Google is looking for channel help, posting an ad for an "enterprise director of channel sales" on TalentZoo.com this week.

Normally, we wouldn't care, but the Tuesday post comes after The Channel Insider discovered that some Postini VARs got a rude shock when they listened to a Postini/Google channel sales official lay down the law.

Basically, Google is chopping the legs out from under VARs by undercutting them in price. Read the details on The Channel Insider here.

One VAR told eWEEK it is "definitely going to migrate away from Postini for a lack of loyalty because Google is hinting that when [our] contract is up with Postini, that's it. They're basically saying we need to move from a higher margin, low volume business to a higher volume, low margin business and that opportunities remain for us to provide value-add services, totally undefined."

Ouch. Google says in the ad the hire will build "channel programs that augment Google's Direct sales team and drive additional business and value to the customer."

One presumes he or she will have their work cut out from them in the wake of the VAR revolt. How do you find VARs willing to take less money and keep the customers to whom the applications are being piped to happy at the same time?

But if Google is to challenge Microsoft in applications, it will have to do some pretty drastic things, such as charge far less for its software and risk ticking off some solution providers.
The new hire's challenge, then, is merely a reflection of Google's own as an organization.