Netskope Doubles QoQ Growth on AWS Marketplace with Tackle

Executive Summary

Netskope, a global cybersecurity and SASE leader, was looking to accelerate its growth through Amazon Web Services (AWS) Marketplace. The Netskope team invested resources and leveraged AWS partner, Tackle, to take advantage of the company’s expertise and experience in optimizing business growth on AWS Marketplace. As a result, Netskope doubled its growth in the third quarter of 2022 on AWS Marketplace.

Tackle Speaks AWS

Netskope recognized the value of AWS Marketplace early on and partnered with Tackle from the beginning of this journey. Dave Willis, Head of Technology Integrations for the business development team at Netskope, explained, “We knew that AWS Marketplace was a go-to-market channel that a lot of our customers were starting to engage with as a primary vehicle for provisioning.” The 2022 State of Cloud Marketplaces report by Tackle underscores this, highlighting that 44% of sellers expect to transact more than 10% of their revenue through a Cloud Marketplace in the next year.  

While researching Cloud Marketplaces, Netskope determined that Tackle was a strategic partner to help list Netskope on AWS Marketplace and maximize business benefits through its platform. Andy Horwitz, Vice President of Business Development and Technology Alliances, Netskope, emphasized this, “Tackle speaks AWS. They understand the AWS Marketplace and are so entrenched in the system that they frequently point us to benefits that we might not otherwise be aware of. Working with Tackle has been invaluable in helping us grow our Marketplace business so fast.” 

 

Tackle Offers Streamlines Seller Workflows     

An AWS Marketplace listing was just the starting point for Netskope and Tackle. Tackle keeps pace with the frequent updates and additional functionality that AWS Marketplace provides. A great example is how Tackle Offers helps streamline the seller workflow for Netskope. Tackle gives Netskope sales teams complete visibility into the status of their deals and the order details when they close through Tackle Offers. Sarah Vatcher, Alliance Program Coordinator, Netskope, explained, “What’s great is that I can loop in the sales team on notifications that a deal has moved forward, so they’re not coming back to me with questions about the status of a particular offer. Everybody’s getting the same information at the same time.”      

Horwitz also highlighted an unexpected benefit, “Sarah has gained valuable sales ops experience that she wouldn’t have pre-Tackle. Using the Tackle platform has helped to boost our team members’ professional development and improved the overall productivity of our sales operations team.”

Reducing Friction for an Improved Seller Culture

This comprehensive support of its customers—at the core of what Tackle does—has the added advantage of shaping the broader seller culture at Netskope to create a win-win situation for everyone. Tackle has helped Netskope reduce friction in sales engagement by building awareness of AWS Marketplace benefits among Netskope field sellers. Tackle supported the effort to educate Netskope sellers on AWS Marketplace customer benefits, including enterprise discount programs (EDPs). With greater understanding of how these programs worked, the sellers changed the baseline of their customer engagement and brought up Marketplace earlier on in conversations. For instance, sellers could now speak to how EDPs incentivize spending down committed cloud budgets. Netskope sales teams were also able to approach channel partners with more confidence, knowing their margins wouldn’t be affected. As Horwitz explained, “If a channel partner feels they're going to lose margins, they're less likely to engage. The same applies to our sellers, and Tackle helped us reinforce the importance of comp-neutrality messaging to our executive leadership.”

The More you Do, The More you Grow

In addition to doubling its quarterly growth on the Marketplace, Netskope has realized savings on time, effort, and resources. “We have transformed the way we drive business through AWS Marketplace. Tackle is part of the process now and it's starting to become muscle memory for our field sellers,” Horwitz said.

Hear from David Willis, Head of Technology Alliances

 

About Netskope

Netskope is a global security leader, recognized by Gartner as a Leader in its 2022 Magic Quadrant for Security Service Edge (SSE).