Letter from the Editor: How to Build a Community

I’ve been the editor at The VAR Guy for about three months now. I’m not new to writing about tech, but I am quite new to writing about the channel. So I place tremendous value on opportunities to learn such as the annual Channel Visionaries conference provided me last week. The quality of the presentations there and the authenticity of the conversations were remarkable. Channel leaders from a wide range of vendors opened up and engaged in very frank discussion of the challenges today’s channel ecosystem is facing.

The overwhelming theme of the two-day conference in Santa Clara was that of transformation, in both vendors’ and partners’ businesses. It seems like everything is in a state of transition. On the technology front, the rise of cloud, mobile and converged systems means everyone is rethinking their solutions mix. The demographics of the channel are changing, too.  Jay McBain, CEO at channeleyes, pointed out in his opening remarks that 40 percent of channel partners will be retiring in the next eight years. By 2024, 75 percent of the channel will be millennials, with their social values and social media, their flextime and BYOD addiction. And where technological advances and generational paradigm shifts occur simultaneously, there always is an evolution in business models. Today, the entire channel is struggling to find its footing as we move away from one-time sales and hardware-based revenue streams to recurring revenue enabled by the new as-a-service ecosystem.

Here at Penton Tech, we're going through the same thing, asking the same types of hard questions. Who are our readers today? How do they consume content? What are the pain points they turn to us to educate them on? Are we still relevant to our partners? Are our partners still the right partners?

We have a lot of questions, and there’s a lot we’re not sure of. But over the last three months since I’ve entered this space, there’s one thing that’s become absolutely clear: Citizens of this crazy little world called the channel are hungry for the exact type of conversations we’ve had here the last two days.

On both the vendor and the partner sides, in sales, marketing, development, operations, finance—we’re all feeling our way, and we’re all searching for our place in this space in transition. What’s our identity? Like Janet Schjins, VP of Global Channels at Verizon, talked about last week, what is the essence of our brand, and how can we cultivate it, manage it and share it?

But just as importantly, who are our people? We have an opportunity to take an active role in shaping the channel community of tomorrow, and it all starts with dialogue.

That’s where Penton comes in. We are so eager to tell your stories and provide a platform for partners, distributors, vendors and consultants to get to know each other in a meaningful way. What about channel IT gets you excited to wake up in the morning? What frustrates the hell out of you?

What is the one thing you wish you could make everyone understand? Where are your decisions backed by data, and which are really just flat out guesses?

People are nervous. There’s a lot to be nervous about. During every big transformation, some people are left behind. That’s the nature of change, and it’s scary.

But there’s a lot to be excited about, too. And I’m here to tell you that one of the best ways to get people excited about you is through effective storytelling. Share your stories. That’s how to build a brand…and how to build a community. In the spirit of the dialogue we had at Channel Visionaries last week, I encourage you to reach out to me, too. If you have something to say, we have so many different ways to get your voice heard.

Near the end of the conference, Sal Patalano of Lenovo Software spoke about the concept of Vuja De, of looking at things we do every single day and trying to see them in a new, creative way. It really hit home, because that’s what we’re all engaged in, or it should be: reinvention. This is the exact concept we want to embrace at Penton. We want to make history, not repeat it. Do something different. Be creative. Be meaningful.

If you have a story to share, email me at kris.blackmon@penton.com.