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It all starts with recruitment. Pick the wrong part-
ners and you will be wasting time. You can’t even as-
sume Pareto’s Rule of 80/20; it’s often 95/5. Only about
5 percent of your partners will produce consistent sales.
And you want more like them, correct?
In each channel program, there is always the “quan-
tity versus quality” debate. More often than not, there
is pressure to add more partners. More is better. More
means more sales. That’s the theory anyway.
“If the partner is selling our competitor, why couldn’t
he sell our stuff?” There actually could be a bunch of
reasons. Ask Cisco partners to sell Juniper or Xerox
partners to add Ricoh to their lines. Why aren’t Ford
dealers selling new Chevrolets?
But let’s back up a little. Whenever I start a project
in channel sales, the first thing I do is determine the
relationship with that customer, and billing builds trust.
To be a true Telecom Solution Seller, the partner has to
want to be more than the pipe salesperson. He may not be
comfortable asking about any other services. He may be
transactional. Replacement services of like for like (broad-
band or T1 for 10MB, SIP trunk for PRI) are easy to sell
transactionally. But most businesses are using hosted email,
conferencing, backup (hello, Dropbox!), especially today with
smartphones and their personal clouds with Apple, Amazon
and Google. It can still be a replacement sale.
It is about customer wallet share. Getting deeper into
the customer (for the partner) means that the churn goes
down, ARPU goes up and the commission checks get big-
ger. Another factor: no other partner will come along and
replace your services with their own, cutting you out.
Network is the easy piece. Voice and cloud services
are usually a little complicated because there are moving
parts (such as phone numbers, data to move, and new
processes to train employees on). Yet once you get them
on your service, they are sticky.
The key to sales is to be helpful. In what ways can you
enhance your relationship with your partners? One way
is to let them know who is buying what. When a sale is
made, let partners know. “This bank bought this and that”.
Now the partner has a concrete idea that banks buy this
and that. Service providers can do this by email, but they
can also utilize their LinkedIn group or Twitter account. It
doesn’t have to be email all the time.
The other big issue is: How do I get their attention?
Partners are drowning in email and webinar invites. May-
be email isn’t the best way to reach them. Have you asked
them what method of communications they would prefer?
If the partner is ignoring emails, there are other av-
enues. Social networks such as Google+, LinkedIn and
Twitter allow for a different way to reach out to a partner.
It doesn’t have to be a “Hey you!”
In my experience, congratulations are a great way to
touch a person. Whether it is a birthday, promotion, anni-
versary – or, even better, their name mentioned in the press
– dropping a quick “Congrats!” on social networks is a way to
get noticed while acknowledging the moment for the partner.
“Being helpful” was Zig Ziglar’s definition of sales. Jef-
frey Gitomer used to say, “Always give value first.” What
most people care about is themselves. WIIFM is the watch
word of the day: What’s In It For Me.
Treat the partner to a marketing campaign to peak
his interest. Tweet about the new SPIFFs without details
– have them reach out to you. Use it as a hook. “One
partner just got a check for $2,000. Contact me to find
out how you can get one.”
Send a Vine or a video email that is two minutes or
less but is personal. “Hey, your last quote request was for
a bank. Just sold a couple of bank deals. Think we can le-
verage that for your deal? Call me.” It was quick, personal
(or relevant), concrete, clear with a call to action.
Often I am added to email lists. This morning I re-
ceived a “newsletter” with the subject line about a disaster
area. The body was a mess of info about energy and mesh
and renewable. No idea who sent it or why I got it. That is
the case often. Don’t be that person.
The subject line needs to catch their attention. (So
does the sender name.) There needs to be a call to action.
An irresistible offer – SPIFF, promotions – also helps.
Through all this keep in mind: am I being helpful? Is this
valuable? Would I send it to a friend?
As far as being helpful, think about new partners. How
can you work with a new partner to get them a win in
their first 60 or 90 days?
One reason Freemium is a popular model today is that
the risk for a user is really low. Extrapolate that to our
business. Free-trial offers or no-risk guarantees are note-
worthy. If a partner is new, a smaller deal is less risky.
It isn’t always about the price, sometimes it is about
the risk (which is about trust). Build trust in little ways like
testimonials and reference accounts. Written procedures for
deployment and introductions to the implementation team
or project manager also can help build trust with a partner.
Recruiting and on-boarding are just the beginning in
a partner relationship. Helping the new partner with her
first win is just as important.
Chapter 4:
Recruitment
70
Channel
Vision
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May - June 2015