planner for B2B technology marketing agency, Mason Zimbler. Alana will provide cost-effective digital marketing tips to help you target SMB customers. Review a recording of last months’ Business School Meeting which discussed how to structure your business for growth.

The dates for the next Business and Technical Schools have just been released. These schools are becoming very popular and gaining momentum. Don’t miss out: Make sure you register today!

Look forward to seeing you at the meetings!