Novell Gold Partner - is it worth getting? 2

[marvhuffaker]

Hoping someone could help me with this.. I am an independent consultant, and I support Novell NetWare and products exclusively. I have met the certification requirements (CNE 6 and CNS 6.5) to get Gold Partner status, but the $795 program fee concerns me.

I have also read discussions that tended to belittle the worth of a Gold Partner, from a client perspective.

Could anyone give me their take on the deal? Should I do it or not? Will it help bring in new business? Will I recover the fees in new contracts? or is it another worthless marketing strategy?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Marvin Huffaker
Marvin Huffaker Consulting

 

[Psychoid]

I believe that it would be worth it for two reasons:
1) Gold partners get quite a lot of free training on Novell products
2) Novell Consulting will often sub-contract work to their partners. Obviously, a gold partner would get preferential treatment


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Bill
Consultant / Network Engineer
CNE, CCNA

 

[Provogeek]

Worked for Gold, no Platinum partner. You will be at a disadvantage if you compete with a platinum partner.

Check to see if there is a platinum partner in the area, if there is, you will get secondary treatment.

Platinum partners are required to have 4 CNE's, 1 CDE, 1 GCNE, and I think 2 or 4 CNS's

You will get the traning vouchers Psychoid tlaks about, but not as much as the platinum partner gets.

Since your a one man shop, things will be difficult, and training will be hard to make time for.