GFI claims price cuts will boost recruitment

SME security vendor GFI Software has claimed its decision to slash the price of its software packages by up to 45 per cent has bolstered its channel recruitment drive.

Despite admitting its 2,200 UK resellers were initially nervous that cuts would hit their margins, GFI said the move has been positive for the channel.

In February, GFI slashed the price of its flagship anti-spam software by 45 per cent and its other packages by between 20 and 30 per cent in an attempt to regain its reputation for being cost effective.

Adam Bazeley, EMEA sales director at GFI, said: “In the UK, our target was to add 50 resellers this quarter and in the past three weeks we have had applications from 22 resellers.

“The price reduction has been compensated by the increase in volumes and this is positive for our
partner channel,” he added.

GFI claimed its discounts are among the industry’s most generous, with Gold partners netting a
35 per cent margin.

The vendor also recently launched its new Partner Connecting tool, which is designed to ensure VARs get the credit for leads generated through their web sites.

Stephen Chetcuti Bonavita, director of marketing at GFI, said: “Most of our partners have web sites that link into GFI. Now, if an end user shows interest in our products we can route the lead back to the partner from whose web site they came.”

Gregory Micallef, managing director of GFI Gold partner Gregory Micallef Associates, said: “There
is now much more interest in the product, so we expect to do more than enough volume to compensate for the price drop.”