How to get your WPC 2012 Partner Award nominations in now. Time is running out! - Microsoft Sales Excellence Program Manager - Eric Ligman - Site Home

With each passing day, we get another day closer to Worldwide Partner Conference 2012, which is July 8-12th in Toronto this year. I absolutely love Worldwide Partner Conference and it is by far my favorite conference of the year! What is also getting closer with each passing day is the deadline to get your Worldwide Partner Conference 2012 Partner Award nominations in. The deadline for submission is April 15,2012 at 11:59 pm Pacific Time. For those of you without a calendar right in front of you, that’s just over two weeks away!

To help you out, I am posting some information and resources for you here so that you can get started right now in getting your nomination in and are not one of the poor souls that finds yourself on the other side of the deadline saying, “What? I missed it? Can I still submit?” Unfortunately, each year there are those people who procrastinate and put off their submission with the age old reason of, “I’ll get to it tomorrow,” and by the time they get to the ‘tomorrow’ that they are going to do it, it is too late. Don’t be one of those poor souls.

Let’s get started with the categories and awards available to you. Once again, we have a great collection of awards available this year, plus we have added some new awards as well:

Emerging Technologies and Innovation Awards

Microsoft Cloud Partner of the Year
Windows Intune Partner of The Year
BizSpark Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Cloud Business Excellence Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Marketplace Solution Excellence Partner of the Year
Microsoft Office 365 Innovation Partner of the Year
Microsoft Office 365 Commercial Partner of the Year
Microsoft Office 365 Solution Partner of the Year
Private Cloud Partner of the Year
Sustainability Partner of the Year
Visio Partner of the Year
Windows Azure ISV Partner of the Year
Windows Azure SI Partner of the Year

Microsoft Country Awards

Microsoft Country Partner of the Year

Services and Support Awards

Services Partner of the Year—Outstanding Collaboration
Microsoft Support Partner of the Year

Vertical, Industry, and Segment Awards

Microsoft Alliance ISV Industry Partner of the Year
Alliance Partner of the Year—Advanced Infrastructure
Alliance Partner of the Year—Application Platform
Alliance Partner of the Year—Cloud Innovation
Corporate Account Virtualization Data Center Services Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Distribution Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Financial Services Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Manufacturing Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Professional Services Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Public Sector Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics Retail Partner of the Year
Public Sector, Education Partner of the Year
Public Sector, Government Partner of the Year
Public Sector, Health Partner of the Year
Public Sector, Public Safety, and National Security Partner of the Year
Small Business Specialist Partner of the Year

Citizenship Awards

Opportunities for Youth—Citizenship Partner of the Year
Humanitarian Response—Citizenship Partner of the Year
Innovative Nonprofit (NGO) Capacity Building—Citizenship Partner of the Year

Microsoft Partner Network Competency Awards

Application Integration Partner of the Year
Application Lifecycle Management Partner of the Year
Authorized Distributor Partner of the Year Award
Business Intelligence Partner of the Year
Content Management Partner of the Year
Data Platform Partner of the Year
Desktop Partner of the Year
Digital Marketing Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Partner of the Year
Microsoft Dynamics ERP Partner of the Year
Hosting Partner of the Year
Identity and Security Partner of the Year
ISV/Software Solutions Industry Partner of the Year
Learning Competency Marketing Excellence Partner of the Year
Learning Competency Training Solution Excellence Partner of the Year
Midmarket Solution Provider Partner of the Year
Mobility Business-to-Business Application Partner of the Year
Mobility Business-to-Consumer Application Partner of the Year
Mobility Partner of the Year
OEM Hardware Reseller Partner of the Year
OEM Hardware System Building Partner of the Year
Portals and Collaboration Partner of the Year
Project and Portfolio Management Partner of the Year
Search Partner of the Year
Server Platform Partner of the Year
Microsoft Management and Virtualization Partner of the Year
Software Asset Management Partner of the Year
Software Development Partner of the Year
Systems Management Partner of the Year
Messaging Partner of the Year
Communications Market Acceleration Partner of the Year
Communications Technology Partner of the Year
Volume Licensing Partner of the Year
Web Development Partner of the Year

Sales Excellence Awards

Corporate Accounts LAR Global Partner of the Year
Exceptional Sales Management Partner of the Year
Innovative Customer Advocacy Partner of the Year
Outstanding Sales Operations Partner of the Year
Sales Specialist of the Year

As you can see, there are a ton of categories for you to select from, based on your solution offerings, and yes, you can submit nominations for as many different categories as you are eligible for. Looking for more information about each of the award categories and eligibility criteria for each? No problem. We have an Award categories and descriptions document that you can download that includes all of this.

Now about those nominations themselves…

You’re going to need to know where to submit them at. That is easy. You can submit your nominations online here.
Since we’ve done this for several years now, we’ve also put together a collection of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) regarding the awards that might be of help to you.
Like any contest, there are rules that you need to be aware of. To make it easy, you can download the 2012 Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference Awards Official Rules here.
As I am sure you are aware, the winners will be selected by a panel of judges who will go through all of the nominations looking for a set of criteria by which the entries are rated. Sure would be nice to know what the judges look for, wouldn’t it? Tell you what… If you promise not to tell anyone, I’ll let you in on the inside scoop and provide you with a quick look at what the judges are told to look for and rate each entry on by award category.
We also have the Worldwide Partner Conference 2012 Awards Program page located on the Digital WPC site.

Ok, that should give you more than enough information to get your high quality nomination together and submitted for the categories you want to enter this year. Now stop reading this, follow the links above, and get your nominations in! After all, we’re heading into the weekend, so you have some time to get this taken care of before the hectic work week starts again on Monday. Good luck to all of you and I look forward to seeing you all at WPC 12 in Toronto!

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Thank you and have a wonderful day,

Eric Ligman – Follow me on TWITTER, LinkedIn, and RSS and see “What I’m thinking”
Director, Worldwide Partner Experience
Microsoft Corporation
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

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