Susanne Dansey’s Blog

As a Small Business Specialist in the UK, you may have received an email from the SBSC programme team. For those who have yet to read it, here is a brief summary:

• As of 25 October, the ‘Premium’ status (only available in the UK) will be removed from the Small Business Specialist programme.
• Content previously available ONLY to Premium parties will now be made available to all UK SBSC members
• Other fringe benefits such as the marketing bureau and Microsoft Financing will also expire
• Any partner wishing to take the Accelerated Sales & Profitability in the Small Business Channel course will be able to use their exam pass credits towards the Microsoft Business School.
• All benefits to SBSC partners will be reviewed in order to ensure you receive relevant support where needed.
• An online Licensing Clinic will be made available shortly as well as Campaign Builder and Managed Newsgroups (which offers break-fix support)

Those who have used the Premium content will hopefully have seen the benefits but it is my opinion that this it wasn’t enough justify going that extra mile.

I believe that Microsoft’s decision to provide universal SBSC access to previous Premium content is a sensible move because the Community were beginning to scratch their heads over what value the ‘blue badge’ actually offered. Tools like these should be available to everyone so that all business partners get the chance to move forward. Some of us were lucky enough to afford the time to take the ‘exam’ but that alone doesn’t make us of a Premium calibre.

New services such as the Managed Newsgroups give real value to the Small Business Specialist. To attain this accreditation, you need an MCP, and those who qualify tend not to reach for the marketing collateral as a way to do better business. Whilst this content is of a high standard, for those smaller partners who are finding it hard to make the time to stand still, creating more administrative tasks such as reading/watching Flash demos isn’t always practical.

Managed Newsgroups help answer real-time problems and issues that we deal with on a daily basis. If these newsgroups help reduce the time spend trouble shooting, then hopefully there is more time available to plan other business activities. If you can make time, I would recommend that you book yourself on to the FREE marketing training that the Microsofties are offering - it should give you further insight into how you can engage with customers better with tools already on hand to support you.

For the larger SBSC partners, access to the Microsoft Business School (more on this soon) is a great way to encourage learning and understanding for those who want to continue with their personal development. It’s one thing to give someone a presentation, but if they don’t know what to do with the information then it is wasted in the long term…

The trade off on our ‘fringe benefits’ for programmes that are more comprehensive is also a good move. At the end of the day, a programme is only as good as it’s adoption. So far, pitching the benefits of the partner directory and the blue badge are still to be realised by most but I know that the change in direction by the SBSC team would not have been an easy one and will no doubt be in the best interests of their partners.

A partner programme must be one that offers real business benefits, to date, not many small businesses out there understand why they should be turning to a Small Business Specialist for help. In fact, the community itself has done a better job of promoting this because of the time and commitment members have already shown to the programme. I believe that good things are still to come and it is decisions such as this one that keep my faith in the SBSC Think Tank over at Thames Valley.

So most of us aren’t sure about what we need to do to re-accredit, some of us have seen big benefits from the Blue Badge whilst others aren’t quite sure. Guys such as Robbie and Dave have worked hard to lay the foundations for us, and with Microsoft’s new financial year, there should be plenty of budget for us to get some real business value. That tied with the big buzz around Vista (show us how to sell it to small businesses guys!), Office 2007, and Exchange should help get Microsoft focusing more on their SMB partners in late 2006/2007.

Just remember that the SBSC accreditation isn’t your passport to your business future. The Blue Badge is another string to your bow. As the archer, you need to know how to locate your target, focus and steady your aim, and hit the target effectively - nobody’s going to fire it for you.