Case Study: Plesk

Plesk is one of the largest, most well-known brands in the web hosting control panel market; however, in North America its brand had negative connotations. A new management team was at the helm that had set a new, better direction for the company. Plesk wanted to get noticed for that new direction, wanted to make amends with worthwhile former partners, and wanted to set a new course towards growth in North America.

Plesk needed insights only a third party could gather. Third party engagement of key partners will help re-establish relationships. Examining existing relationships will also be sufficient to chart a path to growth. This is because Open Eye used partner insights to determine what Plesk is good at, and what it is failing at. From that, it is relatively simple to chart a roadmap for the organization that has it doing more of what is working, and less of what it is not.

By approaching Plesk partners as an independent third party, Open Eye was able to accomplish something that Plesk itself could not. Hiring a third party to gather feedback and do an assessment showed that Plesk was interested in gathering real, actionable feedback from its partners. Most partners were thrilled for the opportunity to speak openly and honestly about their experiences with Plesk. After giving partners a chance to share their experiences with the product and the company, Open Eye strategically detailed Plesk’s current activities in a way that helped them re-establish key in-market contacts with partners, to rebuild credibility with them.

At the same time, Open Eye learned from those partners. Plesk was doing some things right, and other things wrong; in some cases, there was a fundamental mismatch between the partner and Plesk that couldn’t be easily resolved. In others, there was real growth potential. After talking to enough people, it was possible to anticipate where the opportunities lay. A predictable landscape developed that forecasted which partners were key growth agents, which were ideally suited for the future of Plesk, and which were not. That roadmap could be applied well beyond the group of key interviews – it could serve as clear target profiles for future partners.