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Building Your Cloud Partnership Team: Key Roles and Strategies

The Cloud Alliance, Technical Cloud Alliance, and Co-Sell Growth Manager are key roles within a successful cloud partnership team able to transform vendors into a thriving sales channel.

By Kobi Leizerovich, Mar 11 2024
Building Your Cloud Partnership Team: Key Roles and Strategies

Embarking on the journey of constructing a cloud partnership team requires a nuanced understanding of the roles and strategies that drive success in the dynamic landscape of cloud services. 

In our previous blog, we discussed the four pillars of a cloud partnership: Sales, Business Development, Partnership Enablement, and Marketing. In this blog post, we focus on the individuals who orchestrate the collaborative efforts within a cloud partnership team—the Cloud Alliance, Technical Cloud Alliance, and Cloud BDR. Join us as we unravel the intricacies of their roles, responsibilities, and the strategies they employ to transform cloud vendors into a thriving sales channel.

The Cloud Partnership Team

A successful cloud business partnership has a wide scope covering various aspects, including sales, business development, partnership enablement, and marketing. The extensive range of these pillars necessitates creating a team of individuals with various skill sets who can work together to cover each of the integral pillars. It’s only with all four pillars in place that your cloud partnership team will be able to generate a scaleable sales channel that drives growth. 

Below, we explore the ideal role structure of the cloud partnership team, which involves three key members. Let’s explore how these integral components come together to create an effective team.

Cloud Alliance

At the core of the cloud partnership team is the pivotal role of the cloud alliance, serving as the linchpin in orchestrating successful collaborations within the cloud ecosystem. This crucial team member is a business development expert, shouldering responsibilities ranging from high-level strategy to meticulous planning and the orchestration of the entire team. Because partnership enablement necessitates an extensive knowledge base to navigate the complexities of the cloud landscape, it is the domain of the cloud alliance.

One of the central functions of the cloud alliance is the crafting of the “better together” story—a narrative that emphasizes incentives, whether monetary or business-related, providing field sellers with compelling reasons to collaborate. This storytelling responsibility falls under the purview of the cloud alliance because it demands the most comprehensive understanding of the ecosystem.

Technical Cloud Alliance

The technical cloud alliance assumes a crucial role within the cloud partnership team, straddling the realms of both business and technology. Tasked with facilitating seamless interactions between technical and business domains, this position is instrumental in navigating the intricacies of product integration. A nuanced understanding of both the ISV and cloud solutions is paramount, demanding a unique ability to bridge the communication gap between internal (ISV) and external (cloud) technical professionals. 

Because every program in partnership enablement also has a distinct technical component, the technical cloud alliance is entrusted with the responsibility of overseeing all technical programs. These include cloud marketplace onboarding and other programs, as most programs within the cloud vendors have technical requirements.

While the Cloud Alliance is tasked with crafting a better together story, the Technical Cloud Alliance has its own story to tell. They must be able to clearly articulate a story about how the ISV product and the cloud service complete one another, enable each other, and offer a better solution to the end customer.

Cloud BDR

The cloud BDR shoulders the responsibility of translating the message and use cases crafted by the cloud alliance into tangible market actions. Focused on bringing as many stakeholders as possible to the table for discussions surrounding the solution, the cloud BDR operates at the intersection of communication and market engagement. Their mission is not only to disseminate the message effectively but also to foster discussions that highlight the relevance of the use case for diverse audiences. In essence, the cloud BDR serves as a proactive advocate, bridging the gap between strategy and execution to ensure the resonance of the cloud partnership narrative in the market.

Moreover, Cloud BDRs play a pivotal role in shaping the early stages of co-selling partnerships. As architects of lead generation, they identify and target potential end-customers, laying the groundwork for business growth. Their strategic positioning in the cloud-centric ecosystem enables them to leverage the extensive customer base of cloud providers for large-scale co-selling initiatives. Operating at the forefront of the sales funnel, Cloud BDRs collaborate closely with cloud account teams, fostering relationships, understanding diverse needs, and consistently developing new use cases. This multifaceted approach not only creates opportunities but also cultivates dynamic and mutually beneficial partnerships with cloud providers, contributing to the overall success of the cloud alliance.

Building Your Cloud Partnership Team

From the cloud alliance to the technical cloud alliance and cloud BDR, each role within a cloud partnership team plays a distinct yet interconnected part in transforming cloud vendors into a thriving sales channel. Together, they cover all four pillars of the Cloud Partnership–Sales, Business Development, Partnership Enablement, and Marketing–working together to get the most out of the venture.

If the task of building an internal team proves challenging, outsourcing to experts with the requisite resources and knowledge becomes a viable avenue to harness the full potential of cloud collaboration.

Either way, remember that the success of your cloud alliance hinges on the strategic interplay of these roles. Whether internal or external, the right team composition is your key to unlocking the full potential of scalable sales, propelling your growth in the dynamic realm of cloud services.