Kaseya-Datto Doubling Down On Partners: 5 Things To Know

Here are five things to know about Kaseya’s refreshed commitment to the partner community.

IT vendor Kaseya-Datto rolled out a new concierge service, a revamped partner program and brought back a Datto favorite all as the company continues to invest and be partner-focused in 2023.

Dan Tomaszewski, EVP of the channel at Kaseya-Datto, said partners will see that Miami-based Kaseya has made a significant investment into its staff and new programs going forward.

“Let me and my team have a chance to interact with you and help you drive your success that you’re looking for,” he said. “I find that if people give us a chance, they find that we do give them the answers and they find that they’re often in a better off spot. Now it’s time for us to go out, start interacting with our partners, letting them see the power of the investments that we made and let them see a difference. I know they will notice a change in the level of support and the level of attention that we give them in 2023.”

After the dust has settled on Kaseya’s $6.2 billion blockbuster acquisition of rival Datto last year, Tomaszewski said Kaseya is committed more than ever to partner community and the growth of MSPs.

“Look, acquisitions, they happen,” he said. “[There may be] new account managers or you get somebody new and maybe [with] communication, there‘s a wire crossed. Things happen, and we know those things are going to happen. So we want to make sure that if something does happen, you have a resource that you easily know the number, email, whatever, they pick up the phone and you’re going to get results.”

Here are five things to know about Kaseya-Datto’s refreshed commitment to their partners.

The Return of Matt Scully

The return of Matt Scully to Datto is one bet Kaseya is taking on its partners. Scully was with Datto from 2015 to 2020 first as a growth sales representative then as a channel development manager. He returned to Kaseya-Datto in late January as senior channel development manager.

“My role is not going to be too much different from what my role was before,” Scully told CRN. “I’m going to be on the front line, sort of an ambassador, meeting partners whether it‘s at trade shows, doing the MDF(marketing development funds), events roadshows… you name it. I’m the person that they’re going to be meeting, I’m going to be speaking to them about their business, about the capabilities of Kaseya and all the different skews that we represent.”

Internally he will be working with Kaseya reps on what the business development team is doing and how can they leverage that to the success for their partners.

A Revamped Partner Program

Tomaszewski said one of the really important things that Datto brought, and one of the things that Kaseya looked at as a company, was their partner program.

“Everybody wanted to be a Blue Diamond partner,” he told CRN. “They saw the different programs and it had a starting point with some MDF and some basic things for the Blue Diamond customers, and we wanted to take it to another level. We do pulse checks with our customers and one of the things that we were hearing from our Kaseya customers was, ‘We really would love to have a partner program like Datto.’”

Kaseya also took from Datto’s partner program playbook to enhance its tiered system for partners. Now, customers can combine their Datto and Kaseya spend and, depending on their level, get free services including enablement team support, live technical webinars, 24/7 customer support, free passes to industry events and more.

Datto had about a $1.3 million budget for MDF funds. The combined program allows about $3 million in MDF funds.

“We’re not just giving you the money and saying, ‘Good luck,’” he said. “Datto did a little bit of it, but they were limited with a couple-person team. We now have a 60-person team with Kaseya and we will actually fund your event. We will send people there. If it’s a webinar we‘re on the webinar with you. If it’s a lunch and learn, we’re flying our team out there to support you because we really want to help our customers see success at events.”

A New Concierge Program

Kaseya also launched its concierge program which is to that of a white-glove service to its partners.

“The goal is you call concierge, that concierge has got access to me and my leadership team,” Tomaszewski said. “If it’s a billing problem, we’re going to the billing department on their behalf and working their issue out. If that‘s a support issue, we’re going there and doing that. Our hopes are that we can reduce people‘s frustrations.”

The five-person concierge team, which will grow in time, will be in Facebook groups and other forums to listen and address partner concerns and issues. There will also be an email address and hotline to call.

“One of the things I’ve seen is that people tend to go on social media when there’s an issue,” Tomaszewski said. “It doesn’t matter what vendor per se, but they tend to go on and say, ‘Hey, I’m just not getting support,’ or, ‘Hey, we have a billing issue or something and I just need to get some assistance.’

More Partner Enablement

With Kaseya-Datto’s enablement team, it can help partners put together a price package or a security stack.

“A lot of folks are former MSPs or have worked at MSPs on this team, so we’re able to help them go to market faster, go to market profitable and acquire customers, because at the end of the day

if they’re not successful, we’re not successful as a company,” Tomaszewski said.

The enablement team is building content for the partner with no mention of Kaseya, its brand or its products.

“It’s fully white labeled for them to go put themselves and their brand on it and really be able to go to market,” he said. “What I want everybody to know is, is that we hear you,” he said. “I know we have a lot of eyes on us. I know we have a lot of different MSPs that rely on us and I wake up every day wanting to develop programs and things that are going to support them. The biggest message I want people to know is you’ve got a group of people here that genuinely care.”

Virtual MSP Days Are Happening

Kaseya-Datto is now offering virtual MSP Partner Days so MSP partners can continue learning about the ever-changing market and how to grow their business. The one-day events will feature different learning tracks so MSPs and include keynote presentations and cash prizes.

“We want something for you to be able to come in and experience and gain some extra knowledge,” Tomaszewski said. “We‘re going to have over $30,000 in cash and prizes. We want to make it fun for our partners to win some games, incentives, contests, things like that throughout the day, so we’re really going to try to go all out and let people see the experience and be able to interact with executives, support teams and product teams.”

Kaseya-Datto is “rolling out the carpet” for partners to ask more questions and see the company’s roadmap. There will be quarterly tracks to discuss growing MSP profit, operations, sales and marketing, to name a few.

“What we’re focused on is creating really good products for our customers to go out and grow their businesses on and build their businesses on,” he said. “It’s our job to listen to them and to make workflow integrations that are really meaningful to them that can help their teams drive efficiency and drive a better bottom line.”