Market Entry

The client was a leading software vendor. It had a new security solution it was looking to take to market. It had previously sold direct and was keen to investigate how to recruit a channel to expand the product’s reach in key global markets.

How we helped

Canalys was selected for its expertise in analyzing go-to-market strategies, its partner program research, and its experience in security market analysis.

• Expert partner interviews: Canalys ran an online survey on Candefero to understand partners’ perception of security products and solutions. It also asked how partners looked to add additional security vendors to their portfolios. Canalys also conducted free-flowing interviews with partners. Each 30-minute interview covered the main topics as agreed with client: what type of security is sold, how do partners add additional vendors to their portfolios, what they expect from a new vendor, etc.
• Security market analysis: Canalys used data from its Security Analysis service to help size the market, show the primary routes to market for security products and rate the overall size of the security partner community.

Client outcome

Canalys showed the client the market opportunity as well as the size of partner community. It was able to articulate the challenges of building a channel from scratch (and countering the previous direct heritage). It explained how to build an initial group of partners to seed the market, before moving to build a partner program. It facilitated introductions to a small number of target partners.