What does channel sales mean

Recruit channel sales partners. Make sure you pick the right partner based on capabilities, culture, and willingness to engage with you. Inbound recruitment. Inbound recruitment happens when potential partners come to you. For instance, you can set up a form on your website where potential partners can express interest in selling your products. Then, someone inside your company can vet the application and determine if the partner is a good fit. This can be a cost-effective way to grow your partner network, but you may need to supplement this with outbound recruitment to attract the right partners for your needs.

Outbound recruitment. Identifying and contacting partners proactively rather than waiting for them to contact you is another option. For instance, many vendors rely on events like trade shows to highlight their solutions and attract prospective partners. These initiatives can be time-consuming and costly, but may be effective in helping you find the ideal partners. Hire a channel sales team. Your channel sales program needs dedicated staff to support it and your partners. Depending on the size of your company, these positions may be spread across many or few individuals.

Channel sales leader. Channel sales leaders are responsible for meeting partner revenue targets and overseeing a healthy sales funnel. Besides needing a solid grasp of the indirect selling motion and partner ecosystem, channel sales leaders require strong business acumen and financial knowledge. CAMs are on the front lines and own the relationships with partners, from onboarding to providing sales resources and support.

CAMs are responsible for working with partners to build pipeline, so the ability to coach and motivate is critical. Channel marketing manager. Channel marketers must be able to run two distinct types of marketing: In to-partner marketing, you engage current and prospective partners and communicate the value of doing business with you. Channel marketers must be very clear on the value proposition of your products and services and how to position them effectively.

Channel operations or portal manager. Also sometimes described as partner program management, channel operations involves helping partners become productive and successful by building out scalable tools and processes. One important responsibility includes designing and managing the partner portal, where partners log in to access resources and workflows. Here, a focus on operational excellence, efficiency, and user experience is particularly useful. Onboard new channel sales partners.

At a minimum, your onboarding program should get partners up to speed on the following: Products and features Pricing structures Selling processes Goals of the partnership Personalize the partner experience with relevant content and recommendations. Support your channel partners. Now what? Partners need ongoing support throughout their involvement with your company. Below are some ways to show your support and set partners up for success.

Provide instant access to resources. In addition to onboarding materials, partners need just-in-time information to help them address specific customer issues. Partners may need access to product specs, marketing assets, pitch decks, or more. Making these resources available on demand empowers partners to be more productive and reduces the back-and-forth with internal channel managers.

Offer omni-channel support and peer groups. Be sure partners have chat, email, or phone support for when questions arise. You can also consider offering a B2B social media community for partners, where they can find applicable success stories, ask questions of each other, and share best practices.

This peer-to-peer community is potentially worldwide and always open 24 hours a day, which makes it more scalable than providing one-to-one partner support alone.

Offer market development funds. Market development funds MDF are discretionary monies vendors give to partners to execute marketing initiatives and generate future sales. Some vendors are very specific about how MDF can be used, while others give partners more latitude to spend it how they choose.

Provide prepackaged campaigns. Build strong relationships with channel partners. Recruiting, onboarding, and supporting channel sales partners takes valuable time, money, and other resources.

Launch a partner advisory board. Give select partners an active voice in your strategy. Create a board — either formally or informally — that you can tap into for feedback, ideas, and pilot testing new programs and technologies. Create a joint business plan. Keep partners — and yourself — accountable by aligning on yearly business plans. Set goals for each quarter and check back in with each other at a regular cadence to ensure both sides are delivering on their promises and collaborating effectively.

Co-invest in sales reps. Channel partners always want more salespeople, but those cost money. This can be very attractive to the partner, and give you reps who are very interested in your own product.

Take responsibility for issues. When end customers have an issue with a partner, they often complain to the vendor. When that happens, do not throw partners under the bus, even if they were at fault. Instead, apologize to the customer and work with the partner to make things right. Customers expect partners to be an extension of your business, so working with the partner to resolve issues reflects positively on both of you.

For example, Salesforce has their AppExchange program, an online marketplace for apps and consulting services.

Companies like AppSumo are also becoming increasingly popular with many early-stage SaaS startups. The drawback to this channel strategy is that these startups must offer their product to AppSumo customers at discounted rates, lowering profit margins.

The hope is that the increased sales volume is enough to make the effort worthwhile in the long run. Partnering allows you to leverage the existing customer base of an established brand, so you can expand your own customer base.

This lets you take your products to a wider market and increase your cash flow at low cost, without needing to scale your sales team. There are a variety of different ways you can implement partnerships for your channel sales, including:. Depending on the nature of your product, you may be able to include several of these partnership models in your sales tactics to increase your reach and revenue.

The biggest sticking point will be the cut that your partners take from each deal. If your startup relies on monthly recurring revenue MRR , the metrics and calculations around this are impossible to predict when third parties are involved. Choosing your sales partners carefully is critical to your and their success in this type of relationship. Partnerships can quickly turn sour if communications and support break down, or if there are conflicts between your partners and your direct sales team.

Most startups begin with hiring a sales rep or two and taking the direct sales route, adding channel sales further down the track. Blog Post. Read Now. The Modern Sales Tech Stack. Your Primer on AI for Sales. Sorry, No data match for your criteria. Please refine your filters to display data. View Conference. Gartner Webinars Expert insights and strategies to address your priorities and solve your most pressing challenges.

View Webinars. Recommended Webinars for You Webinar.