Plan a professional service offer
This article introduces the different options and requirements for publishing a professional service offer to the commercial marketplace. Read this article to prepare your offer for publishing using Partner Center.
Note
Professional services must be sold using a US, UK, or Canadian seller ID. To understand which market your seller ID is configured in, select Account settings, then Legal info, then the Developer tab.
What's a professional service?
Professional services are customer engagements that support a customer's use of the Microsoft Cloud. Use this offer type if you want to offer assessment, briefing, implementation, proof of concept, workshop, migration, or customer support services for software that is platformed on the Microsoft Cloud (this offer can be for your own software, another partner's software, or Microsoft software). Professional services can be transacted on the marketplace via Private Offers. You're responsible for fulfilling the service. Microsoft handles billing, invoicing, collecting payment from the customer, and paying out to the partner.
Note
Today, professional services must be offered virtually. They cannot be offered on-site at the customer's location.
Types of professional services
You can offer professional services that support your own software or another partner's software (third-party software), or you can choose to offer services that support Microsoft software (first-party software).
For services that support third-party software, you'll be prompted to provide a link to the commercial marketplace listing for that software on the Properties page. This ensures that every service on our marketplace is related to software that is also being sold on the marketplace. You aren't required to sell both the software and service together at the same time. Services that support third-party software are transactable via Private Offers by default. You can't publish these as listing-only offers.
For services that support first-party software, you'll be prompted to select the primary Microsoft product that your service supports on the Properties page. Because you're selling services for Microsoft products, we verify that your company has earned the appropriate Solutions Partner Designations. Services that support first-party software can be published as listing-only offers or as transactable offers.
A note on offer discovery
Based on the type of software your service supports, and whether you elect to sell through Microsoft or not, the storefront experience varies.
| Type of product your service supports | Sell through Microsoft? (yes/no) | Primary product | Storefront |
|---|---|---|---|
| My service is intended for software published by my company or another Microsoft partner (also known as third-party software). | Yes (also known as a transactable offer) | N/A | Marketplace in Azure portal Note: Transactable offers aren't searchable on the storefront today, and therefore won't generate customer leads. If you'd like to share your offer listing information with a customer, you must provide them with a direct link to the offer. |
| My service is intended for Microsoft software, such as Azure, Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, or Power Platform (also known as first-party software). | Yes (also known as a transactable offer) | Any Microsoft product (examples: Azure, Dynamics 365, Microsoft 365, Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI, Power Virtual Agents) | Marketplace in Azure portal Note: Transactable offers aren't searchable on the storefront today, and therefore won't generate customer leads. If you'd like to share your offer listing information with a customer, you must provide them with a direct link to the offer. |
| My service is intended for Microsoft software, such as Azure, Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, or Power Platform (also known as first-party software) | No (also known as a listing-only offer) | Azure | Azure Marketplace Note: Listing-only services are displayed to customers in the storefront as Consulting Services. |
| My service is intended for Microsoft software, such as Azure, Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, or Power Platform. (also known as first-party software) | No (also known as a listing-only offer) | Not Azure (examples: Dynamics 365, Microsoft 365, Power Apps, Power Automate, Power BI, Power Virtual Agents) | AppSource Note: Listing-only services are displayed to customers in the storefront as Consulting Services. |
Customer leads
For listing-only offers, the commercial marketplace will collect leads with customer information so you can access them in the Referrals workspace in Partner Center. Leads will include information such as customer details along with the offer name, ID, and online store where the customer found your offer.
You can also choose to connect your CRM system to your offer. The commercial marketplace supports Dynamics 365, Marketo, and Salesforce, along with the option to use an Azure table or configure an HTTPS endpoint using Power Automate. For detailed guidance, see Customer leads from your commercial marketplace offer.
Note
Today, transactable professional services listings are not visible on our storefronts and therefore won't generate customer leads. You may still choose to connect your CRM system to your offer for future use.
Category
When you publish your offer, you'll be prompted to choose a category for your service. Marketplace supports the following service categories:
- Assessment: An evaluation of a customer's environment to determine the applicability of a solution and to estimate the cost and timeline of its implementation.
- Briefing: An introduction to a solution or a service using frameworks, demos, and customer examples.
- Customer support: An upgraded support plan with expedited response times or access to specific professionals for a software solution.
- Implementation: A complete installation that results in a fully working solution.
- Migration: A service that helps to migrate a customer from a software solution running on-premises or another cloud to Azure.
- Proof of concept: A limited-scope implementation to determine whether a solution meets the customer's requirements.
