Reseller Channel

Building an indirect sales channel is not easy, and it takes time and effort to do this correctly. In building our channel at MicroBiz, here are a few lessons we learned.

The right content can transform sales reps into teachers. They become sources of information, rather than someone who simply repeats a tagline. They become problem solvers who understand the challenges that their prospects face. They become coaches who are equipped to understand their prospects’ strengths and weaknesses—and encourage them to think differently. And by championing the right content, they become thought leaders.

Success comes in many forms, but a significant area of importance for business growth is the building and maintenance of collaborative partnerships. If a small business is built on a model that cannot sustain more than a handful of clients at any one time, how do you scale?

If you want to dramatically grow your revenue you need to determine what will propel or ignite your company’s revenue growth. What are the critical elements of your go-to-market strategy and plan that will make the difference for you? What do you have in place and what is missing? Are you operating on all cylinders? Let’s review five ways you can ignite your revenue growth and innovative best practices which you can implement today.

A channel enablement definition is: utilizing resources to ensure that channel sellers have all the tools they need to be successful—and that the organization can track the success of their efforts—to increase operational efficiency and improve alignment. What is channel enablement exactly? Channel enablement has emerged as a leading concern for organizations that rely heavily on partners to sell and market their products and services.

We hear it all the time. The sighs of exasperated channel account managers and channel marketing managers who toil away implementing and maintaining legacy PRM systems that are rarely, if ever, actually used by their partners’ sales reps.

If you want to sell through the channel, you begin with a pre-departure checklist. I know it sounds tedious, but it’s not a waste of time. In fact, you may get to know your company better by going through this assessment.

These 30 top SaaS providers run the best partner programs in the business—here’s how you can do the same.

Here’s how to shine the spotlight into your ring, reduce the distractions, engage channel sales reps one on one and drive more revenue.

Lina Parness runs the Alliances and Partnerships program for LogiGear and has more than 15 years experience helping companies expand partner programs and business development channels. She took time to speak with Software Business Growth about how she helped build the Partner Program at LogiGear, as well as the unique challenges that come with working with large partners such as Oracle.

One of the worst mistakes a company can make is to believe an external sales team needs no training or close interaction — that you can just sign a reselling agreement and then go back to business as usual while strangers make your offerings fly off the shelves. But trusting an external team like a Value Added Reseller (VAR) with your work is like trusting a babysitter with your children. You can just rush out the door and hope the kids are in one piece when you get home, or you can work with the sitter to develop a plan for the best, safest, most enriching experience. The more involved a software manufacturer is with their VAR team, the better that team understands the value propositions your solutions deliver – and the better equipped they are to make consistent, lucrative sales.

As a channel sales consultant, I sit down with various high-tech companies interested in creating a channel. Many of these businesses are startups or SMBs and their ability to even begin to build a channel can be a challenge. They lack customers, revenue, and/or sufficient resources to build out a proper infrastructure. So, how can they make revenue to support this endeavor, find partners willing to work with them, and provide the leads necessary to get the program off the ground?

Vendors looking to go above and beyond in their business have likely considered building out a channel partner program, and if they haven’t, they should. Channel partners can help vendors access new markets, reach new buyers, extend their pool of resources and rev up revenue — driving growth and bringing in the numbers vendors want. Despite the quantitative benefits and the easy assumption that more is better, when it comes to leveraging the channel optimally, vendors must remember that if quality doesn’t trump quantity, it certainly enables the abundance of positive results.  

The definitive outcome in a successful channel partnership is to engage and motivate their reps to push your product above the rest on a continuous basis.

The best, most successful channel partnerships are built on a strong foundation that consist of establishing a business plan, educating, and training on the product or service, and ensuring a clear vision and mutual understanding of goals—from day one.