Who’s involved

• ISV AE + SE - own the problem and opportunity (customer)

• Cloud Sellers/PDM/SA - add credibility, customer insight, access

• Channel partner (SI/VAR) - optional; boosts delivery & deal size

• Customer sponsor - decision + marketplace purchase path

Core building blocks

• Marketplace listing - how the customer purchases you

• Commits (EDP/MACC) - pre-allocated cloud budget to tap into

• Private Offer - enterprise contract with custom price/terms via marketplace

• Portal registration (ACE / Partner Center) - seller credit + visibility

• Workload mapping - which cloud services your deal grows (data, AI, security, compute)

Why it wins

• Speed → marketplace = vetted vendor + fewer legal steps + fast deployment

• Budget → could be funded by commits, not a new line item

• Incentives → cloud field gets paid when partners win via marketplace, especially if it drives their service consumption

Key steps

1. Make it visible: Register the opp in the cloud portal with key details, and where you need help

2. Qualify commit: Does the account have commit they can use?

3. Align outcomes: “Customer outcome → Cloud outcome → Your outcome.”
   “This helps our customer consume your [AI/Data/Sec] services—and we’re qualified to burn their commits.”

4. Get the intro: Ask cloud sellers for customer and budget intelligence, buying patterns, etc.

5. Propose purchase path: Private Offer on marketplace (multi-year if possible).

6. Add an SI/VAR when it improves outcomes or services pull-through.

7. Close & claim: Reference the workload win, and share the story internally/with the cloud.​

Do

• Lead with the customer + cloud consumption + marketplace/commits

• Map to key services (e.g., Bedrock, Fabric, Vertex AI; or S3/EKS/BigQuery)

• Show traction: dates, ARR, contacts—make it real

Don’t

• Don’t ask clouds to sell your product for you - it’s not their job

• Don’t “fish” for intros without a qualified, registered opp

• Don’t send generic decks; show account/industry-specific outcomes​

KPIs to track

• $ of opportunities co-sell eligible

• Registered co-sell opps / won

• Drag: Incremental cloud usage your product drives

• Closing time & win rate: direct vs marketplace

​Co-sell is how you tap customers' cloud commitments and the cloud provider's distribution and credibility to win.

Do these things well - and it becomes your default GTM.

Put this playbook to work in Q4

Co-sell is one piece. Repeatable Marketplace revenue also needs the right strategy, an aligned sales team, channel partners and KPIs your leadership trusts.
​That’s the system we’re breaking down in the Cloud GTM Leader Course: five weeks of practical frameworks with experienced operators, built for alliance and Cloud GTM leaders growing on AWS, Azure or Google Cloud.

​Q4 is just getting started. Build a clearer growth plan for the quarter ahead and a stronger foundation for 2027.

Last chance: Cohort 16 starts tomorrow, Tuesday, October 6.

Join Cohort 16