Accelerate the Salesforce Partner Ecosystem in the Middle East
The Salesforce Partner Ecosystem continues to expand year-on-year globally, with huge potential for collaboration across all regions. The Middle East is one of the fastest-growing regions within the emerging markets for Salesforce, and one where we have been operating for over ten years. It’s a region where we rely heavily on our partner ecosystem to help us establish a regional presence and enable us to deliver our world-class solutions to end customers whilst driving ongoing customer success.
To learn more about the opportunity and relationships that we’re seeing in this area, we spoke with Mukesh Kumar, Alliance & Channels Director, and Bar Israeli, ISV Principal Partner Manager for the region. They shared insights about the challenges and opportunities for partners in the Middle East, as well as how to build strong relationships.
“It is a side-by-side relationship, where we provide the international experience and the partners provide the creative feedback and ideas,” said Israeli. “Together, we are developing a thriving ecosystem to serve our customers in more personalised and innovative ways.”
The Opportunities for Partners in the Middle East Market
Currently, there are more than 70 partners in the Middle East region, and a similar number in Israel territory as well, including both consulting and ISV partners. This number is growing year on year, with exciting potential for existing and new Salesforce partners.
“When it comes to the Middle East market, historically we have been most successful in the UAE and Israel due to an early adoption of Salesforce products by many large organizations. We also see great potential across the rest of the Gulf countries, with huge opportunities emerging from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain. This presents a great opportunity and need for Salesforce partners on the ground to help maximize growth,” said Kumar.
Right now, Salesforce has only scratched the surface of the huge potential in this very exciting market. In fact, a recent IDC study indicated that Salesforce and its ecosystem of partners will create $2.6 billion in new business revenues and 11,000 new jobs in the UAE by 2024.
Talent Challenges
It’s a region not without challenges. ”Partners tell us there’s an overall lack of Salesforce skills in the Middle East. This, of course, gives partners some specific challenges — either they need to recruit from outside the region or they need to develop and certify new talent locally.” said Kumar.
To help tackle this challenge, we recently launched the Salesforce Talent Alliance, a global program that enables partners to connect with Salesforce-certified candidates and bring new talent into the ecosystem. Salesforce also supports partner-led initiatives in the region, such as She-Force Program in Israel or Women In Digital UAE, a program to empower and upskill UAE women in Artificial Intelligence, Robotic Process Automation, Salesforce, and other digital technologies.
In the last 12 months, Salesforce partner certifications grew by an impressive 47% across the Middle East region. A continued focus on building talent and certifications means that we are better equipped as an ecosystem to support our customers in this region.
Strong Collaboration is Key
For new partners thinking about joining the ecosystem in the Middle East, you’re never alone — there are plenty of established ways in which we collaborate.
Kumar recommends “Our Middle East Partner Network Group within the Salesforce Partner Community platform is a good place to start your engagement with other partners in the region.” The community allows us to share product updates; announcements, events, and access to Salesforce specialists. It also enables Salesforce partners to collaborate with partners in other strategic areas of Salesforce including Tableau and Mulesoft. “Together, we’re a formidable ecosystem, offering customers 360-degree expertise across all our platforms and wide product portfolio,” said Kumar.
Additionally, in normal circumstances, we meet annually at Salesforce Basecamp Dubai or Basecamp Israel. These are great places where partners can gather together to showcase their Salesforce solutions to our customers. This year we’ll be running a virtual Salesforce Live Israel on the 14th September and Salesforce Live Middle East event on 30th September 2020, so stay tuned for an announcement and look forward to a more socially distanced get together.
We’re also committed to recognizing the great work being done by partners in the Middle East region. At the recently held Annual Middle East Partner Awards, we highlighted some amazing use cases that deserved recognition, based upon evaluation criteria consisting of revenue contribution, certified resources, and customer success.
Give a virtual round of applause to the following award recipients:
- Middle East Rising Star Non-UAE: CloudzLab
- Middle East Rising Star in UAE: Emakina
- Middle East Top SMB (Small/Medium Business) Partner: 4C
- Middle East Top CBU (Commercial Business) Partner: Smaartt
- Middle East Top EBU (Enterprise Business) Partner: Accenture
- Middle East Top Partner Initiative: Cloudworks
- And finally, Middle East Partner of the Year: PwC
Ready to Join?
“Our existing partners in the Middle East never cease to amaze us in the fantastic work they do. The talent, the projects, the output, and the deliverables are truly remarkable and we look forward to our continued collaboration in this region,” said Israeli.
Our partner ecosystem is providing guidance and solutions for organizations of all sizes and across industries to return to the workplace safely, and there is enormous potential with the recent launch of Work.com solutions. These solutions and the Work.com platform is designed to help businesses reopen the workplace as quickly as possible while helping to keep employees, customers, partners, and communities safe and informed during the COVID-19 crisis and beyond.
If you’re thinking of joining the Salesforce Partner Ecosystem, we would be delighted to have you as part of our Ohana family. Here are three recommendations to help you to succeed from Kumar and Israeli:
- “Customers are increasingly asking us for evidence of strong vertical experience and we expect the UAE’s digital economic growth and job creation to be strong across financial services, manufacturing, retail, communications and media, healthcare and life sciences, and government.”
- “Focus on what expertise you can bring to the ecosystem that is not currently being addressed. This is your unique value.”
- “If you have a strong Go-to-Market strategy and are well connected in the region, this is a plus.”
We thank our ecosystem for their dedication to this region’s success and we look forward to working with the next wave of innovators.