- Workshop: An interactive engagement conducted on the customer's premises. It can involve training, briefings, assessments, or demos built on the customer's data or environment.
The category you select determines the tax code associated with your service. If your service spans multiple categories, select the category that is most relevant.
Note
Listing-only professional services do not support Customer support and Migration categories.
Offer listing details
When you create your consulting service offer in Partner Center, you'll enter text, images, documents, and other offer details. Customers see the following when they discover your offer in Azure portal:
Call-out descriptions
- Logo
- Service type
- Solution areas (Azure Marketplace) / Products (AppSource)
- Industries
- Country/region
- Offer name
- Search result summary
- Description
- Promotional media
- Supporting documents
Note
Transactable professional services listings are not searchable on any storefront today. If your customer would like to see your offer details and marketing materials, you may share a direct link to your offer.
To help create your offer more easily, prepare some of these items ahead of time. The following items are required unless otherwise noted.
Name: This name appears as the title of your offer listing in the commercial marketplace. The name can be trademarked. It can't contain emojis (unless they're the trademark and copyright symbols) and must be limited to 200 characters. Don't include your company name unless it's also the product name.
Search results summary: Describe the purpose or goal of your offer in 200 characters or less. This summary is used in the commercial marketplace listing search results. It shouldn't be identical to the title. Consider including your top search engine optimization (SEO) keywords.
Note
Transactable professional services listings are not searchable on any storefront today. If your customer would like to see your offer details and marketing materials, you can share a direct link to your offer.
Description: This description is displayed in the commercial marketplace listing. Consider including a value proposition, key benefits, intended user base, and any category or industry associations.
When writing the description, follow these criteria, according to your service type:
| Service type | Description requirements |
|---|---|
| Assessment | Include a detailed agenda for assessments longer than a day, and articulate what deliverable the customer can expect. |
| Briefing | Explain what deliverable the customer can expect. |
| Customer support | Include a detailed description of the type of support your customer can expect. |
| Implementation | Include a detailed agenda for implementations longer than a day, and describe what engineering changes, technical artifacts, or other artifacts a customer can expect as outcomes of the engagement. |
| Migration | Describe the steps to take to complete the migration from on-premises (or another cloud) to Azure. |
| Proof of concept | Describe what engineering changes, technical artifacts, or other artifacts a customer can expect as outcomes of the engagement. |
| Workshop | Include a detailed agenda for your workshop. |
Here are some tips for writing your description:
Clearly describe the value of your offer in the first few sentences, including:
- The type of user who benefits from the offer.
- Customer needs or issues that the offer addresses.
Remember that the first few sentences might be displayed in search results.
If the price of your offer is estimated, explain what variables determine the final price.
Use industry-specific vocabulary.
You can use HTML tags to format your description. You can enter up to 5,000 characters of text in this box, including HTML tags and spaces. For information about HTML formatting, see HTML tags supported in the commercial marketplace offer descriptions.
Search keywords (optional): Provide up to three search keywords that customers can use to find your offer in the online stores. You don't need to include the offer Name and Description.
Contact information: In Partner Center, you'll be asked to provide name, email address, and phone number of two people in your company (you can be one of the two contacts). We use this information to communicate with you about your offer.
Supporting documents: Upload at least one and up to three customer-facing PDF documents that provide information about your offer. For example, they could be white papers or brochures.
Marketplace media – logos: Provide a PNG file for the large-size logo. Partner Center uses the file to create a small logo. You can optionally replace the small logo with a different image later.
- Large (from 216x216 to 350x350 pixels, required)
- Small (48x48 pixels, optional)
The large logo appears on your offer listing page in Azure Marketplace or AppSource. The small logo appears in Azure Marketplace search results or on the AppSource main page and search results page.
Follow these guidelines for your logos:
- Make sure the image isn't blurry or stretched.
- Limit the number of primary and secondary colors on your logo. The Azure design has a simple color palette.
- If you use a transparent background, make sure that the logo and text aren't white, black, or blue.
- Avoid gradients in the logo or background. Don't place text on the logo (not even your company or brand name).
Marketplace media – promotional images: Add at least one and up to five images that highlight your service's value proposition, differentiation, and customer success. The images could include snapshots from a slide deck, fact sheet, case study, or marketing one-pager summarizing your service. All images must be 1280x720 pixels in size and in PNG format.
Marketplace media – videos (optional): You can add up to four videos that demonstrate your offer. The videos must be hosted on YouTube or Vimeo and have a thumbnail (1280x720 pixel PNG file).