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What Is the Azure Marketplace and
Why You Should Be Paying Attention to It

The Azure marketplace by Microsoft is an online store where you can find several applications and services. These services and applications are built on Microsoft’s Azure cloud. The products and services that are available on the Azure marketplace either come from Microsoft directly or its technology partners. 

Before any product or service becomes available on the Azure marketplace, they must be eligible for the certified program by Microsoft. This certification of the products or services is to ensure that they are compatible with the Azure cloud. 

There are different categories inside the Azure marketplace which we will discuss in this article. Before that, let’s know why to sell on microsoft marketplace?

Why to sell on Microsoft Marketplace

Are you thinking about why you should sell on this marketplace? Here are some potential benefits that you will get by selling through the Azure marketplace. 

• You can expand your products and services to new markets.
• It will give you new leads and market opportunities.
• You can upsell and cross-sell your products or services.
• The Microsoft community will help and support you with actionable insights to maximize your campaign.
• You will gain access to the free Microsoft Go-To Launch Program.

Apart from these, there are many other benefits that you can get when selling your solutions through the Azure marketplace. 

Microsoft Azure Marketplace

The Azure marketplace offers thousands of products listed in different categories. A good understanding of these categories will help you choose which is the right category for your solution. 

1. Virtual Machines: These virtual environments work like a virtual computer system and functions like a computer on the web.
2. Developer Services: You can provide Add-on services of your own.
3. API apps: Developers need to connect to APIs or SaaS. You can also offer application programming interfaces.
4. Azure Active Directory Applications: Also, you can provide Azure compatible applications for account management.
5. Web Applications: If you want to develop web applications and offer them to users, you can do that too.
6. Data Services: If you’re a data analyst, you can also provide data services from different industries, including financial, retail, sports, etc.
7. Microsoft Dynamic Solutions: You can also provide customer relationship management and enterprise resource planning solutions.

Now that you understand different categories, take a look at the step-by-step process of selling through the Azure commercial marketplace.

How to sell on Microsoft Marketplace

For selling through Microsoft Marketplace, you need the following things: 

1. Create an Azure Active Directory Account 
   This account is also known as the work account. Through this account, your details will be authenticated to connect to the Partner Center. The Partner Center will authenticate your username, password, and associated attributes. 
2. Microsoft Partner Network
   Once you get authentication from your Partner Network, you can access the tools, partner programs, support, and community. It’s essential for publishing offers into the Azure Marketplace. 
3. Commercial Marketplace Enrollment
   After you connect to the Partner center, you need to enroll in the commercial marketplace to activate your publishing offers. Here you need to accept the Microsoft publishing agreement. 
4. Partner Center Permissions
   There are different role-based models assigned to different users after they complete the enrollment process. The user needs to fill in all the essential details such as payout and tax information. 
5. Tax and Payout Info
   This is the last step where you need to provide your payout information where you want to receive the money. Also, you need to provide the tax information for selling your products or services through the Microsoft marketplace. 

Conclusion

Hopefully, the above information has helped you to know about Azure Marketplace and why you should pay attention to it. Again, it gives you insights on how to sell on the Microsoft marketplace. For more information, you can go through the FAQ section on Microsoft.