Sales and use tax vendor Avalara has kicked off a program for QuickBooks ProAdvisors and their QuickBooks Online clients in the United States. The initiative provides participants with not-for-resale copies of AvaTax for QBO. They receive a six-month free trial of the Avalara Sales Tax Compliance App for QBO for ProAdvisors' QBO clients. Advisors can also earn AvaBucks, a program that provides $75 per referral for those who refer clients to Avalara.

Exact Macola has outlined a five-point plan in what it calls a high-level strategy to change its approach to the channel. The plan was detailed by Gayle Prokop, director of alliances and channel development, at this week's Exact Macola Edge 2015, its channel conference. The first was a general plan of "evolving" the Unity Partner Program that was launched in February. More specific is the intent to develop "a structured, certification-based enablement program" and to add employees to the channel organization.

Xtuple, which markets an open source ERP System, says named Charles Schley, managing partner of the ERP Implementation Consulting Group, as Partner of the Year award. That award has been renamed "Partner of the Year—Dan Means Memorial Award", after Dan Means, an xTuple reseller who died in February 2014. The company also named two resellers who made its Elite Partner status for the first time this year.