Table of Contents

Sales and Marketing

The tools and means mentioned in this section are available for you to support your Sales and Marketing activities.

Prepare your staff to excel

For starters, it is important to properly inform and train all your customer-facing staff (e.g. sales, pre-sales, marketing, product marketing, etc.).

Typically, this is achieved with a tailored program of online sessions, adjusted to the partnership type and aligned with your specific strategy and goals. Typical sessions are based on presentations, demos, and Q&A moments. They include:

  • Partnership positioning: A joint presentation with Q&A, aimed at the involved staff and leaders, on the nature, goals, and objectives of the partnership. This is intended to ensure full alignment and to provide practical information such as points of contact.

  • General introduction of DataMiner: Comprehensive outline of the overall vision of DataMiner, platform architecture, logical architecture, platform functions, features and capabilities, etc.

  • Selling DataMiner solutions:

    • Overview of the various DataMiner licensing options and pricing structure.

    • Training on how to scope, budget, and sell DataMiner solutions.

    • Explanation of the typical sales process for a DataMiner solution, specific policies that may apply, the dos and don’ts, and the various tools and options available to support the process (e.g. Dojo Community).

  • Use case specific presentations & demos: DataMiner supports an unlimited number of use cases, across a broad range of different industry verticals. Depending on your specific business and line of activities, Skyline subject matter experts can host in-depth sessions on all key related use cases and applications.

  • Sales meet & greet: As networking and people in general are instrumental in a successful collaboration, it is important for the right people to get introduced to one another so that they can establish a strong ongoing relationship (e.g. it is important for regional sales people to be connected to their peer at Skyline).

Leverage the brand

DataMiner is one of the biggest brands in the industry and has a powerful presence in thousands of leading organizations, across more than 110 countries around the world.

These are all organizations that crave added-value DataMiner services and solution offerings. As a partner, you can capitalize on that. It is a quick way to jumpstart your business.

Making yourself and your offering stand out is the foundation for your success.

Here are some pointers to maximize your visibility.

  • Press releases and other content: Ensure that you have a steady stream of press releases, news items, blog posts, and updates going your contacts’ way.

    These could revolve around the signing of a partner agreement, successful certification of your staff, new projects that you have secured, highlighting an innovative use case/workflow that you have implemented, your attendance to industry events, opinion pieces showing your leadership and guiding people in the new world paradigms, etc.

    Note that you have the option to apply for a joint press release with Skyline at all times, which will further boost your reach.

  • Dojo Partner Profile: The DataMiner Dojo Community is the largest open online community of its kind and offers you tremendous opportunity and visibility thanks to the thousands of people involved with DataMiner across thousands of organizations.

    For starters, make sure that you have an appealing and up-to-date Partner Profile available on Dojo.

    Furthermore, through the DataMiner DevOps Professional Program, you will also receive plenty of opportunity to further grow your exposure and build up leadership identity (e.g. publication of blog posts, use cases, etc.).

  • Leverage all your channels: Ensure that you leverage the DataMiner brand across all your channels, including your corporate website, social media, email signatures, etc.

    Focus on your DataMiner and general associated expertise and contributions. You can consider things like structured pages and leaflets on the services or solutions you offer, or blog posts giving center stage to leadership.

    You could also take on smaller opportunities such as:

  • Events: Exhibitions, conferences, and private events are all still very effective at informing, educating, and empowering people.

    Make sure that you contribute to events Skyline is attending. Your involvement can include the promotion of these events and Skyline’s attendance, but these events can also create the opportunity to schedule joint meetings with your customers and prospects to educate them on the latest and greatest DataMiner has to offer.

    However, as a partner, there is also an expectation that you participate yourself in public or private events and that your DataMiner-related offering takes a prominent position in those. You can contact Skyline for extra support with these events.

    This support can range from joint announcements, to support through DataMiner demo systems and setups, all the way to support staffing if needed (e.g. technical staff to support your demos and meetings, speakers, etc.). Note that private events these days are also instrumental to engage and empower a user community and that Skyline is available to support those.

  • Show leadership: Showing leadership and expertise and delivering added value beyond regular product or service marketing is table stakes these days.

