Mozy has had a busy year. This past summer, the cloud backup provider announced a rearchitected technology platform as part of its transition from device-centric to people-centric data protection. And it doubled the number of platinum partners, a goal that Darrell Gamble, director of channel sales, had set for the reseller program. Mozy also grew its overall reseller partners from 5,000 to 6,000.
“We’ve been excited about how many larger partners we’re bringing on,” Gamble says. “It speaks well to the programs we’ve put in place.”
Mozy by EMC Corp. is headquartered in Seattle and is part of EMC’s backup and recovery portfolio. The EMC and Mozy channel partner programs are still separate at this point, Gamble says.
Mozy’s roots are in the consumer space, but the business has evolved to about 70 percent commercial, with a strong focus on the channel, Gamble says. Recent product enhancements reflect both the shift to the business market and from device-centric to people-centric data protection in response to mobility and BYOD trends. In November 2013, Mozy announced the next generation of its cloud data protection service, which has been added to the EMC Data Protection Suite.
Gamble points to several new features that resellers like and have been asking for. For example, new API support allows partners and resellers to integrate with remote monitoring and management (RMM) or professional services automation (PSA) systems. An integrated Mozy Sync folder keeps files updated and available across multiple computers and mobile devices. And resumable backup “is key for channel partners,” he says. “A lot of the channel backs up servers.” Previously, if the backup of a large file, such as an Exchange .pst file, was interrupted, the process would have to start over. Now backup resumes where it left off. “What that’s done is decreased the amount of bandwidth required, and provided faster backup. That’s a big feature for us.”
Resellers were also telling Mozy that they “need to manage customers easier and faster.” Now with storage pooling that Mozy rolled out in August, Gamble says resellers no longer have to “individually manage machines. We’ve saved them a fair amount of time.”
More Channel Incentives and Events
Gamble says Mozy meets quarterly with its reseller advisory board of 25 to 30 members to discuss new product features and reseller program enhancements. Mozy has added several new features to the reseller program over the past year. A new incentive is the rewards program, which launched in midsummer. Resellers receive points for gigabytes of storage sold, and can redeem those points for merchandise or travel from a national catalog.
Gamble says Mozy has also been successful with co-marketing and sponsorship events this past year. “We’ve done a lot of lunch and learns with platinum resellers.” He says Mozy will continue to grow its MDF program in 2014. “We have allotted more budget. It has been fun and developed a lot of leads, and we’ve helped resellers grow their presence.”
Mozy is also continuing to work on lead share, notes Gamble. “For 2014, we are going to take incoming leads that are larger in nature and will be working with platinum partners to pass those to them.”
Growth is also an obvious goal, he says, with another double-digit growth target for the channel. He has also directed Mozy reps to spend 50 percent of their time in the field in an effort to get more face time with resellers.
In this market space, the challenge is to help resellers see the vision of cloud and how it fits into their portfolio of services, Gamble explains. “It’s all part of [reps] getting out on the road more, arming them with the right information and the right go-to-market strategy, to be true partners with the resellers.”
