More organizations are realizing the benefits they can gain from cloud tools and solutions. In fact, 92% of organizations are already in the cloud in some capacity. This isn't surprising since cloud technologies offer a solid foundation for becoming more agile and collaborative — critical skills to keep pace with the digital transformation wave.

As Accenture points out, the cloud can bring more to your business than just an effective solution for internal storage and collaboration. It's a powerful tool that enables organizations to transform their data by enhancing its freshness, accessibility and scalability to provide high-level customer service support and increase profitability.

But how can you be sure that you're extracting the most value possible out of these technologies and support systems?

Let me share what I've learned over the years by working with some of the most notable technology vendors (Microsoft, DataDog, and Snowflake).

1. Customer Success Support

One of the most valuable benefits of partnering with a cloud vendor is access to a support team. These contacts are often just as committed to your success and are invested in providing the support you need to achieve sustainable profitability and growth. They'll be the first to guide you through the partner ecosystem and help you maximize each opportunity.

Assigned customer success managers can help you keep track of your spending and budgeting. It's no secret that cloud costs can spiral if not managed well. However, actively tracking and monitoring your spending across these platforms eats up a lot of time. Having a trusted customer success manager who's responsible for monitoring your spending and alerting you to any challenges can help you achieve peace of mind and stay on track with your goals and budget.

2. Technical Guidance And Expertise

The adoption and integration aspect of working with a cloud vendor is the most important step in the process. Thankfully, cloud technology vendors offer in-house expert engineers, "architects" or managers dedicated to offering your company guidance throughout the process. Onboarding new technologies can be complex and arduous, especially for large enterprises. Having the ability to work closely with specialized experts who can solve sophisticated tech problems as they arise and optimize your data experience can turn your data strategy into reality. When it comes to getting new employees up and running on the platform or training them on a new capability, having go-to, technical contacts is an invaluable advantage.

Forming close, first-name-basis relationships with in-house experts can also keep you in the know about upcoming services and products. Ask them about their plans on expanding services and products, especially if you're making a cloud vendor your long-term partner. When their plans mix well with your own, there's a strong chance that the relationship will be a long and productive one.

3. Access To The Marketplace Sales Engine

Partnering with a cloud vendor also allows you access to their sales engine, providing you with common customers and targets to expand your pipeline. Thousands of customers leverage cloud data platforms at a time, which enables organizations to expand the value and reach of their data even further.

Entering a partnership with a data marketplace opens your organization up to a larger ecosystem of new customers that can drive up your overall sales. For example, vendors like Microsoft enable greater lead sharing as well as the opportunity to co-sell. Joining forces with other companies in this way not only expands your customer reach but also encourages the development of your organization's unique offerings and creates better customer outcomes and shared profits.

4. Greater Awareness With Mutual Marketing Programs

Not only does a cloud vendor partnership open you up to greater lead opportunities, but it can also grant you access to mutual marketing programs. For example, a unified platform like Snowflake enables marketing teams to thoroughly evaluate trends more easily and can offer the opportunity to analyze and gauge progress at an individual or more holistic level. With a central data solution, organizations can efficiently access insights and identify untapped potential.

By joining multiple data streams into the cloud, marketers can take advantage of centralized and easily accessible data sets, unified reporting that can be analyzed and viewed holistically in real time, easier data management, seamless sharing and lower costs with the ability to scale up or down based on the data storage you need at a given time.v

Many cloud vendors also offer benefits that provide guidance and amplification throughout the listing process. Whether it's a press release, blog or social posts to promote your partnership, or the option to enlist in free trials, cloud vendors will work with you to help you get in front of customers and further boost awareness and credibility.

So, my takeaway: Work with your partners, exploit your partners, they're there to support you and happy to help. If you utilize them correctly, they won’t only de-risk any complex technology implementations but help you to market them and sell more.

This article was originally published by Forbes Technology Council.