The Microsoft CSP Program Guide

Lyndsey Hoffman, Pax8 Director of Microsoft Programs
A man working at his computer using the knowledge he gained from the Microsoft CSP Program Guide from Pax8

Discover how to make more possible with Microsoft.

How well do you really know Microsoft? Whether you’re brand new to Microsoft or have been purchasing and selling it since the days of Clippy, Pax8 can help you achieve further success with the Microsoft CSP Program.

“Pax8 really takes cloud seriously. We truly feel like we have an expert when it comes to our Microsoft business.” — LAN Infotech

Enable Remote Work

The IT landscape constantly changes, and the events of 2020 showed us just how quickly MSPs and IT professionals can (or more importantly cannot) adapt to the new needs of their clients. Almost overnight, businesses had to be able to support a remote workforce and needed the right cloud products to do so.

Microsoft 365 + Teams + M365 Business Voice

Use Microsoft 365 (M365), Teams, and M365 Business Voice to virtualize the office experience and transform your clients’ employee collaboration. M365 is ideal for providing the level of productivity, collaboration, and communication employees need to do their jobs. If you need some help convincing your clients, we’ve created a comprehensive M365 selling guide.

Microsoft Teams, which is included in M365, is an easy way for team members to seamlessly collaborate and communicate across projects and departments. According to Microsoft, there were more than 115 million Microsoft Teams users in October 2020, and we know that number’s only grown!

If you need some help getting Teams up and running, our Wingman Professional Services team has put together a Teams admin training video and a white-labeled end user training video. Lastly, M365 Business Voice integrates into the M365 environment to bring together calling, meeting, and messaging in Microsoft teams, creating an all-in-one communications solution.

Secure Remote Workers

When employees are able to work from anywhere, their devices and accounts can be compromised from anywhere. Microsoft cloud services see 300 million fraudulent sign-in attempts every day! To mitigate the risks, you should make sure your clients (and more importantly you) are following internal cybersecurity best practices.

36% of organizations have dealt with a security incident due to an unsecured remote worker. — OpenVPN

M365 + Azure

Use the powerful cybersecurity and business continuity features within M365 and Azure to protect and manage your devices by providing secure collaboration tools and controlling remote access. The advanced features focus as much on internal threat protection as they do external, with multi-factor authentication (MFA), conditional access, single sign-on (SSO) with Azure Active Directory (AD), and much more. In their 2020 Global State of the Channel Ransomware Report, Datto found that 47% of MSPs say they use Azure AD for SSO.

“We were able to create redundancy in the data center with Microsoft Azure, maintaining security with Microsoft 365 Business. Being able to integrate them into Microsoft Azure enables us to own that network for them and have the same control as we would if we had an employee on-site 24/7.” — Visual Edge IT

We know the ins and outs of remote work can be a little tricky at times, but that’s why we’ve created this nifty guide to remote work that’ll help you securely enable and empower a remote workforce.

Accelerate Cloud Migration

Getting clients to move entirely over to the cloud is sometimes easier said than done. Plus, once you get them moved over to the cloud, you’ve got to make sure everything is deployed and working properly. With the right solutions, you can easily shift workforces to the cloud and achieve digital transformation.

51% of MSPs use Microsoft Azure for offsite compute and storage. — Datto

Azure + WVD/Nerdio

Coupling the power of AI and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) from Azure with Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD) from Nerdio enables you to deploy, manage, and optimize your clients’ cloud environments without leaving the couch. As you can imagine, what makes both of these solutions so powerful is their versatility.

Azure is extremely customizable, which means it can also be a bit complex, so we broke it down for you in our MSP’s Ultimate Guide to Azure. At a quick glance, WVD separates the compute environment from user devices, allowing end users to work remotely with a secure connection. You can learn more about the power of Azure and WVD with our WVD webinar on-demand.

“Pax8 has taken the stress and headaches out of Microsoft Azure deployments and made it easy for us to expand our offerings while still being able to serve our clients at the level they demand. Building out in Microsoft Azure is almost completely different than an on-premises deployment, but we have a Wingman we can trust.” — Technical Adventures

Empower with Business Apps

Even though many employees are remote, the business still needs to function like it did previously, especially sales. That’s why having customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) software that exists and operates within the cloud is essential. Research shows that 63% of businesses prefer cloud-hosted CRM systems over on-premises applications, and 35% of businesses deploy ERP through the cloud.

