Bull`s Eye Awards: Channel Conference of the Year - CHALLENGER
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ConnectWise Partner Summit
If you want to experience community and collaboration, all you need to do is
show up at the annual ConnectWise Partner Summit. This year saw the fourth
installment of this event, and it continues to get better and better. Drawing
nearly 1,000 solution providers from around the world, it’s not only one of the
best events, but it's one of the largest. Here’s why.
ConnectWise, maker of professional services automation (PSA)
tools, has evolved to take on near cult status. The throng of the ConnectWise
faithful and PSA loyalist are drawn to the
event held in Orlando, Fla.,
to learn new tricks for maximizing the benefits of their PSA
package, network with peers, and bath in the experiences and success of the
total community. CEO Arnie Bellini and his Director
of Communities Jeannine Edwards have done a masterful job establishing a sense
of esprit de corps among ConnectWise partners.
The ConnectWise Partner Summit is hardly the death-by-PowerPoint that makes
other events more like funerals than industry events. ConnectWise carefully
crafted an event that includes talks by industry luminaries and thought leaders,
hands-on training sessions, and peer testimonials. Of course, ConnectWise had
the obligatory vendor fair and product demos, but even those weren’t the usual
force march of attendees seen in too many conference ballrooms. And
after-hours, ConnectWise served up numerous and diverse social activities that
served as celebrations of partner connectivity and success as much as mandatory
entertainment.
ConnectWise is masterful at message and image, and it leverages this annual
event to reinforce its partner connections and loyalty. ConnectWise users call
their PSA application “an operating system
for their business,” and the Partner Summit helps them maximize the benefit
from that app. Other vendors, distributors and trade groups could learn a thing
or two from ConnectWise on building events and forming communities, and that’s
why ConnectWise is the recipient of the Channel Insider Challenger Bull’s Eye
Award for Channel Conference of the Year.
