At Brigantia, we value strong partnerships and are proud of the relationships we’ve established in the UK and Irish channel communities.
Our carefully selected vendor portfolio has established us as a trusted cybersecurity advisor to our MSP partners. This is based on our extensive knowledge and highly specific vendor selection process.
Our partners recognise the Brigantia seal of approval as a mark of quality. This post is about the rigorous process we use when selecting our vendor partners.
Finding a vendor
The first step is to identify a need. We're not looking for gimmicks or to oversaturate the channel with imitations of existing solutions. We are also not interested in selecting vendors based on their current standing in the industry.
Quality is important to us. Every solution in our portfolio must work effectively and address a genuine need. This is determined through proactive market and threat research, as well as feedback from existing partners.
How we choose our vendors
We use strict criteria when searching for new vendors to partner with to ensure they meet our standards. These are some of the criteria we use:
- They must be novel to our portfolio and have no or little overlap with an existing vendor. This has two major advantages. First and foremost, we are not pitting our vendors against one another. Second, it keeps our portfolio small, allowing our team to become experts in all of our vendors.
- Vendors must meet the security and technical requirements of our Director of Infosec and Head of Technical. These stringent requirements ensure quality.
- It must work commercially within our channel, based on recurring monthly billing. Vendor billing must be simple to adhere to the ideal of keeping things simple. We require vendors to provide accurate data for billing.
Assessing the product
Once the vendor has met the above criteria, we move on to evaluate their product offering. This evaluation considers both technical and security aspects, as well as the commercial model.
Evaluations include product testing and confirming that it does what it is supposed to do. We also look at how they store customer data from a security standpoint, making sure it meets GDPR requirements.
Internal training
Once a solution meets our standards, we train our product specialists to ensure the highest possible level of technical understanding. This makes a significant difference for our MSP partners. We can answer their questions about the new vendor or solution without having to refer them to the vendor.
Webinar launch
At this point, we've established both quality and commercial viability. We've also become product experts and laid the groundwork to ensure that provisioning and billing run smoothly.
The webinar launch is the final step. We will present the new solution to our MSP partners, along with demos and Q&As, in collaboration with the vendor. This allows MSPs to interact directly with the vendor and see the product in action. Meanwhile, we can gauge responses.
Many MSPs will sign up immediately following the launch webinar. Others plan trials or further demos. We're always happy to help for one simple reason: we're confident in the vendor at this point, which instils confidence in our partners.
Vendors in our portfolio
Adding a vendor to our portfolio is just the beginning of their partnership with Brigantia. Once part of our portfolio, we provide them with a trained product specialist so that we can offer product demonstrations to partners. This gives vendors confidence that we can demonstrate their product as if we were a member of their team.
Our knowledge and why it matters
In addition to product specialists, all Brigantia sales staff are trained in each vendor's products. Our sales team's technical knowledge puts us ahead of other distributors. Our sales staff are confident in discussing all the services we provide with our partners.
This means that we don't rely on vendors to sell solutions or answer technical questions. This, combined with our process, provides genuine reassurance to vendors. They can rely on us to become technical experts on their solutions and to provide a sales and technical support network throughout the UK and Ireland.
It also benefits MSP partners. They understand that whatever we provide is of high quality, commercially viable, and supported by Brigantia experts.
Final thoughts
We are committed to providing value to both vendors and MSPs. Knowledge, partnership, and quality assurance are critical to our success. That is why we work so closely with our vendors and have such a thorough onboarding process in place. We constantly review this process to ensure that the products we offer from our vendors are of high quality and continue to meet Brigantia's and MSP’s needs.
