ShoreTel aims for championship
Vendor looks to crack high-end market with range of new channel initiatives
IP communications vendor ShoreTel has launched a new high-touch sales team and a revamped channel programme to help realise its plans of breaking into the enterprise space.
The new Champion Partner Programme incorporates three levels: Authorised, Silver and Gold. Entry-level Authorised resellers will need to sell $60,000 worth of ShoreTel products per year and have at least one accredited sales person, one techie and one demo unit.
Silver partners must transact $300,000 per annum, and Gold partners $600,000, with the number of qualified staff and demo units rising to two and three respectively. Back-end rebates have been introduced, with Silver and Gold partners able to claim back 10 per cent-plus of quarterly sales.
John Howard, EMEA managing director of the vendor, said: "Our programme was very much focused around the SMB and mid-market; this takes us into a programme that allows partners to sell into the SMB, mid-market and enterprise, and get rewarded, not on volume, but on skill level.
"We will selectively look at adding partners that can sell things like fixed-mobile convergence and enterprise contact centre."
The vendor has brought in a high-touch enterprise sales team in the UK to help drive blue-chip business. Howard claimed ShoreTel has already made great strides in making its name heard above the market giants.
"We have made amazing progress from when I took over this role 18 months ago," he added. "Then, it was still difficult for CIOs to take ShoreTel to the board. Now, we have that credibility."
Darren Boyce, chief executive of ShoreTel partner Proximity Communications, praised the vendor's strategy of rewarding partners for customer satisfaction.
"ShoreTel will get into the enterprise by using the strength of its partners," he added. "It will be a slowly-but-surely approach, rather than going all guns blazing."