The Microsoft Dynamics channel has entered the “One Commercial Partner” era with disruptions brought on by cloud and new market demands. As Microsoft adapts to these changes, all roads in Microsoft’s map now seem to lead toward the cloud.
The market, and therefore Microsoft, are demanding resellers become “Modern” partners. This means Partners need to be able to turn a profit on cloud subscriptions in order to transform alongside Microsoft and stay relevant. This cannot be done with ERP alone; competency in the Microsoft cloud platform and applications like Office 365, PowerBI and Flow are becoming increasingly important for Dynamics Partners. Checkout our eBook, Making Money with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central to learn more about the challenges and opportunities of selling D365.
Essentially, Partners need to be able to sell and support cloud infrastructure, productivity and business applications to continue working with Microsoft.
Of course, going cloud means shrinking margins and service revenue opportunities, plus new challenges such as:
- Need for a strategic plan for the transition
- Forecasting revenue from legacy on-premises business and budgeting to invest
- Dedicated time and resources needed for cloud training and solution development
- Managing ongoing customer engagement
- Building an online marketplace for transacting, billing and order provisioning
While it seems Microsoft is not committing much in the way of support to help partners make the transformation, they have recognized the challenge this creates for partners. To address the challenge Microsoft has created opportunities for new types of alliances in the channel through programs like Cloud Solutions Provider Program (CSP) and Microsoft AppSource.
Earning decent margins in the cloud market requires selling more subscriptions to the same customer and driving down internal costs while meeting ever-changing customer demand. With cloud solutions, you can have a growing and significant revenue stream year after year.
Microsoft introduced Dynamics 365 Business Central (formerly “Tenerife), like the rest of Dynamics 365, was built to increase Microsoft’s share of their customer’s strategic technology and Microsoft share of the greater cloud market.