I joined the 2012 Fall IBM Software Business Partner webcast last week and the call was packed with great information.  If you didn’t make the live webcast, don’t worry—you can still register to listen to the replay presentation and download the Q&A.

The 2012 Fall IBM Software Business Partner webcast was hosted by Mark Register, Vice President, Software Business Partners and Midmarket, and Shaun Jones, Vice President, Software Business Partner and Midmarket Marketing. Mr. Register and Mr. Jones talked about where we’ve been so far this year and how to finish up 2012 strong.

Key updates shared on the call included:

Co-Marketing—IBM’s investment in co-marketing increased by over 50 percent worldwide from last year, to help you generate leads. The Co-Marketing Center provides centralized access and tracking for marketing activities, funding and execution support. Ready-to-Execute campaigns provide out-of-the-box simplicity to get started with co-marketing quickly. On the replay, you’ll hear more about the recent co-marketing funding changes to encourage more participation.

Solution Accelerator Incentive—This incentive rewards the simultaneous sale of eligible IBM Servers and Storage with eligible IBM software products. It has a base reward and a solution bonus. Starting October 8, 2012 through March 31, 2013, all new license Passport Advantage products will be eligible for SAI (does not include Appliances, SaaS or Renewals).  We are also increasing the amount of time to make a claim—from 30 days to 60 days after the last invoice date—making it easier for Business Partner’s to participate and earn more money!

Propensity to Close Modeling—Uses IBM Smart Analytics to pull data from multiple sources and rank the likelihood that an opportunity will close…all tested and tuned at the geography level.  This modeling will rank both IBM identified opportunities passed to you, as well as partner-identified opportunities. If you’re juggling multiple opportunities and want to prioritize where to focus your time on the deals most likely to close, take advantage of Propensity to Close Modeling.

These are just a few of the helpful tools and incentives available in 4Q. Listen to the replay and access the links provided to PartnerWorld for more specifics. And don’t forget to let us know what you think! We invite you to use the comments feature below to give us direct feedback.

Debora Cole (@ibm_ics_bps)