The Channel Company Acquires Audienz, Adds Global End-User Cloud Marketing Services Muscle To Portfolio

“Audienz brings a powerful end-user, line-of-business focus that has paid off in breakthrough results and proven return on investment for some of the most successful cloud providers in the world,” said The Channel Company CEO Blaine Raddon. “We’re excited to add that capability to our well-established marketing services for both technology vendors and solution providers. This is a significant investment for The Channel Company in our cloud services offerings for our vendors and solution providers focused on marketing services to end users, to partners, and through partners.”

The Channel Company has acquired Audienz, a cloud marketing services company that counts top cloud providers among its blue chip customer list, in a deal that adds new global end-user digital marketing services capabilities to its portfolio.

“Audienz brings a powerful end-user, line-of-business focus that has paid off in breakthrough results and proven return on investment for some of the most successful cloud providers in the world,” said The Channel Company CEO Blaine Raddon (pictured). “We’re excited to add that capability to our well-established marketing services for both technology vendors and solution providers. This is a significant investment for The Channel Company in our cloud services offerings for our vendors and solution providers focused on marketing services to end users, to partners, and through partners. With the addition of the Audienz team and talent, there is simply no one can that can match the full cloud marketing services portfolio we now provide to support our clients’ growth strategies.”

Twelve-year-old Seattle-based Audienz—which will become a new stand-alone cloud services practice within The Channel Company’s services business—has earned a reputation for delivering breakthrough marketing results aimed at end-user line-of- business executives for leading cloud providers in areas like cloud marketplaces and independent software vendors (ISVs). “Audienz’s knowledge of cloud marketplaces and the ISV market is going to be a demand generation game-changer for our customers,” said Raddon.

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In one case, the end-user knowledge and business intelligence brought to bear by Audienz translated into a campaign for a cloud services provider that resulted in 27,000 downloads compared with the usual 300.

“That is what we call breakthrough results,” said Audienz founder and CEO Fernando Mendez, who will become senior vice president of the The Channel Company’s cloud services practice. “That project propelled us to a different level with the client.”

Audienz’s “secret sauce” is a deep knowledge of the cloud services “audience” with a razor-sharp focus on the growing line-of-business buyers, said Mendez. That has given Audienz a leg up over traditional B2B (business-to-business) marketing service providers, which have struggled to deliver comparable cloud marketing services return on investment, he said.

“The channel and B2B in general were reluctant to adopt digital selling,” he said. “We got out in front of it and built that cloud digital marketing capability from the ground up, and the results for our customers have been astronomical. It has been very, very rewarding to see the leads we have delivered result in a major, major impact on revenue for our clients.”

Audienz has completed more than 600 projects for cloud providers that have ranged from end-to-end digital marketing content creation and lead tracking to cloud strategy consulting and audience research.

The end-user line-of-business cloud marketing muscle provided by Audienz adds to The Channel Company’s strength in helping vendors and solution providers transform their digital marketing capabilities with a full portfolio of campaign development, content creation and lead tracking capabilities, said Raddon.

It also adds to The Channel Company’s broad portfolio of offerings aimed at powering growth for technology suppliers and solution providers, including media with CRN.com; events such as Midmarket Enterprise Summits, XChange and Women of Channel; and IPED Channel Consulting and Services, said Raddon.

“Throughout our 35-year history we have constantly changed to meet the needs of our customers,” he said. “This is another step to ensure we can continue to deliver the full range of marketing and channel services our valued customers have come to expect from us.”

Raddon said he sees a big opportunity for the combined company to drive significant cloud sales growth for technology vendors and partners with proven digital marketing campaigns.

“Customers are going to see a big leap forward in our cloud services and cloud marketplace capabilities,” he said. “We are now a one-stop shop for all our customers’ cloud marketing services needs with the talent and team to connect line-of-business buyers with technology vendors and solution providers. We see this deal helping customers drive breakthrough digital marketing results at a time when the cloud services market is accelerating.”