Cyren and S3 educate customers on inbox security

Security is top of mind for customers, but the channel will continue to play an educational role as it helps to introduce more innovative options for users.

Inbox security is one of the technologies that interests users when they hear the details, but it often needs a channel partner to make an informed pitch to get the conversation started.

For that reason, channel building becomes important and partnerships are key for a vendor like Cyren. Matt Halsey, senior director sales, EMEA and APAC, at the security player, is keen to work with partners.

Security Software Solutions (S3) is one of the channel players that has taken on the Cyren product and been out in front of customers stirring up interest.

Tony Mason, managing director of S3, said the firm was always looking for the chance to put something fresh and useful in front of customers.

“With email security, you’ve got all the standard players there, but it’s good to see some innovative solutions coming in, like inbox security, that a lot of our customers haven’t heard of yet,” he said. “It definitely enhances our story.

“When a customer trusts you, then you talk to them about secure email gateways and antivirus, and they start to trust you about the other technologies as well in that space. So, if you’re adding it to your story and putting the arguments together, you’re potentially solving some problems for them.”

Halsey said there were advantages to working with partners that had a “trusted adviser” relationship already established with their customers.

“The value of working with partners like S3 is the strength of the relationship they have with their customers and the trust they have to bring those solutions, so they don’t have to adapt to go through that massive due diligence process because they have already done that kind of bit for them,” he said.

Mason agreed that a lot of the conversations it was having with customers were educational, informing them of the technology and how it could add to their cyber defences.

“We’re still in the education phase,” he said. “We’ll speak to an end-user and they’ll say, ‘Well, I didn’t even know I could do that. Thanks for letting me know. I need to think about that’.”

Email security has gained importance with the shift to hybrid working, with more staff relying on the technology to communicate with colleagues, and Halsey said it had also formed a partnership with security training and awareness player KnowBe4 to get more users up to speed on threats.

S3 was awarded KnowBe4’s partner of the year accolade and Mason said it remained important for customers to be prepared to fend off the latest attacks, with phishing continuing to rise.

“Security awareness training is all about that backstop of training your staff to be a firewall, really,” he added.