Fortinet has announced a series of channel initiatives that support the company’s ongoing objective of creating value for, and getting commitment from, its resellers and distributors internationally. Those additional programs and tools focus on education, profit and proximity, to help increase the expertise and profitability of Fortinet’s channel partners across the EMEA and APAC regions.
The three key areas around which Fortinet developed its new channel initiatives are:
- Education: Fortinet’s new Authorised Training Centers (ATCs) program is designed to provide additional sales benefits to existing ATCs and foster the presence of ATCs at the local level. This selective program evaluates the performance and commitment of each ATC and requires the provision of highly qualified instructors. The objective is to help increase the product expertise of Fortinet’s reseller community through access to localized training on Fortinet’s solutions portfolio. As part of its education strategy, Fortinet also developed a series of marketing tools, which include free online webinars and targeted channel communications depending on the partner’s status and product specialization. In particular, the ‘40-minute’ quarterly program is specifically designed to educate Fortinet partners on new products and channel tools as well as IT security trends.
- Profit: the introduction of the deal registration tool aims at protecting channel partners who actively identify new business opportunities and comprehensively share them with Fortinet. With that automated tool, resellers are encouraged to further take leadership on sales opportunities while, in exchange, benefit from Fortinet sales and technical support knowledge to help close deals faster. Fortinet has also developed a simple and intuitive Web-based interface, the Renewal asset tracking tool, designed to help resellers identify renewal income opportunities through: unit and subscription services tracking; view on FortiCare™/FortiGuard® contracts information; and identification of upgrade/upsell opportunities.
- Proximity: the recently launched Fortinet mobile application* gives partners easy access to Fortinet’s product information and threat research updates, at the touch of a button, anywhere and anytime. Developed for the Apple iPhone and Google Android operating systems, the application includes: a search engine to access full product information; a FortiGate® identification tool to help find the right device according to the client’s specific security requirements; a partner and Fortinet office locator (with ‘Around Me’ option); and access to the FortiGuard® Security Center for real-time updates on the latest global threat levels and the Top 10 threats list (according to main regions and malware types). In order to provide enhanced local support and service to its channel, Fortinet has created a new Distributor RMA program that aims to encourage distributors to act as local RMA centers in order to provide best-class delivery, including next business day delivery, to Fortinet’s resellers. Fortinet has also implemented local toll free numbers in most countries of EMEA and APAC regions to facilitate partner service and support.
“Fortinet sells exclusively through its channel partners. Pursuing our goal of becoming the leading network security vendor, it is thus paramount that we keep improving our channel strategy in order to foster the business opportunities of our resellers and distributors,” said Emilio Roman, vice president of international sales operations at Fortinet. “Today’s channel initiatives are designed to help further support our resellers and reward our high-value partners, who truly invest in our brand, technology and products.”