Dynamics 365 + Power Platform

Use Dynamics 365 to effortlessly automate workflows, build apps, and analyze data to activate digital selling and drive data-based decision-making across all departments. Power Platform modernizes processes by making it simple to build low-code/no-code apps and create visualization dashboards.

Companies that use Microsoft Dynamics 365 see a return of $16.97 for every $1 spent. — Microsoft, Nucleus Research

The Power of Pax8 + Microsoft

The possibilities are endless with Microsoft, and Pax8 wants to make sure you know about all of them so you can get the most out of your Microsoft business. We’re here to educate and enable our partners to confidently and successfully buy, sell, and manage their entire cloud tech stack.

“With Pax8, our Microsoft relationship is growing. We are able to double our profits on Microsoft sales. They helped us capitalize on strategic business, become more operationally efficient, and simplified our billing. Pax8 is moving our business forward.” — machineLOGIC

Microsoft Education & Enablement from Pax8

Education and enablement are the core pillars of the Pax8 mission. We provide a variety of resources and opportunities from white-labeled materials to on-demand and live, interactive virtual events.

1. Mission Briefings build on your Microsoft foundation to help you build a comprehensive tech stack.

2. Microsoft Bootcamps provide technical deep dives into Microsoft 365, Azure, and Dynamics 365.

Register for these Pax8 educational events here.

3. Partner Education Sessions keep partners up to speed on emerging IT trends and show how you can strengthen your cloud tech stack through standardization. The sessions focus on the topics of security, business continuity, productivity, infrastructure, network, and communications. Sign up for one of the recurring education sessions here.

4. The Pax8 Platform enables partners to seamlessly buy, sell, and manage their Microsoft and other cloud products in one place. Simply put, the Pax8 Platform simplifies your business. Now, at Pax8, we’re always innovating and looking at how we can make our partners’ experience even better. That led us to create Pax8 Pro, which has new advanced features and functions that give partners a level of multitenant visibility and business insights that’s unmatched in the industry.

“Pax8 has the best platform for buying Microsoft products, provisioning, and billing. There is nothing like it in the IT channel.” — HCS Technical Services

5. White-labeled Professional Services help reduce the burden on your team to do everything by themselves. We know some projects are too time-consuming or maybe just too hard for your team to do it alone. That’s why Pax8 partners have access to a whole team of IT experts ready to help you migrate to M365, deploy Azure, harden Microsoft security, train remote workers, and just about any other kind of project your team wants help on. Learn more about Pax8 Professional Services here.

6. 24/7 technical support ensures that our partners don’t have to wait around for a vendor to respond, or for “regular business hours” to get their problems fixed. With 24/7 support teams in both the US and the UK, we can quickly resolve Microsoft issues in-house without escalating tickets to Microsoft. In fact, we resolve 85% of support requests in-house.

7. Expertise and insights into the ever-changing Microsoft landscape from Pax8 experts help you get the most out of your Microsoft business. We show partners how to earn more margins by getting Microsoft competencies and help them optimize their incentives and rebates. Access our Microsoft CSP Incentives & Rebates Playbook to learn more.

“Pax8 knows Microsoft better than any distributor on the market today. With Pax8, we always know which rebates apply to us, product navigation, and overall value. Their expertise with Microsoft was a key consideration when moving our business to Pax8.” — machineLOGIC

8. Microsoft CSP Program Guide from Pax8 simplifies the most important things partners need to know about Microsoft and the latest updates to products and programs. Check out the guide and see what being a Pax8 partner and having a Microsoft Wingman is like.

“The Pax8 Wingman CSP Program has opened doors for us and helps us achieve our business goals without any of the hassle. Pax8 works with us to drive innovation instead of just managing IT.” — TrueIT

 

Pax8 is excited to partner with you and help take your cloud business to the next level! We know you can get your Microsoft and cloud products anywhere, but you won’t find anything close to the experience of having a Wingman with the other guys.

See for yourself the reasons MSPs are switching to Pax8. If you’re ready to further your cloud business, schedule a call with a Microsoft Wingman. If you didn’t access it earlier, now’s also the perfect time to get the Microsoft CSP Program Guide to learn more about the power of Pax8 + Microsoft.

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