With an environment as robust and comprehensive as Cisco’s, it can be daunting for new partners to identify which training track will align best with their expertise and their customers’ needs. Between all of the certifications, specializations, and authorizations available, it can become overwhelming. Many value-added resellers (VARs) don’t know where to start when it comes to building a successful Cisco practice. They might invest in the wrong tracks for their business, and, as a result, miss out on sizeable discounts and rebates. To help them make the right investments and choices, Comstor and NterOne have joined forces to create the EDGE Focus Tool for Comstor partners.
The EDGE Focus Tool helps partners navigate the complex ecosystem that is Cisco and identify which training tracks align best with their specific goals and expertise and allowing them to secure valuable rebates and discounts for their programs. With an API integration with Tableau, Comstor can extract relevant partner data, complement it with point-of-sale data, and help create a plan of action that makes sense for any given partner.
“It’s a way for them to forecast on future business and decide where they want to leverage their engineers, their account managers, marketing dollars, everything,” explained Carissa Scholl, Comstor’s Enablement Programs Project Manager for Cisco Business Development. Instead of trying to “boil the ocean,” so to speak, Comstor partners can identify the Cisco partnership levels to create opportunities that make the most sense for their team to maximize revenue. “Instead of throwing a bunch of features and products at them, we work with them to understand what part of the environment they are going to succeed with, so they can maximize their rebates and discounts.”
Scholl further explained how the tool helps inform Comstor partners in their own hiring and training processes. “We can share with our partners what they could have earned if they were invested in the correct training track with us and help them make the right call for the next earning period,” she said.
The EDGE Focus Tool makes it easy for partners to opt-in to different EDGE progression programs and pull over their relevant data simultaneously from a singular landing page, which streamlines the disparate pages that were previously used for each track offered. It also utilizes a “refresh” tool – ensuring that all of a partner’s current Cisco certifications are accurately reflected in each partner’s account when they import their credentials and agree to the terms and conditions.
You can learn more about the EDGE Focus Tool and how it can help track your Cisco partnership which will aid to maximize your revenue, rebates, and discounts here.
