Create the Path for your “Career Journey” to Define and Enable a Future that Inspires You
Did you ever notice that as you prepare for a job interview, you learn something about yourself? The dreaded “How did you get here” question forces you to try to explain the connections that led you from “Before” to “Now”. (more…)
Channel Not Selling Your Products? 2 Steps to Connect Your Products to How Your Channel Sells (Part 3 of Series)
Part 3 of a Series: Channel Not Selling Your Products?
- Part 1: 3 Questions You Can Ask to Diagnose the Problem
- Part 2: How Do You Fit Into the Way They Sell?
- Part 3: 2 Steps to Connect Your Products to How Your Channel Sells
- Part 4: Should You Recruit, Enable Or Both? How Do You Decide?
- Part 5: Help Your Channel “Productize” Your Offering within Their Business
In the last two weeks, I’ve talked about diagnosing problems in your channel – and how you can address these challenges to grow revenue. You may have read these two posts excited to see your challenges in print, but also with a sense of doom. You may have thought to yourself, “Darn, that is exactly the situation for my organization. But how can I change this situation?”
This week, I will talk about how technology vendors can make some basic changes to how they market and sell their products that will enable them to connect to how their channel sells. I will focus on “Two Steps to Connect Your Products to How Your Channel Sells” – and discuss how technology vendors can follow these steps to unleash the revenue potential of their Products and Partnerships:
Step 1
Make sure you are connecting to the way that your channel sells, and not not falling victim to the “The Solution-Branding Box” that I talked about in Part 2 of this series. The higher end resellers (the ones that you probably want to have selling your product) don’t position vendor products as stand-alone offerings, but instead position THEIR SOLUTION and THEIR BRAND to the customer, and talk about the vendor products as supporting proof points. Figure 1 below shows how a reseller positions their solutions to customers. Look carefully at the center of the circle – the value proposition, training, sales tools and marketing campaigns all revolve around the overall Solution the reseller is bringing to market– not any of the component vendor products.
Figure 1: How Solution Providers Talk to Customers
Make sure you are connecting to the way that your channel sells, and not not falling victim to the “The Solution-Branding Box” that I talked about in Part 2 of this series. The higher end resellers (the ones that you probably want to have selling your product) don’t position vendor products as stand-alone offerings, but instead position THEIR SOLUTION and THEIR BRAND to the customer, and talk about the vendor products as supporting proof points. Figure 1 below shows how a reseller positions their solutions to customers. Look carefully at the center of the circle – the value proposition, training, sales tools and marketing campaigns all revolve around the overall Solution the reseller is bringing to market– not any of the component vendor products.
If you are operating “inside the box” like many technology companies, you only provide materials centered around YOUR PRODUCT (which is not what your best resellers are selling to customers…) As discussed in more detail in my earlier post about “The Solution Branding Box”, you are doing 2 things that cause big problems for your companies health:
- #1 – You are not connecting with the way that your channel sells or the way customers buy – and you are missing out on revenue opportunities
- #2 – You are wasting a lot of time and money creating materials that don’t fit what your channel needs. You do need product assets, but you should not be creating a lot of assets that start the sales conversation with your product (or worse, one of the sub-products to your platform product. You are creating materials without an audience – because the audience for your channel training is YOUR CHANNEL. Who is not the audience? YOUR SALES TEAM! There can be a big different between what is needed to enable your field team and what is needed for your channel, and I will talk about this more in future posts…
Perhaps more subtly, if you bombard your channel with a ton of “product-push” resources (as discussed in my post, “Does Your Org Structure Lead to “Push” Marketing (and Missed Revenue)?”, you distract them and increase the likelihood they will give up on selling your product and become passive non-sellers. You may recognize these companies – they are the channel partners who look like they COULD sell a lot of your products, but don’t…
Step 2
You can produce GTM programs for your channel that connect with how they do business and help them create a standard process for marketing, selling and delivering your products, as part of the Solutions that they sell. Figure 2 below shows two key phases of this process. Let’s start by looking at Phase 2: Execution. This looks pretty similar to what many vendors do to support their products and this is a good start at connecting with your channel. If you are not organizing your training and tools in a way that is conceptually similar to the Promote, Sell and Deliver, this is an easy win to get started. Ever heard feedback from your channel that your partner portal is a bunch of stuff and they are not sure how it is all supposed to be used? Changes are good that you have not mapped your materials to a basic process to show how they are supposed to be used. Is it any wonder that a partner sales rep (who also sells 10+ other lines) doesn’t know how to find the information they need?
Figure 2: Connecting Your GTM Program to How Your Sales Channels Sell
Phase 1: “Planning to Succeed” is really the “Out of the Box” ingredient in this process and there are two different and very powerful elements in this Phase.
- The first element is the Planning Process, which should occur in the partner BEFORE marketing and selling. Partners are like the rest of us in high tech – they see the world as full of opportunities (from many vendors) and they want to pursue many of the shiny objects that they see. So they market Solution A, train their sales team on Solution B, spend their time in front of customers reacting to what the customers ask about (and often not proactively driving any long term goal at the account). Most partners do planning, but not for all of their product lines, or as well as they would like. To facilitate this planning, vendors should build their GTM programs with an explicit planning step and resources to support business planning. Your CAMs need to have the tools and training to help drive a plan with resources inside your top partners – and by making your CAM a business consultant, you will stand out to your channel as a vendor that is focused on their success.
