Two numbers from our latest research look, at first glance, like they can’t both be true. About two-thirds of companies (66.9%) say they’ll likely buy their next communications technology directly from the platform provider. Yet just over two-thirds (67.6%) say some type of channel partner, rather than the platform provider, delivers the greatest value to their company.
As it turns out, both findings hold up in Metrigy’s Buying Strategies for Communication Services 2026-27 global study of 202 companies in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Germany, and France in August.
Direct Is Already the Default
Looking first at where companies buy today, a clear majority buy workplace collaboration directly from the platform provider, such as 8×8, Cisco, GoTo, Microsoft, RingCentral, Vonage, or Zoom. The rest are split roughly evenly between buying only through a partner and buying from both. Contact center is more contested, as direct leads by a narrower margin and partners play a role, alone or alongside the platform provider, in a noticeably larger share of purchases (44.4%). Direct contact center purchases go to providers such as 8×8, Cisco, Dialpad, Five9, Genesys, NiCE, RingCentral, UJET, Vonage, or Zoom.
Company size explains much of that split; the median size of company buying direct is far smaller than one buying only through partners, and companies buying from both are larger still. In fact, most direct buyers make their purchases on the provider’s website rather than through a salesperson. Smaller companies can often click “buy” and be done, while larger ones use more vendors, have more locations, and require more integrations, which is precisely where partners earn their keep.
The Next Purchase Leans Direct—Mostly
Looking ahead, two-thirds of companies say they’ll definitely or probably buy direct next time and only a small minority (14.1%) lean toward a partner. Few say they’ll definitely buy from a partner.
Over the past five years, more companies shifted toward buying direct vs. buying from partners. But among companies with more than 1,000 employees, more moved toward partners than toward direct. The companies leaning toward a partner for their next purchase are larger, too, with a median of 500 employees vs. just over 200 for those set on buying direct.
There’s also a sizable middle ground of companies (19.0%) with no preference at all for their next purchase. Those undecided buyers, along with the largest enterprises, are the channel’s real opportunity.
The Value Vote Tells a Different Story
So if buyers are heading direct, why do partners keep coming out ahead on value? And why doesn’t that value translate into purchases?
When we asked which type of provider delivers the greatest value, the platform provider came out on top as the single most frequently chosen type, though its 32.4% share falls well short of a majority. The rest went to a long list of partner types: technology services distributors (TSDs), carriers, managed services providers (MSPs), systems integrators, cloud marketplaces, independent software vendors (ISVs), value-added resellers (VARs), and referral partners.
IT and CX leaders find value in the partner relationship for integration, migration, multi-vendor management, and maintenance, among other attributes. But they perceive leverage on product development with a direct relationship with the platform providers. There are dozens of vendors and thousands of partners to consider, resulting in more fragmentation among partners than platform providers. That fragmentation is the channel’s real problem, because while partners collectively deliver more value than platform providers, at buying time the smaller number of platform providers show up as big, familiar names and partners show up as thousands of smaller voices.
What Partners Deliver That Platforms Don’t
To find out why companies credit partners with so much value, we broke out the reasons behind each vote, and the answers split cleanly by provider type.
Companies that picked a partner type were more than twice as likely as those picking the platform provider to cite the ability to manage multiple vendors. They also gave more weight to geographic reach, local presence, and vertical industry expertise, which barely registered for the platform provider. On the flip side, companies that chose the platform provider leaned much harder on pricing and AI expertise, while integration capabilities ranked high for both groups.
That split explains a big reason for the apparent contradiction. , Buyers make the purchase decision on price and AI, where the platform provider looks strong and its website makes buying easy. Partners earn their value afterward—coordinating the vendors, locations, and integrations that no single platform provider covers. Not surprisingly, companies rank ongoing support as the biggest role partners play in their decisions, so the value is real, but it shows up after the purchase decision has already been made.
Waiting for the Value to Speak for Itself Isn’t a Strategy
Partners that want to improve their positioning should consider the following:
- Go after the undecided. A sizable group of buyers has no preference for their next purchase, so get in front of them before they land on a provider’s website.
- Put a number on multi-vendor management. If coordinating vendors is why customers value you, quantify what it saves them in staff hours and outages avoided, and lead with it in the sale, not at renewal.
- Focus on larger companies. Partner buyers are consistently bigger, and the largest enterprises are moving toward partners rather than away from them.
- Improve and promote AI expertise. Decision-makers are emphasizing companies that they consider to be AI specialists. Having and promoting that expertise is crucial.
For platform providers, the lesson cuts the other way, since direct momentum doesn’t mean partners matter less. Two-thirds of companies still say a partner delivers their greatest value, and partners are most involved in the larger, more complex accounts every provider wants. Treat partners as the ones who keep those customers running smoothly after the sale, not as a channel to route around.
For more information, check out the full study.
