Marketplace or direct sales: which distribution channel

Cloud marketplaces carry increasing weight. Sales on hyperscaler marketplaces rose to about 16 billion dollars in 2023 and are expected to reach 85 billion by 2028, according to Invisory.

More importantly, the money is already there: companies hold more than 360 billion dollars in cloud commitments they can use to buy third-party software through these marketplaces. Selling where the budget is already committed noticeably shortens the buying cycle.

Direct sales keeps the opposite advantage: full margin and 100% ownership of the customer relationship. No commission, no intermediary between you and the buyer, total control over price and experience. But all the demand is yours to generate.

The commission isn't a single number. On AWS Marketplace, it ranges from 3% for a standard SaaS offer to 20% for a server-type offer (AMI, container, ML model), with private offers dropping to 1.5% on large deals, according to the official AWS Marketplace documentation. Azure and Google Cloud apply a simpler rate, around 3% on most transactions.

On a SaaS priced at $49 a month, a 3% commission represents about $1.50 per subscription, a minor amount if the marketplace brings you a customer you wouldn't have found otherwise. The math changes on a server-type offer at 20%, where the commission can eat several months of margin over the life of the contract.

Before listing your SaaS, calculate the real commission of the marketplace you're targeting and compare it to your current acquisition cost with the CAC calculator. A 20% commission still pays off if it saves you a sales cycle of several months; it stops paying off if your direct sales already convert well.

The marketplace lends you an audience and trust: the buyer sees your product in an environment they already know. In B2B this is decisive, since word of mouth and ease of integration weigh heavily in the choice of a tool, as shown by G2.

The price of that reach is a commission that eats into your margin and a relationship partly captured by the platform: limited customer data, dependence on its rules. You gain speed, you lose autonomy.

Direct sales demands more acquisition effort at the start, but every customer truly belongs to you. Calculate the impact of the commission on your real acquisition cost with the CAC calculator.

Many SaaS companies do not choose: they use the marketplace for initial acquisition, then push their customers toward a direct relationship for margin and loyalty. The marketplace becomes an entry channel, not the only door.

This mixed model protects your margin on your best accounts while still benefiting from the traffic and already-committed budgets on marketplaces. The key is to never stay a prisoner of a single distribution channel.

If referral-partner channels interest you, also compare affiliation or partnerships, and to frame your overall model, see product-led or sales-led and our guide building a SaaS.

The real danger of a marketplace is dependence. A change in rules, commission or algorithm, and part of your acquisition disappears overnight. A marketplace is an excellent entry channel, a poor sole channel.

The remedy is simple: use the marketplace to acquire, but build a direct relationship and owned channels in parallel, such as your newsletter or your SEO. You benefit from the reach without being chained to it.

This logic applies to every borrowed channel: the more a channel does not belong to you, the more you need to balance it with assets you own. It is the same caution that guides the choice between rented acquisition and owned acquisition.