Demystifying how to create a transactable offer in Microsoft Marketplace

What is a transactable offer?

A transactable offer is a type of offer that allows customers to purchase your solution directly from Microsoft Marketplace, the online store for cloud-based applications and services. Customers can use their existing Azure subscription and billing account to buy your solution, without having to go through a separate contract or payment process. This simplifies the customer journey and reduces the friction of acquiring your solution.

Note: The term “Microsoft Marketplace” in this post includes both AppSource and Microsoft Commercial Marketplace

What are the benefits of a transactable offer?

By creating a transactable offer, you can leverage the following benefits of Microsoft Marketplace:

• Access to a large and growing customer base of Azure users, who can discover and buy your solution from the Marketplace website, Azure portal, or other Microsoft channels.
• Ability to offer flexible pricing and billing models, such as monthly or annual subscriptions, pay-as-you-go, or usage-based billing.
• Integration with Azure's identity, security, and management features, such as Azure Active Directory, Azure Resource Manager, and Azure Monitor.
• Ability to use pre-committed cloud spend that your customer has already set aside for this purpose.
• Reduced operational costs and complexity, as Microsoft handles the billing, invoicing, and collection of payments from customers.

What are the different kinds of transactable offers?

There are various kinds of transactable offers in Microsoft Marketplace but for the purposes of this post, we will focus on SaaS offers as they are most relevant to ISVs.

SaaS offers

A SaaS offer is a cloud-based application or service that you host and manage on your own infrastructure, and that customers access via a web browser or an API. Examples of SaaS offers include CRM, ERP, or e-commerce solutions. A SaaS offer can have one or more plans, which are different tiers or options of your solution that customers can choose from. Each plan can have its own pricing, billing, and feature set.

How do you create a SaaS transactable offer in Microsoft Marketplace?

To create a transactable offer in Microsoft Marketplace, you need to follow these steps:

• Register as a publisher on Microsoft Partner Network, the platform for Microsoft's partner ecosystem.
• Create a publisher profile on Partner Center, the portal for managing your offers and business relationship with Microsoft.
• Create an offer in Partner Center, and select the offer type (SaaS), the pricing and billing model, and the technical and marketing details of your solution.
• Complete the technical aspects (dedicated post coming up!)
• Submit your offer for validation and approval by Microsoft, who will review your solution for quality, security, and compliance.
• Publish your offer to Microsoft Marketplace and monitor its performance and customer feedback.