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Yearly Archives: 2014
Podcast: Driving Revenue by Bridging the Gap Between Your Alliances and Channels
Listen to the recent podcast – from Steve Andrews
Overview
Over the past couple of years, we have been talking about the challenges for vendors to drive revenue for their products and partnerships, and how many of current practices are based on old business models for selling hardware, then software, and now being misapplied for cloud.
But how can technology vendors change to drive revenue in today’s world?
- The Mission for the Andrews Consulting Group is to “Help Technology Vendors Unleash the Revenue Potential of their Products and Partnerships”
- To accomplish that goal, we’ve developed a new approach to “Climb Out of the Box”™: A New Approach to Drive Revenue for your products and Partnerships
Learn More
Does Your Messaging Work in the Internal “Cocoon” – But Fall Flat with Customers?
I often create customer presentations for clients, and talk to friends and ex-colleagues to see how tech companies are positioning their offerings to customers. What I’ve observed is that staff inside tech organizations get very comfortable with their products and their internal acronyms and tend create messaging in a sort of internal “cocoon”, and as a result, position their products in a way that often does not connect well to customers.
We’ve all heard the term “pull marketing” and know it is a desired marketing outcome where the customer is reaching back to you as the vendor for information about your product. That makes the life of sales easier because customers are saying they want to talk to them – and that can lead to an easier and shorter sales cycle. Think of “Push” marketing as the opposite -– when a vendor broadcasts their message to customers and hopes that something about their message resonates and leads to sales pipeline and closed deals. Declaring that one of your messaging pillars is “accelerate I/O performance” sounds like a good thing, but how does it connect with a problem the customer has? In other words, Why should target customers care?
“Push” marketing is often the result of being internally focused and this is often driven by product-focused org structures, as discussed in my blog earlier this your, “Do Your Product Business Units Lead to (Product) “Push” Marketing (and Missed Revenue)?” (more…)
Struggling with Channel Demand Gen? Escaping “Boxed” Marketing Strategy and Execution (Part 3 of Series)
The last two weeks I’ve discussed common misconceptions about Channel Demand Generation as part of a series called,
“Struggling with Channel Demand Generation?
- Maybe Your Partners Don’t Want the Same Things You Want…
- What Should You Do When Channel Partners Say They Need Leads? Run!
Today we will talk about the root causes of these differences in strategy and execution – and what tech vendors can do about it. This topic is a great example of the “boxed thinking and execution” that stems from long term practices that were developed in the past – but no longer apply or work in the current environment. I’ve detailed “the Four Boxes in previous posts and they are the root causes of many of the challenges the tech industry faces driving revenue for their products and partnerships. (more…)
What Should You Do When Channel Partners Say They Need Leads ? Run!
We’ve all heard the request (even plea) from channel partners, “Give me leads and I can sell more of your product!” It seems like a reasonable request, right? After all, your channel partners have every reason to expect a 2-way street partnership with their vendors.
The problem is that of all the things that the vendor can do to help their partners be successful, providing leads is at the bottom of the list. That seems counterintuitive and today when I “Googled”, “leads for your channel” I did not have to look far to find the conventional wisdom – “You know you have to do it – and they expect it….”
This topic had come up in a number of discussions with partners over the years and I had my “A-Ha” moment on this issue in mid- 2000s. I remember the conversation over late night beers at a Partner Advisory Council. When this topic of leads for the channel, came up, a partner owner leaned over and in a hushed voice said something like: “You know, we all like to get leads, but… (more…)
Struggling with Channel Demand Gen? Maybe Your Partners Don’t Want the Same Things You Want… (Part 1 of Series)
I recently attended a webinar by a consulting firm on how to optimize the lead waterfall and I was interested in seeing how they dealt with the nuances of working with a channel. They discussed the very real issues regarding lead rating, qualification and follow up, system challenges, and the lack of marketing skills in many channel partners, and they outlined some best practices.
What they did not talk about was that for many channel partners, leads just don’t play a very big role in their business model – so it is any surprise that they don’t market the way vendors want…
- Every tech vendor starts from a point of zero penetration and has to build awareness and start customer conversations with accounts that are new. They hire Reps that know the local customer base, but a Rep only has so many accounts and relationships – and they need to continuously add customers to grow.
- On the other hand, a mid-sized channel partner often can build a strong business selling 80% of their business into 5-10 accounts. They try to sell more to these customers and develop profitable services to support product sales.
