Pure Storage revamps partner program to focus on profitability and growth

“You need to make money as a partner and Pure Storage is obsessed with ensuring our partners are profitable,” says Andrew Fisher, Area Vice President, Partners, APJ at Pure Storage.

Recognized as a leader eleven times by Gartner Magic Quadrant, Pure Storage continues to provide customers with the best storage requirements needed. The data storage and technology provider has now updated its Reseller Partner Program to significantly increase the profitability opportunity for partners by enabling them to lead customers to successful data storage transformation and superior business outcomes.

According to Andrew Fisher, Area Vice President, Partners, APJ at Pure Storage (Pure), the upgraded partner program comes at a time when consumption-based models and the increased, accelerated adoption of AI are driving shifts in the IT landscape.

At the same time, as the opportunity to replace hard disk with flash continues to increase, the program equips partners with the tools to address customers’ most pressing data storage requirements and tailor the Pure Storage Platform to address solution-specific use cases – including AI and cyber resilience.

“We're seeing huge opportunities come our way in AI. We're working with our partners on opportunities that we would not previously have seen in the market. Our partner program this year is built around enabling partners to tell the story of how Pure's platform creates a powerful AI infrastructure for their partners and their customers,” said Fisher.

In cybersecurity, Fisher added that there is a demand in the market for storage for recovery and backup, which Pure fits perfectly into. Fisher highlighted markets like India in particular have shown growth in storage for cybersecurity. There are also challenges in hybrid cloud adoption and modernization which Pure believes provides a unique opportunity for partners to focus on this year.

A more focused partner program

Given that customers are facing greater storage and computing requirements than ever before, the program will enable Pure Storage and its partners to help customers modernize their data storage needs to tackle these requirements and challenges head-on. The elevated partner program also reaffirms Pure Storage’s commitment to drive shared success together with its partners.

“This is not an evolution. This is a step change. We've taken the step change because the market has moved so fast this year. Our portfolio, our platform has grown, but also the market has moved in this new space around cybersecurity and certainly around AI. So, we've had to move our organization's focus, and our partners focus and their enablement with it,” said Fisher.

As part of the Pure Storage Reseller Partner Program, Pure is introducing new solution-oriented training designed to address the changing needs of the market and to empower both individuals and organizations. This enhanced training and enablement equips partners with the resources they need to drive greater profitability and growth.

According to Fisher, partners can take advantage of solution-oriented, on-demand courses and in-person technical boot camps to enhance proficiencies. With access to expanded content and practical tools, partners can enhance their role as trusted advisors in the industry and build even deeper customer relationships. Additionally, the program outlines new incentives and rebates with a focus on accelerating customer transition to the Pure Storage Platform.

“We've actually reduced the amount of time it will take to do each individual certification and have increased the number available to them. It's entirely opt in. For example, if you’re a partner that focuses on cybersecurity and want to be involved in our solution around cybersecurity, you take that track. You are not required to do 1, 2, 3, or 4, or certainly any, any of the other more auxiliary ones. If you think about it in the past, we tried to take a person on the full journey. Now we're taking a person on the opt-in components that they wish to do so each one of those tracks is substantially faster than the total previous training requirement,” explained Fisher.

Fisher added that Pure’s partners are very excited about taking up this training as it allows them to come as close to the way they're selling as it reduces their overhead costs.

The latest enhancements to the Pure Storage Reseller Partner Program also deliver unparalleled earning potential, offering partners a game-changing opportunity to accelerate their market impact by driving competitive replacements and adoption of the Pure Storage Platform.

Fisher mentioned that partners can now benefit from enriched rewards and rebates tailored to maximize profitability, in recognition of their role in delivering transformative solutions to customers.

“We've made the decision to pass on significantly more of our profit back to partners. For the first time ever, we've taken a structured step-based payment and a front end and back-end rebate program to our partners. Traditionally we would have had a more “peanut butter spread”, or a more “blanket-based” approach. We are now going to be rewarding our partners for being excellent in those solutions. Those particularly orientated go to market conversations, they'll be able to stack those on top of each other to achieve quite substantial margins in addition to the effort. Now, this does not come at the cost of the customer, which I think is vital, that's coming out of Pure's pockets,” explained Fisher.

He added that Pure is also raising the bar a little as well.

“We're asking our partners to step into this new world, and they're going to have to do some work, and that's okay. We're not afraid of asking them to do that, and our partners have responded exceptionally well to the requests. But the rewards are going to be far more substantial for them,” added Fisher.

Improving partner capabilities

The new and updated partner-facing tools help the program stand out as one of the most comprehensive and partner-focused in the industry. Partners gain access to unique resources that only Pure Storage offers such as:

• Pure Partner Intelligence: Partners can leverage real-time insights and analytics to identify growth opportunities within their install base, driving proactive expansions and renewals.
• Pure Realize: Partners can elevate customer conversations with use-case proposals, price quotes, and solution expertise for targeted business challenges, differentiating themselves as solution providers.
• New Digital Partner Master Services Agreement (DPMSA) process: Partners can deliver a highly automated and efficient experience for customer upgrades, expansions, and renewals. The automated digital experience through the Pure1® platform enables quote requests, purchase orders, and installations in a fraction of the time it takes with other data storage competitors.
• Continued Operational Enhancements: Partners can expect a redesigned partner portal, and new CPQ tooling which will introduce guided selling for partners and more updates to increase sales velocity and partner autonomy later this fiscal year.

“ There's probably been more money spent this year than an aggregate of the company's history on tooling and enablement, and we know that our partners are excellent. We know that they can provide the right level of advice and service to their customers. We are creating and have created these tools that are now available in real time for our partners today, using AI and using our own intelligence platforms,” added Fisher.

He also believes the updated program will see partners move a lot faster and be more self-enabled. This means partners would be able “to share the story of Pure without necessarily having to come back to us all the time.”

“You need to make money as a partner and Pure is obsessed with ensuring our partners are profitable,” concluded Fisher.