Working with the current cohort of Microsoft Partners in the Partner Elevate program, we realised that we often ask partners about their Microsoft Sales Plays and how they are taking those plays to market. The more partners we spoke to, the more obvious it became that their understanding of Microsoft Sales Plays varies widely.
So why is a Sales Play important for Microsoft and for Microsoft Partners? And just as importantly, why does understanding and unpacking your Sales Play matter if you want to drive growth in your business?
In this blog series, we are talking about:
We believe that if partners cannot find a way to unpack Microsoft Sales Plays, they will become frustrated. This is because Microsoft’s priorities can easily feel misaligned with their own business priorities. And if you want to be seen in the eyes of Microsoft, you need that alignment. This is one of the keys to becoming an Investible Partner.
Let’s break it down. Here are the four key challenges you face when you do not understand your Sales Play.
Each year when Microsoft decides its priorities for the next financial year, many partners look at them and think: those are Microsoft’s priorities, not mine.
What this does is lock out the opportunity of investments you could otherwise take advantage of. Behind those priorities sits a series of investments. If you do not open yourself up to interpreting those priorities for your own business, you will continue to miss investment opportunities.
It is no secret that the Microsoft Partner ecosystem is crowded. There are many partners selling the same or similar products and services. So when a new Sales Play appears — and usually there is more than one — you start questioning whether you should navigate toward that new focus.
Inside the business, you are already trying to decide where to apply your skills, attention, and energy. Being presented with a whole list of new Sales Plays only adds another layer of distraction.
Just as the seasons change, Microsoft’s priorities change too. Microsoft makes these decisions based on fiscal year, half-year, or quarterly focus areas at a particular time. If you try to keep up reactively, it can feel like you are chasing your tail and not moving forward.
With all of the above combined, you can start to feel that even if you put time, energy, and resources into understanding the Sales Plays, there is still no real guarantee things will change for your business. There is no guarantee that simply getting behind Microsoft’s Sales Plays will automatically create growth.
Now, that is the bad news. But it is not all bad news. Because if you get this right, you can turn that frustration into opportunity.
Now that we have covered the challenges, it is time to understand how partners benefit from unpacking Microsoft Sales Plays and understanding them in more detail.
If you unpack Sales Plays in the right way, you can unlock much more opportunity for your business. Why? Because Microsoft’s investments are aligned to Sales Play priorities. Those investment priorities then become another opportunity you can leverage to grow your business.
Once unpacked, you gain the insight to align the skills and capability you have today and identify the gaps you may need to fill. This lets you look for immediate short-term opportunities first, and then decide where to invest your time, energy, resources, skills, and capability over time.
It is not about aligning to a future capability you do not have yet. It is about aligning to what you can execute on today, and then building the skill set you need for the future.
When opportunities are unpacked and you understand where your skills and capability align, you gain the ability to analyze and decide quickly.
If you have a repeatable process to unpack Sales Plays in your business, you then have a simple way to analyze which ones are relevant and right for you, your business, and your target market. Then it becomes much easier to decide where you want to spend your time, energy, and attention.
If you get this right, you create alignment that will help your business grow. You do not want distraction — you want alignment to the Sales Play that will genuinely benefit your business and help it grow.
If the above feels familiar, keep an eye out for the next article, “The four keys to Sales Play Clarity,” to understand the things you can do in your business today that will help you unpack your Sales Play and take advantage of your partnership with Microsoft.
If you want to know more about how Partner Elevate helps with this, check out the Sales Play On-Ramp™ program. If you would rather talk to someone directly, you can also book a meeting.