Guest post #2 from Hilton - Aussie SBSC PAL
See guest post #1 here.
Thanks,
Robbie
As the Australian SBS User Groups are changing focus, direction and names into the SMB IT Professionals groups, we need to ensure that we're not only changing our names, but living up to them. Microsoft has really expanded our market upwards by introducing EBS. The Enterprise players will generally look at this, see Wizards and dismiss it as a toy. We're in the ideal position to not only know this simply isn't right, but to be able take advantage of this new product and move into this mid-market space if we so choose. Some of our existing SBS clients will be ideal for EBS, some new clients will be ideal for EBS, some will be ideal for SBS and some will not fit either product - either too big (and then onto Windows Server 2008) - or too small (under 10 seats, so maybe Windows Home Server in a workgroup).
MAPS users are going to be receiving both SBS 2008 and EBS 2008 as a part of the Quarterly Update Kit that starts shipping on 24 October,2008 and in addition to this, SBS 2008 is already available on both MSDN and TechNet and EBS 2008 will be available there shortly. Having these products ship in MAPS (for Registered Member SBSCs) is an excellent way for smaller SBSCs to have a look at EBS and see if it is something they are interested in. If not, well, that's fine - at least as a member of one of the SMB IT Pro groups you will know who else in your region you may be able to work with if EBS seems a good fit for a client. That's what these groups are all about - sharing, learning and supporting the SMB IT Pro community. As SBSCs, we're a big part of that community.
As members of this larger SMB IT Pro community, the Australian groups are looking at being able to present a unified face to both vendors and our SMB clients - this means that if we play our cards right, we'll have more influence with vendors who understand the SMB marketplace which will bring benefits to both us as IT professionals and to our clients. To do this, we all have to ensure that we not only let the vendors know if and where they can better target their resources for our market segment, but we also need to ensure that when a vendor is doing something right, we let them know about it!
So, to kick things off here - and after all, this SBSC PAL thing isn't here *just* so I can pick on Microsoft, it is so that I can channel SBSC feedback to Microsoft and Microsoft feedback back to the SBSCs - what things are Microsoft doing right in the SBSC program and with the SMB marketplace in general? Please send comments directly to me at Hilton.Travis@SBSCPAL.com and while you're at it, please join up to the ANZ-SBSC Yahoo! Group (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ANZ-SBSC/) for SBSC-related discussions, questions and assistance.
http://blog.hiltontravis.com/
Regards,
Hilton Travis
Phone: +61 (0)7 3105 9101
Phone: +61 (0)419 792 394
Manager, Quark IT http://www.quarkit.com.au
Quark Group http://www.quarkgroup.com.au
Microsoft SBSC PAL (Australia) http://www.sbscpal.com/
