While past ESET marketing materials have been static downloadable assets, this tool, designed by marketing automation company MindMatrix, fully automates campaigns, to make them easy to design, use and track.
Cybersecurity vendor ESET has announced the launch of a new ESET marketing centre. The tool, which is free for partners to use, will be available for use in the U.S., Canada, and the Caribbean. It lets partners run completely automated and adjustable email campaigns with content and resources which they can brand.
“We are always trying to make sure we are servicing the channel in the best way possible,” said Iva Peric-Lightfoot, ESET Canada Country Manager. “This latest iteration with this new marketing tool is very exciting.”
The tool was developed by MindMatrix, an end-to-end marketing automation company. It will let ESET partners brand content and resources, deploy email campaigns and manage their prospect database.
“MindMatrix has a proven track record with other vendors, including Autodesk and Datto, and will be able to take our marketing tool to the next level,” Peric-Lightfoot said.
That next level features a high degree of automation. ESET has provided marketing resources to partners before, but they were qualitatively very different.
“What we had in the past was downloadable assets from the marketing portal,” Peric-Lightfoot said. “It couldn’t be managed in a more automated way. With this, once the reseller logs in, the assets in their profile are centralized and customizable. The resellers can begin co-branding automatically and immediately once they register. The assets can be planned out into the future – say five days from now – and the campaigns tracked, and the resellers have the capability to pull reports and see what they need to tweak. This allows them to plan further out with their campaigns.”
Peric-Lightfoot stated that the customer information submitted to MindMatrix by customers will be secure.
“The information won’t be compromised, and the customer list won’t go outside MindMatrix,” she said.
Getting partners to use this kind of tool has been a challenge for many vendors in the past, but ESET expects that the tool’s use of use will spur adoption.
Iva Peric-Lightfoot, ESET Canada Country Manager
“There’s a strong need for this,” Peric-Lightfoot said. “Small VARs in particular will benefit from it. It is so easy to use and so automated. The old tools didn’t have the automation that exists now. This is also designed to be very easy to use, which we think that will make people want to use it. In addition, we now have the capability to reach out to partners and train them, with webinars and additional touch points.”
A French-language version will be available.
ESET will also be leveraging their distribution relationship with Ingram Micro to increase awareness and adoption of the tool.
“We will take it to our first-tier partners like Ingram, with a strong message of ease of use,” Peric-Lightfoot said. “We also see an opportunity to advance it through groups like the Ingram SMB Alliance.”
Peric-Lightfoot said that partners who already have more advanced marketing outreach capabilities will still find value in this.
“If they have another tool that they prefer, they are still able to pull the information from this, and deliver it to the repository they want to use,” she said.
ESET is anticipating significant use of the new tool.
“I think that a 25 per cent pickup rate would be a success,” Peric-Lightfoot said. “That’s really aggressive, but it is achievable. I’m especially curious to see how the MSP community will use it, and how much they can grow their business with this.”
