ChannelCandy: Sweeter Mobile Apps for Channel Partners?
From Cisco Sytems (CSCO) to Verizon (VZ), roughly 50 technology companies and associations now use ChannelCandy as the foundation for mobile smartphone and tablet apps. But what exactly is ChannelCandy and where are company co-founders Bob Godgart and Jay McBain taking the mobile apps platform next?
First, a little background. As you may recall, Godgart and McBain co-founded ChannelEyes in late 2011. Earlier, Godgart was CEO and co-founder of Autotask, and McBain had channel-centric positions at Autotask and Lenovo. ChannelEyes is a Facebook-like platform is designed for technology companies and their channel partners. It’s certainly promising but building social networks and online marketplaces — that continually pull vendors and partners back into the conversation — is a tricky task.
- Real-time news and sales tools;
- Push notification; and
- Branded, customizable and secure content.
The bottom-line goal: ChannelCandy hopes to empower technology vendors that want to communicate, engage and enable their partners.
ChannelCandy Mobile App Modules
The ChannelCandy platform has multiple modules that allow technology companies to push, engage, measure and manage content outcomes. Add-on modules include:
- Card Carousel, which lets users “swipe” through information;
- Deal registration, to help partners register deals while they are still with customers;
- Single sign on to assocated web sites;
- Community and group capabilities;
- Marketing overlays to collect more user demographic information;
- Localized languages;
- An ad server;
- Live chat and more.
Interesting Stuff
Frankly, The VAR Guy is intrigued. Godgart and McBain offered some growth information on background during last week’s call — and the information sounded promising. Also, the ChannelCandy pricing model is extremely simple — an annual subscription fee, in fact. Sorry, The VAR Guy can’t spill the beans on exact pricing…
Will the ChannelCandy mobile app business enjoy sweet success? It’s always difficult for The VAR Guy to make firm predictions when he doesn’t have access to deep financial information — past, present, future. But Godgart and McBain seem to reaching out to all the right sources.
Axcient, HTG Peer Groups, StorageCraft and several other channel-friendly organizations use ChannelCandy for various mobile apps. The VAR Guy hasn’t had a chance to check in with those sources… But stay tuned for potential updates.
It’s good to see The VAR Guy
It’s good to see The VAR Guy intrigued with, and investigating, the ChannelCandy mobile app. HTG Peer Groups launched our PeerLink app using the ChannelCandy platform to several hundred members and sponsors at HTG Summit in early May.
Much like starting with social media, we learned a lot about the app, what content works well, what users want and how to build community effectively. We’re still gaining momentum, but the experience of working with the ChannelCandy team has been positive. As their list of customers grows we, and our users/partners/members, should benefit from feedback and enhancements.
The ball is still in our court to leverage the tool to reach our goals. We may add a second app tied to our platform that supports group collaboration and meetings. That said, we like the fact other companies are choosing and validating the ChannelCandy platform. We also like that The VAR Guy is interested.
Scott Scrogin
HTG Peer Groups
Terrific product, people, and
Terrific product, people, and purpose.
Glad to see other vendors
Glad to see other vendors launching mobile apps for channels. Relayware launched our app last fall. It supports news feeds, activity streams (think Facebook Timelines or LinkedIn updates), lead management, deal reg, media libraries and product catalogs, multimedia training and much more. Maybe you should check it out at http://bit.ly/Xv7QQb
It’s exceptional to see The
It’s exceptional to see The VAR Guy fascinated with, and exploring, the Channelcandy portable application. HTG Peer Groups started our Peerlink application utilizing the Channelcandy stage to some hundred parts and supports at HTG Summit in promptly May.
http://www.contus.com/mobile-application-development.php