    As a DataMiner Partner, you invest in this, and Skyline will support you. This could include, for example, online webinars or LinkedIn Live sessions on a variety of topics, ranging from general topics to specific use cases, product or solution updates.

    For this purpose, you can find a variety of resources on the DataMiner Dojo Community platform. You can take advantage of Skyline’s content and online events, or organize your own events where Skyline can join you.

  • Brand Materials: A variety of standard off-the-shelf brand materials are available for you to leverage the DataMiner brand (corporate materials, skylicons, etc.).

Day-to-day engagement

Considering the multitude of applications and the infinite number of solutions supported by DataMiner, the broad range of verticals covered, and the strategic selling aspect of the platform, Skyline typically collaborates very closely with its partners during the pre-sales phase to maximize success.

Therefore, partners are highly encouraged to align with this collaborative mindset and to fully leverage the expertise of Skyline. Typical available activities and tools include:

  • General DataMiner introduction: When DataMiner is introduced to a new prospect, it is important that the solution is properly contextualized and pitched, in line with the specific expectations that the prospect may have.

    Skyline is available to conduct both online and on-site introductory presentations and demonstrations on DataMiner. A typical outcome of this phase would be that specific use cases are identified that can then be converted into tangible opportunities to start the sales cycles for the account.

  • Use case specific presentations and demonstrations: Once a prospect is narrowed in on a specific use case, you can rely on the unique expertise within the Skyline team across different market verticals to explain and demonstrate to the prospect how DataMiner can deliver a solution for their specific needs.

    This then typically forms the basis for first opportunities and to start the scoping of a solution for the prospect.

  • Scoping & quoting: Skyline can support your sales teams with both the scoping and quoting of specific solutions for specific opportunities.

  • Formal RFx responses: When it comes to larger and more formal engagements, Skyline is typically closely involved by assisting, e.g. responding to formal requirements, providing attestations, etc.

  • Expert support: Your teams can consult a wide range of subject matter experts at Skyline to support your sales process (e.g. our Security Analysts can support you in discussions on that specific topic, System Architects can support you on the various architecture options, etc.).

  • Proof of concept: In some cases, more customer-specific technical engagements may be required. Skyline can also support your teams in this, albeit under very specific terms and conditions that need to be agreed upon.

  • F2F sales peer business reviews: Considering the nature of a platform such as DataMiner, continuous close collaboration is key. Therefore, we typically encourage peers across the operation at both ends of the organizations to align on a regular basis.

  • Dojo Community: DataMiner Dojo is by far the most dynamic open community of its kind.

    It provides a wealth of information and tools not only catered to engineering roles, but to anybody else involved with DataMiner (e.g. sales, pre-sales, marketing, etc.). Therefore, it is highly recommended that everyone involved learns how to use this resource.

    Highlights for non-engineering roles include:

    • Q&A: The Q&A section of Dojo allows people to ask all kinds of questions and to get a fast, accurate response straight from the source, as the entire Skyline staff are active Dojo users.

    • Video library: The video library contains a wealth of video material (e.g. presentations) on a variety of topics, ranging from general topics all the way to highly specific use cases or features and capabilities of DataMiner.

    • Use case library: The use case library provides bite-sized inspiration on what can be done with the transformational power of DataMiner, for a variety of different market verticals and applications.

  • Ziine DataMiner demo platform: Everyone with a dataminer.services account (which is available to everyone, free of charge) can not only access the full content available on the DataMiner Dojo Community but can also access the Ziine DataMiner demo platform, where you can find an assortment of demos that can be leveraged to learn more about DataMiner or to provide demos to third parties.

  • Deal registration: Under specific terms and conditions, Skyline also provides the option to register deals, which then provides partners with protection for opportunities that they have developed and that they are working on.

    We recommend that you become familiar with the process of register deals and use them to secure a return on your business development efforts.

  • Professional services referrals: Subject to specific terms and conditions related to technical qualifications and certification, partners can be eligible to get referrals from Skyline to specific DataMiner projects or accounts where professional services are required for the design, development, and deployment of solutions based on DataMiner.

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