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January 30, 2008

Part 3 of 3: 2008 Partner Enablement Trends

30 January, 2008
By William Vanderbilt

It's not uncommon for the majority of an IT vendor's channel partners to need up to 18 months before aggressively selling the vendor's new products. In fact, in a 2007 survey of vendors channel managers, "Investment in new channels / products" was identified as the number one challenge related to enabling channel partners.

Partner Enablement Gaps

There are several reasons for slow channel adoption of an IT vendor's new products:

"Moore's Law" - There is an increasingly complex IT ecosystem for channel partners to sell and support. Their ability to stay current with all of the products from all of the vendors they support is exponentially more difficult every year.
Interoperability and Interchangeability - There are numerous alternative vendors, products and services to which channel partners can turn. If widget A doesn't fit a solution well, it is relatively easy for a channel partner to make widget B fit. The two products don't even have to be directly competitive. It is increasingly common for channel partners to find new ways of solving problems with altogether different technology solutions.
"Chicken and Egg" - Until results are realized, there is hesitancy on behalf of all parties to make too great of an investment. Vendors may limit the investment they make in driving sales through partners, until they learn what partners are successful with the product. Channel partners may limit their investment (training staff, goodwill with customers, etc.) in the new product until they see more successful product implementations.

A common solution to the problem is to produce massive amounts of product information and training. The theory is that channel partners will only start driving sales of a product when it has adequate product information. No one wants to look uninformed, least of all in front of his or her customer. If channel partners can't answer all of the questions that may be thrown at them, they won't aggressively begin positioning the new product. At least that has been the theory.

Yet, this sheer volume of product information and training can make the problem worse. Channel partners are led to believe that they have to grasp all of these details to sell and support the new product. The more information provided, the more complex the product seems to be. The end result is that fear, uncertainty and doubt can be driven to new heights.

So what are vendors doing about this in 2008? Many are doing nothing. Not sure where to begin to solve the problem, or not even aware of the problem in the first place, many vendors are continuing to pump out information related to new products, and then set unrealistic expectations for when and how channel partners will sell their new products.

Some vendors are turning to direct sales channels to address the issue. The theory is that a vendor has a greater chance of convincing its own people to drive new product adoption. This logic makes sense. However, it may have ramifications on the ability of the vendor to leverage its channel; not just for the new product, but for any products it may sell.

Some leading vendors have approached the situation differently. Instead of increasing the amount of new product information they provide to channel partners, they are actually decreasing it. Of course, this has to be handled with care and strategy. Not giving channel partners the information they need to sell and service products can increase support costs and slow channel adoption. But clever vendors have started to systematically analyze what information they need to provide channel partners, to ensure new product adoption.

The 80/20 rule is alive and well. This area of business is no exception. Channel partners really only need 20% of the information they have traditionally been given to drive 80% of the product adoption. Instead of cramming every detail about the new product into very big and scary technical manuals and extended training programs, successful vendors have systematically approached the information sharing process by asking, "What is the 20% of the information that can give me the 80% results?"

The average channel partner works within about 20 vendor partner programs. Frankly, with the amount of information produced on new products, it's a wonder that channel partners even manage to pick up what they do about new products.

So, as you proceed with 2008, ask these four questions:

Am I delivering the right information?
Am I reaching the right partners with this information?
Am I delivering the right information at the right time?
Is the information delivered in the right medium?

To learn more about what vendors are doing to enable existing and new partners and how NIIT is systematically supporting those efforts, please download the Channel Partner Enablement brochure today, Click Here.

Part 1 of 3: 2008 Partner Enablement Trends
Part 2 of 3: 2008 Partner Enablement Trends

William Vanderbilt has over 20 years experience in all aspects of IT education, and in his current role he has responsibility for strategy in the information IT vertical, focusing on channel partner enablement. Previously, Mr. Vanderbilt held executive positions within technology companies including, most recently, VP of Education and Training at CompTIA, and C-level positions at the Beacon Institute for Learning, and CompUSA.

As IT vendors rely more and more on their channel partners to drive sales, customer satisfaction and profitability, the need for enabling those channel partners grows. To understand those dynamics and identify best practices associated with enabling partners, NIIT has conducted several research projects on the topic of IT Partner Enablement.

For more information about these studies, contact NIIT at 1-630-343-6261.

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