RED HAT & CRAYON
Delivering Crayon a smoother way to optimise and innovate.
At a glance
Discover how Crayon addressed the challenge of evolving from traditional migration narratives to embrace the full scope of Red Hat's open-source opportunities. By developing a unified story and strategic foundation, Crayon not only empowered its sellers to upsell with AI, data, and application innovation, but also provided Red Hat with a scalable model for rapidly launching future partnerships—ultimately offering businesses a roadmap for efficient modernization and growth.
The Challenge
Many businesses that feel tied to their legacy infrastructure and applications are looking to modernise with Red Hat’s open-source technology because it gives them the freedom to choose the best technology for the job.
But Red Hat partners needed help capturing the breadth of the Red Hat and open-source opportunity, and as a result, their story to customers was not clear. Though many partners are excellent at selling a standard infrastructure migration and modernisation story, jumping to an automation-driven Red Hat OpenShift, Linux and Ansible story is like going from a Fiat to a Ferrari. Red Hat needed to help their Partners close the knowledge gap.
Crayon was already a stand-out Red Hat partner, and in 2022 Crayon Group and Red Hat entered into a strategic partnership to power joint growth. They wanted to build a strong, shared pipeline of opportunities, increase revenue in a big way, and create market awareness around Crayon as the go-to strategic advisor for containerisation and Red Hat technology.
The Solution
We had two main missions: first, to help close the knowledge gap for Crayon sellers so they could more effectively sell Red Hat technologies, and second, to create business-led customer solutions that would help them grow—and we needed to do it under one unified story.
We started by developing the strategic foundation. The main value the partnership adds is to create a smoother customer experience: a journey that goes from building an agile, secure and automation-driven digital foundation to improving business performance and powering innovation with modern application development and enhanced data and AI capabilities.
This gave Crayon sellers a model to better understand the Red Hat technology world, and the compelling “optimise today, to innovate tomorrow” message also helps cut through to customers.
We also created a go-to-market plan to empower internal sellers, target new audiences, and upsell existing, and used our in-house agency to produce initial assets from the plan to speed up time to market.
Why Crayon's results are remarkable
By transforming the sales narrative from traditional migration to a nuanced focus on open-source opportunities, Crayon sellers are now equipped to upsell using AI, data, and application innovation. This shift has not only elevated the sales conversation but also provided Red Hat with a streamlined model for rapidly launching future partnerships.
Why this story matters
This case study showcases how a well-executed strategic partnership can drastically improve sales capabilities and streamline go-to-market strategies. For businesses grappling with the complexities of modernizing their legacy systems, it offers a blueprint for leveraging open-source technologies to not only innovate but also scale rapidly and efficiently.
About Crayon
Headquartered in Oslo, Norway, Crayon is a global IT consultancy with more than 3,300 employees in nearly 40 countries, specialising in guiding businesses on software, cloud, data, and AI solutions tailored to their needs and budgets. With a strong emphasis on marrying technology with human expertise, the company operates around the clock and offers a range of services, from optimising hybrid and multi-cloud environments to innovating with scalable data platforms, all underpinned by values of integrity, pace, quality, and agility.
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challenge
Building a joint foundation
Many businesses that feel tied to their legacy infrastructure and applications are looking to modernise with Red Hat’s open-source technology because it would give them the freedom to choose the best technology for the job. But Red Hat partners need help capturing the breadth of the Red Hat and open-source opportunity, and as a result, the story to customers is not clear. Though many partners are excellent at selling a standard infrastructure migration and modernisation story, jumping to an automation-driven Red Hat OpenShift, Linux and Ansible story is like going from a Fiat to a Ferrari. Red Hat needed to help close the knowledge gap. Crayon was already a stand-out Red Hat partner, and in 2022 Crayon Group and Red Hat entered into a strategic planning cycle to power more joint growth. They wanted to build a strong, shared pipeline of opportunities, increase revenue in a big way, and create market awareness around Crayon as a go-to strategic advisor for containerisation and Red Hat technology.
SOLUTION
Optimise today, innovate tomorrow
We had two main missions: first, to help close the knowledge gap for Crayon sellers so they could more effectively sell Red Hat technologies, and second, to create business-led customer solutions that would help them grow--and we needed to do it under one unified story. Our tried and tested methodology fuses strategy, creative and go-to-market, so to build the right foundation we started with strategy. We identified that the main value the partnership adds is to create a smoother customer experience; a journey that goes from building an agile, secure and automation-driven digital foundation to improving business performance and powering innovation with modern application development and enhanced data and AI capabilities. Not only did this give Crayon sellers a model to better understand the Red Hat technology world, but the compelling “optimise today, to innovate tomorrow”message helped cut through to customers. We also created a go-to-market plan to empower internal sellers, target new audiences, and upsell existing, and used our in-house agency to produce initial assets from the plan to speed up time to market, ensure sellers from both organisations understood the joint value, and solidify the message in market.
RESULT
Partnership is stronger than ever
Crayon sellers are empowered with the knowledge and tools to explain how customers can migrate and modernise effectively with Red Hat to gain the freedom they seek. By extending the solution setup beyond infrastructure and migration to a conversation around innovation, powered by AI and app modernisation, it means Crayon also have the right tools and story to upsell their current base. In addition to solidifying this partnership, Red Hat is able to use the model we created to redefine and launch other partnerships to market at greater speed to expand their reach and solution adoption with specific verticals and regions.
Partnership is stronger than ever
Crayon sellers are empowered with the knowledge and tools to explain how customers can migrate and modernise effectively with Red Hat to gain the freedom they seek. By extending the solution setup beyond infrastructure and migration to a conversation around innovation, powered by AI and app modernisation, it means Crayon also have the right tools and story to upsell their current base. In addition to solidifying this partnership, Red Hat is able to use the model we created to redefine and launch other partnerships to market at greater speed to expand their reach and solution adoption with specific verticals and regions.