Do You Have Holes in the “Tire” of Your “GTM Wheel” That Prevent Revenue from Your Products and Partnerships?
The last few weeks I’ve been talking about how to build a GTM Program Wheel, shown in Figure 1 below, that aligns your company to drive revenue for your products and alliances.
- First we defined the layers of a GTM program in “Is Your Channel Program an “Onion”? Leveraging the GTM Wheel to Build a Program that Drives Revenue”
- Then we talked about 2 Common Mistakes in Defining the “Hub” of the “Channel GTM Wheel” that limit revenue for products and channels
- Last week we talked about the program elements, of the GTM Wheel, in “Are the Spokes of Your “GTM Wheel” Aligned to Drive Revenue?”
Figure 1: The “GTM Wheel”
This week we will be talking about the underlying foundation, or “The Tire” of the GTM wheel highlighted in Figure 2 below. The “Tire of the GTM Wheel is the Operations and Infrastructure that take your GTM program and make it a reality for your team and your partners. (more…)
Are the Spokes of Your “GTM Wheel” Aligned to Drive Revenue?
If you’ve been reading this blog throughout 2014 you’ve seen a continued focus on the GTM Bridge that technology vendors need to build to connect their products and their alliances to their customers. The GTM Bridge is shown below in Figure 1 and the last couple of weeks, my posts have focused the second element of the bridge – how to build a “GTM Program Wheel”.
Figure 2 below shows the components of the base layer of the GTM “Onion”, the “GTM Wheel”. In today’s post I’ll be talking about the hub and spokes of the wheel and how you leverage those elements to drive revenue.
Figure 1: Building the GTM Bridge – GTM Program
2 Common Mistakes in Defining the “GTM Wheel” that Limit Product and Channel Revenue
Last week I talked about an approach to driving revenue for products and channels in terms of “Three Layers of the GTM Onion” and defined the base layer of the GTM in terms of a GTM Wheel. A wheel is a good analogy for developing a GTM program because there is a center, or hub of the wheel that is the center of rotation for the “spokes “that define the critical elements of the GTM Program.
In today’s post I will talk about this base layer of the “Onion”, the GTM Program Wheel (shown below in Figure 1), and two common mistakes companies make in in defining and executing the “Hub” and the “GTM Wheel” that can lead to missed revenue. (more…)
Is Your Channel Program an “Onion”? Leveraging the “GTM Wheel” to Build a Program that Drives Revenue
In last weeks’ post I talked about 2 Common Gaps in Most Companies’ GTM based on the GTM Bridge shown in Figure 1 below. The first element of the Bridge was Solutions. Today we will look at the second section of the bridge – Channel GTM Programs.
Channel Programs are like Ogres – and onions. Of course this is a reference to the movie, “Shrek”, where Shrek is upset that that everyone thinks he is a stupid beast and are not able to look beyond his appearance to understand the sensitive soul inside…
Shrek copyrights owned by Dreamworks Animation
People take one look at me and go “Aargh! Help! Run! A big stupid ugly ogre!” …
They judge me before they even know me. For your information, there’s a lot more to ogres than people think…
Ogres are like Onions. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers… You get it? We both have layers.
The Ogre/Onion analogy is descriptive for channels because what you see depends a lot on your role and how well you understand what it takes to deliver value to customers and channel partners in a channel program. (more…)
What Causes Products and Alliances to Miss Revenue Targets?: Two Common Gaps in the “GTM Bridge”
In a number of my posts this year I’ve talked about the key elements of a GTM program for a product or an alliance in terms of “Building a Bridge” between your products and your customers. The “Bridge” analogy is an apt description because for a product or an alliance to drive revenue, companies need to complete all of the key pieces of the bridge (who wants to go halfway across the bridge and then fall in the abyss below). The Four Key Elements of the GTM Bridge are shown below in Figure 1.
- Solution
- GTM Program
- Field Readiness
- Sales Channel Execution
The question we are looking at in today’s post is where in this process do technology vendors generally have problems? In my experience there are two parts of the GTM Bridge that consistently cause problems and lost revenue in technology vendor GTM programs. These challenges are highlighted by the Red in Figure 1 below.
- Solutions are not clearly defined and messaging does not connect with customer challenges (often “product push”)
- GTM programs are not adopted by field marketing, sales and channels teams (and programs are perceived to be “thrown over the wall”)
Figure 1: The GTM Bridge and Common Gaps in Execution
“Climbing Out of the Box”™ 