Forgive the after school special title of this post, but we’ve been extremely focused on training & certifications lately. The skill level of our service pros is crucial to our success. And we know that many VARs and solution providers choose their contract techs based upon key IT certs. So by establishing learning opportunities, we enable our pros to improve their skills and win more work through the OnForce marketplace.

Recently, we announced a partnership with Microsoft to promote new opportunities between our two communities. Among other things, this deal enables our pros to access Microsoft Small Business Specialist certifications. We this this is a growth area in the future, so we’re encouraging our service pros to get trained and certified ahead of the curve.

Then, last week at Breakaway, we announced an ongoing partnership with CompTIA to raise the technical and business skill levels of IT professionals. The initial program enables OnForce pros to get exclusive discounts on training and certification bundles, including CompTIA A+, Network+, Security+ and Server+.

We also announced last week that we’ve selected DirectPointe’s e-learning solution to create and manage our future training programs. This will enable us to quickly roll out world-class training programs, including custom e-learning content to meet the needs of OEMs, solution providers and IT firms.

Much, much more to come in this area.

We’re excited to announce the launch of a buyer referral program, which will reward our provider community with cold, hard cash for referring new buyers to the OnForce marketplace.

To participate, providers just need to refer a buyer to OnForce, and instruct them to include their Tech ID as the “Referral Code” during the sign up process. OnForce will keep track of all buyers who sign up using a pro’s Tech ID. Then, anytime one of these buyers closes their first work order, the pro will receive $25 in your OnForce account.

The more active a referred buyers is, the more cash we’ll pay out:
• If that buyer closes 10+ more work orders within the next three months (after the month of their 1st work order), the pro earns an additional $100; OR
• If a buyer closes 100+ work orders within the next three months (after the month of their 1st work order), the pro earns an additional $1,000.

So each referred buyer can be worth $25, $125 or $1025, depending upon how active they are. There is no limit to the number of buyers a provider can refer, so the payouts are unlimited.

Check out the complete details of this program.

We are pleased to invite all OnForce providers to the first Provider Town Hall – an online meeting for all active members of our community. In the spirit of a long-standing New England tradition, the town meeting, OnForce will host a monthly town hall for providers beginning in December. The town hall is an opportunity for providers to hear what’s new at OnForce, connect with members of the OnForce executive and functional teams and ask questions.

Learn more and register for this event online.

Following the discussion, we will seek your feedback (either through email or in the provider forums) so that we can continue to improve these meetings. Our intention is for this to be a recurring event that will enable all interested members of the community to feel more informed about what we’re doing at OnForce (and enable the OnForce team to be more informed about what you want us to be doing).

We had a great turnout on this morning’s Microsoft/HP webinar - thanks to all who attended. There are four more to go this week, so if you are interested in participating, please “sign up”:1 for one of the remaining times available.

Having been part of this company for two years (my anniversary was earlier this month), I’ve watched as we’ve grown from 4 people in our New York offices at ComputerRepair.com to the thriving, growing enterprise that is OnForce. While there are all sorts of milestones and pieces of big news that have come and will continue to come, today was a big one for me and for the provider community as a whole. To the providers: thank you for being the most impressive, committed group of IT service professionals out there…. To our new partners: thank you for all that you’ve done to bring this program to them.

(And thanks to the random guy who popped in at the middle with the repetitive “hello?” “hello?!” - a little humor for an early Monday morning…)

And it’s just the start…

If you had any questions about the program that weren’t answered or weren’t clear, feel free to ask them here…

For those that are ready to get started on the training, you can visit the “OnForce program page on the HP site.”:2

[1]http://www.golms.com/onforce/index.html
[2]http://www.hp.com/learn/onforce

When you are responsible for developing programs and product enhancements for 10,000 people, you hope that one day you’ll be able to just knock it out of the park for those people. I think we’ve done some great things for providers over the past year – PowerPro has created a way for many providers to demonstrate their consistently strong performance. And PowerMatch has forever changed the way that you showcase your skills and interests to the buyer community – and (we hope) dramatically improved the kinds of work orders you are getting.

But what about things that go beyond the OnForce platform? We’ve helped you get access to Dell certifications, which has been an incredibly successful initiative. And, well… What else? Truth be told, we’ve been so focused on making dramatic product and policy changes that we haven’t done much that helps you with your careers as a whole.

Until today.

I am so excited (cartwheel excited) to let everyone know about our phenomenal “collaboration with Microsoft and HP”:1. When we started this business a few years ago, we always hoped we would be able to announce something like this.

With the launch of Microsoft Vista, the impending Longhorn introduction, and buyers’ increasing focus on their small business customers, we wanted to be able to help providers get smart on those technologies fast. And at a price that they could get nowhere else.

The team at Microsoft Learning has been amazing. Not only were they thrilled to be able to offer learning & certification to providers, but they also wanted to go beyond the basics. They engaged HP, one of their partners, to deliver the training. This way we could have completely customized OnForce packages, targeted directly to our providers. Beyond that, they wanted to give our providers access to information early – so that the OnForce community was ahead of the curve on Microsoft technologies and certifications.

Providers, check your Online Office for the schedule of the introductory webinar – where folks from Microsoft, HP, and yours truly will introduce the program.

Many thanks to the teams at Microsoft Learning and HP Education Services. This is a big day in the history of OnForce and we are looking forward to a long relationship with Microsoft and HP.

[1]http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2007/aug07/08-20OnForce.mspx