IBM rolls out redesigned PartnerWorld programme
IBM has redesigned its PartnerWorld programme and digital experience to help IBM Business Partners deliver higher value to organisations in the cloud and cognitive era.
"Digital business combined with digital intelligence is fundamentally changing companies, professions and industries," says Marc Dupaquier, IBM Global Business Partners general manager.
"IBM is accelerating our transformation by helping Business Partners capture emerging business models, build deeper expertise and at the same time, broaden our reach to attract new Business Partners," Dupaquier says.
Refined roadmaps have been designed to help build expertise, offer guidance for building new capabilities in strategic growth areas, including cloud and cognitive computing, and helping to increase revenue opportunities for Business Partners.
Key components of the programme include:
New competencies that recognise and reward demonstrated Business Partner expertise around products, solutions and industries, including strategic growth areas such as cognitive computing, cloud, commerce, Watson, Internet of Things, analytics, mobile, social and security.
A new set of programme membership levels that become effective in early 2017 and include Registered, Silver, Gold and Platinum. The new Platinum level will recognise and reward Business Partners for their investment in achieving high levels of competencies and sales success.
New Business Partner marks that leverage a redesigned visual expression and showcase a Business Partner's relationship with IBM and their competencies. These can be used by Business Partners on their company website, on email signatures and other marketing collateral, IBM says.
Comprehensive benefits aligned with deeper skills, training, marketing, sales, support offerings and other opportunities that build visibility for Business Partner solutions.
A new offering known as Skill Pack and designed to help new Business Partners accelerate time to revenue that includes resources to grow skills, build prototypes on IBM Cloud and connect with the IBM ecosystem
In addition to launching the redesigned PartnerWorld program, IBM is also expanding a number of benefits for partners. These include:
A newly designed PartnerWorld University portal, web-based learning management system delivering education to Business Partners to help build sales and technical skills, with a broader repository of courses to allow them to gain new IBM certifications.
The enhanced portal includes a personalised user experience that notifies users when a new course is available that meets their interest, ability to start where they left off, statistics on learning, and a course progress tracker.
Added Digital Marketing Workshops across the globe, designed to enable Business Partners to include digital and social tactics in their campaigns, thus helping to increase their ability to attract new clients and buyers.
The workshops include practice with IBM Digital Content Marketing (DCM), an integrated suite of marketing tools and content that enables Business Partners to execute integrated digital marketing campaigns across the web, email and social media.
An expansion of IBM's Business Transformation Initiative (BTI) workshop offering to reach significantly more Business Partners across the globe who are looking to transition their business models to higher value solutions and 'as a service' delivery.
A limited time opportunity for Business Partners to acquire developer Works Premium, a subscription service that provides developers of all levels with resources to help grow their skills, connect with the IBM ecosystem and build next-generation applications on IBM Cloud.
