Launch Central for U.S. Partners : heroes

Is Launch Central Everything You Thought It Would Be?

dianeja — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 01:44:00 GMT

At a recent team offsite, I was thrilled to see the words "Launch Central" in a slide presented to us by a partner of the resources he considered to be critical for his company's success. A colleague and I came up with the Launch Central idea almost three years ago in preparation for the launch extravaganza of Vista, Office, and Exchange. We wanted to create a memorable phrase that we could use on the partner portal and in our newsletters; I added the blog a few months ago as yet another touchpoint. Today, it's become second nature for people to ask how to add information about their launch so that partners are aware of the resources.

Lately, though, I feel like we aren't quite toeing the line in utilizing Launch Central as well as we can. Sure, we have information about Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) and Windows Essential Server Solutions, both families of products launching later this year. We have retained the information about our Unified Communications Launch and our recent "Heroes Happen Here" launch of Windows Server 2008, SLQ Server 2008, and Visual Studio 2008. We have content in our Monday morning partner newsletters and in this blog. But it still feels like we may not be meeting your needs for staying informed, aware, and active when it comes to our product launches.

I'd like to ask your advice. If Launch Central were yours to maintain, and you just wanted to keep the information flowing through the partner portal via the home page (https://partner.microsoft.com/us), Launch Central page, newsletters, and blog, what would your game plan be? What's missing that you'd like to see? Are there other vehicles or efforts you'd leverage? You are welcome to post your comments on this blog, or you can send me e-mail through the blog. If you want to be truly anonymous, you can use our Rate This Page functionality on the Launch Central page (https://partner.microsoft.com/US/salesmarketingsection/smcampaigns/launchcentral) and tell us your thoughts there.

I'm looking forward to hearing from you!

Diane Golshan, Sr. Marketing Manager, US Partner Group

The Server & Tools Launch events are going strong – Jump in and exhibit at one of the remaining cities or hold your own launch event!

kevinpr — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 01:58:00 GMT

The US Server & Tools 60 city launch tour kicked in the beginning of March and is half way done and continues to drive great momentum for Windows Server 2008, Visual Studio 2008 and SQL 2008. Customer feedback has been absolutely great at these events and the partners who have been exhibitors are having a great experience. The feedback that we are getting from partners includes;

· “Great event – we loved seeing our customers in person rather than email! Microsoft knows how to throw a great event!”

· “Good show; high quality leads. We expect the leads generated to pay for our participation.”

· Thrilled to have captured over 1k leads by 10am!

· GREAT event! TONS of people and we’re really impressed with the quality and numbers. Thank you!

For additional information regarding US Launch Event sponsorship packages you can go to https://launch2008.eventpoint.com/public/partnerinfo.aspx to view sponsorship details and remaining cities.

If you are wanting to hold your own launch event, we have also developed the “Launch in a Box” to enable partners to host their own launch events and build the sales funnel by providing customers insight on the Server & Tools products. The “Launch-in-a-Box” provides everything partners need from demand generation materials to drive registration, the event presentation and a event kit with the latest software. You can access the "Launch in a Box" via www.microsoftpartnerevents.com.

Both of these approaches are a great way to ensure that you are building your pipeline and capitalizing on the Server & Tools Launch opportunity.

Kevin Price

Senior Marketing Manager - US Partner Group

Keep Riding the Server & Tools Launch Wave!

dianeja — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 20:57:00 GMT

The official launch of Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 took place on Feb. 27^th in Los Angeles – and kicked off the Server & Tools launch wave.

In the US alone, we will be holding 60 launch events where we will be reaching more than 75,000 people in person--and more than a million people via the online Virtual Launch Event.

The theme of the launch, “Heroes Happen Here,” highlights the outstanding work that IT professionals, developers and partners do every day to create solutions and cutting-edge applications that keep global commerce and industry running. We’re proud to make our customers and partners the focal point of this launch – and make visible their untold stories of IT heroism.

The launch also represents a major milestone on the road to Dynamic IT – Microsoft’s initiative to help customers optimize their people, processes and technology – and in turn, position IT as a strategic asset for the business. These new products help customers more efficiently and securely manage their entire infrastructure and move to a virtualized environment – while also delivering business intelligence and next-generation web experiences that drive business results.

To help partners capitalize on the launch opportunity, we have centralized all of the resources you need on the Launch Central page of the Microsoft US partner portal to provide you a single destination.

Some of the resources you will find on Launch Central include:

Ø Partner Sponsorship Opportunities for the Launch Events

Ø Sales & Technical Training

Ø Demand Generation materials with the Launch related Ready-to-Go Campaigns

This is truly an exciting launch! We encourage you to continue to take advantage of the resources we've made available to our valued partners.

Sincerely,

Kevin Price

Server & Tools Launch Lead

US Partner Group