Frequently asked question

The commercial marketplace is a starting point for Go-To-Market collaboration and enablement with sales channels and Marketplace Rewards. The websites and in-product experiences give your products visibility to millions of customers who are seeking solutions like yours. You don't even need to build or buy the commerce capabilities. The commercial marketplace is available in 141 regions, on a per-plan basis.

Microsoft manages tax payment in many countries/regions, and Microsoft provides access to our global channel network of resellers. You can use a customer's Microsoft Customer Agreement or Enterprise Agreement to sell to organizations without having to create a new buying relationship.

Strategically speaking, Microsoft will have more visibility into your pipeline, current customers and future geo expansion. Being IP Co-Sell Incentivized results in your solution receiving an elevated level of attention from Microsoft’s sellers, as your sales contributes to their Azure sales targets. Your success becomes their success.

The ways that customers can use your commercial marketplace offer depend on how you create the offers.

• For solutions that you provide automatically, whether they're paid, bring-your-own-license (BYOL), or free, customers are urged to Get It Now.
• Offers that support a test drive (demo) request the customer to Test Drive.
• Software as a service (SaaS) offers that provide a trial outside the commercial marketplace say Free Trial.
• Simple listings allow the customer to request Contact Me.

As customers use your offers on the Microsoft AppSource and Azure Marketplace online stores, information is captured. After customers have demonstrated enough interest, a lead is created, and an opportunity is sent to the system of your choice. Publishers who are successful with the commercial marketplace often pursue leads, develop relationships, and turn interest into deals.

For more information, see Customer leads from your marketplace offer.

• Transaction is the exchange of money for goods. An offer is considered transactable in the commercial marketplace if it has a price and is paid for by the customer through our billing and collections.

• Monetization is the ability to charge money for your intellectual property, which can happen within or outside our commerce platform. For example, your bring-your-own-license (BYOL) Teams app can be monetized with a transactable SaaS licensing service.

Software that's built on or built for our cloud services can be transacted through the commercial marketplace. Any form of professional services – external to the solutions offering - would require unique terms between you and the buying party.

This form of agreement can be mentioned and supported in the terms and conditions of your listing. The invoicing of these services will fall under the responsibility of the ISV.

Whilst professional services are not yet transactable. Stactize best practices suggest using metered dimensions to invoice supplementary services such as consulting, configurations, add-ons and/or additional usage

The difference between an EA and a MACC agreement is that the EA agreement is focused on Microsoft services, which include support and licenses. Whereas the MACC agreement is specifically focused on cloud spend (Azure consumption) and entered into directly with Microsoft Sales.

The publisher would have an Agreement for its Service Offerings being procured (via the Azure Marketplace). This would be the standard MS agreement to become transactable via the Marketplace (excluding the additional wording/agreements that the publisher will need to be included for the use of its Services/SaaS). To learn more, see Standard Contract for the Microsoft commercial marketplace.

Microsoft would then have a back-to-back Agreement with those customers that want to procure the publisher’s services via the Marketplace.

Customers can also use their EA or MAC agreement for procuring the publisher’s services via the Marketplace.

The Microsoft Publisher Agreement: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/legal/marketplace/msft-publisher-agreement

Customers are usually billed monthly for any purchases in the previous billing cycle. Consumption-based offers with metered billing plans, such as VM images, SaaS applications, and managed applications, are charged after they've been used. Subscription-based plans are charged at the beginning of the term.

If the solution is used directly in a customer's Azure subscription, the customer is responsible for paying the Azure costs. If the solution is used in your Azure subscription, such as in the case of SaaS applications, you're responsible for the Azure costs. You should account for that in the cost of the customer's SaaS subscription.

Microsoft AppSource supports credit card payments. Azure Marketplace supports credit card payments or invoicing. Offers purchased through Azure Marketplace are automatically added to customers' Azure bill and are charged according to the payment method associated with their subscription.

Yes, you can set up the listing to have both a monthly and an annual billing option. They bill accordingly. The customer has the choice to select which billing option they deem most fitting.

The SaaS (Software as a Service) subscription is automatically renewed by Microsoft at the end of the subscription term of a month or a year. The default for the auto-renewal setting is true for all SaaS subscriptions. Active SaaS subscriptions will continue to be renewed with a regular cadence. Microsoft provides inform-only webhook notifications for renew events. A customer can turn off automatic renewal for a SaaS subscription via the Microsoft 365 Admin Portal. In this case, the SaaS subscription will be automatically cancelled at the end of the current billing term. Customers can also cancel the SaaS subscription at any time.

We can ensure you maintain a ‘contact us’ listing so that you can have a self-service avenue. However, I would suggest to rather identify leads through a free trial. Then beginning the sales cycle to eventually upgrade them to a paid plan.

You would still need to be co-sell incentivised. But at that point, yes, it is an automatic qualification.

A MACC agreement will bill like an Enterprise Agreement, as both are prepaid usage.

To procure via the Azure Marketplace, the end-customer would need to configure a profile to accept the Marketplace agreement and to setup a billing profile, so in short, yes, but it is not a massive process.

Yes, any Microsoft Partner can procure and does not need a MACC or an EA signed with Microsoft. Azure Marketplace helps you simplify the procurement process through different purchasing options. If you purchase products using a credit card associated with your Azure account, all purchases will be consolidated on a single invoice and billed to the credit card of choice. If you are a large customer, you can purchase using an Enterprise Agreement. With an EA, any software purchases are automatically included in your Azure invoice. Your invoice will contain Azure usage charges first, followed by Azure Marketplace charges.
When you purchase through Azure Marketplace, you eliminate the complexity of managing individual vendor relationships and invoices. You get a single, consolidated monthly bill from Microsoft that includes both your Azure Marketplace purchases and your Azure charges.

The account teams receive incentives/recognition for customer ACR (Azure Consumption Revenue). If an end-customer purchases your solution, a % of the ACV (Annual Contract Value) deducts from the account team’s ACR Target for the year, and with it being transacted via the Azure Marketplace, an additional $20k is deducted from their ACR Target.

There is also another mechanism that comes into play, called PRACR (Partner reported Azure Consumption Revenue), where you as iiDentifii report on a per customer level your Azure Consumption, this also contributes toward the respective account manager/executive.

When a company commits to spending for example R1mil when signing their MACC, they negotiate a discount with Microsoft that they commit to spending this amount over x number of years. If their spend is below the R1mil, they incur penalties and a lesser discount when negotiating the next MACC. But if they spend more than what they committed to, they will potentially be able to negotiate a bigger discount with the next MACC and potentially receive incentives from Microsoft.

Microsoft will be the vendor on record, as your solution procured via the Azure Marketplace will get added to the Azure Invoice payable to Microsoft by the customer.