- The second element is “Productization”, which is similar to what some call “packaging”. When you “Productize”, partners create a set of predefined high-level GTM Solutions that include products from multiple vendors, and their professional services, to make it easy to market, sell and deliver the Solution as if it were one product. We’ve all got the same problem – we have a few stars who can whiteboard and design a a custom solution on the fly and the rest of our sales team who are more “product-centric”. How do you enable a product-focused salesperson to sell a complex solution? By defining the solution like a product…
This post leaves me with two follow questions that I will cover in the upcoming weeks:
- Question 1: How should tech vendors build their programs, tools and trainings to enable partners to “productize” Solutions (that drive revenue for your products)?
- Question 2: How do vendors need to support these Solutions with an overall GTM program that includes training, sales tools, and marketing programs and a systematic way to measure success?
I welcome any comments below — And make sure you “Follow” our blog (look for the “Follow” link on the upper left) and have your say. I’m also available as a public speaker, to support local and global events in Silicon Valley, or the rest of the flattening world… For more details, contact me via the form below.
Channel Not Selling Your Products? How Do You Fit Into the Way They Sell? (Part 2 of Series)
Part 2 of a Series: Channel Not Selling Your Products?
- Part 1: 3 Questions You Can Ask to Diagnose the Problem
- Part 2: How Do You Fit Into the Way They Sell?
- Part 3: 2 Steps to Connect Your Products to How Your Channel Sells
- Part 4: Should You Recruit, Enable Or Both? How Do You Decide?
- Part 5: Help Your Channel “Productize” Your Offering within Their Business
In last week’s post, I talked about the 3 Questions you can ask to diagnose problems in your channel
- What is the Value Proposition for partners to invest their time in selling your product?
- Is your product and go-to-market program “Channel-Ready”
- What is the Sales Process for your product and how does it fit into how your channel partners sell?
In this week’s post, I will explore Question #3 regarding the Sales Process in more detail. This question has some important (more…)
Channel Not Selling Your Products? 3 Questions You Can Ask to Diagnose the Problem (Part 1 of Series)
Part of a Series: Channel Not Selling Your Products?
- Part 1: 3 Questions You Can Ask to Diagnose the Problem
- Part 2: How Do You Fit Into the Way They Sell?
- Part 3: 2 Steps to Connect Your Products to How Your Channel Sells
- Part 4: Should You Recruit, Enable Or Both? How Do You Decide?
- Part 5: Help Your Channel “Productize” Your Offering within Their Business
A common question I hear from clients is, “Why is my channel not selling (enough of) my products?” To answer that question, you have to look deeper at how your channel partners operate and how your company is engaging with your partners. The most important principle to remember is that your partners have a choice – they do not have to invest their time and energy in (more…)
What 3 Questions Indicate You Need to Sell “Solutions”? (and when does selling “Product” work better…) (Part 1 of a Series)
Part of a Series: Helping Your Channel Sell Solutions (So they Can Sell More of Your Products…)
In several posts this year I’ve talked about the importance of marketing and selling solutions – if you want to connect with your customer and drive revenue from your products and alliances.
- Today’s Post – (Part 1)
- Do Your Product Business Units Lead to (Product) “Push” Marketing (and Missed Revenue)? (Part 2
- Today;’s Post – What 3 Questions Indicate Whether You Need to Sell “Solutions”? (and when does selling “Product” work better?…) Part 3
- The Solution Blueprint: A Visual Tool for Connecting with Your Customers (and accelerating product revenue…) (Part 4)
- What are the Steps to Create Solution Messaging? (Part 5)
But is it always a good idea to sell “Solutions”, (When what you really want is for customers to buy your product?) I’ve found that 3 questions below can tell you whether Product or Solution messaging would be more effective to helps sales drive revenue for a particular product and sales situation.
These questions are:
- Does the product solve the customer problem by itself, or is it a part of a group products/ services needed to solve a problem?
- How familiar is the target audience with your product category, and the problem that you solve?
- Where is the individual customer in the buying cycle for your product
Before we dive into each of these questions, let’s back up and look at the customer buying process and how that impacts how we need to sell.. As shown in Figure 1, at the beginning of the sales process, you want to focus on “Why”, to give the customer context on the value you provide. As the customer gets comfortable with “Why,” the customer is looking for the more detailed “What” about the product you are selling.
Figure 1: The Basic Customer Buying/Selling Process
Let’s take an example for a product you know and understand, like an automobile/car. You expect a car to be sold as a “Product”, rather than as a “Transportation Solution”. Why is that?
Question #1
One reason you can sell a car as a “Product”, is that is that the car solves a problem stand-alone. (i.e. a “whole product”). A car already includes tires, a steering wheel, even gas, so after you buy, you can drive it off the lot and to your house or apartment.
But what if it worked differently? What if you bought a car, and the tires did not come with it (after all, they are made by separate companies). Or perhaps you had to choose car seats separately and get them installed by a “seat installation specialist” after you bought the car chassis. !) In this scenario, a customer would have to buy other products and services before they could get the value out of buying a car – so you would have trouble selling a car it would be hard for a dealer to sell a car as a stand-alone product. That is the exactly way a lot of industries operate (including the Tech industry!), so for many Tech products, you need to sell Solutions (more on this in Figure 3 below)
Think about your product in comparison to the car analogy below. Where does your product fit?
- The Car – your product is a stand-alone solution (and may incorporate other products as part of that solution) – a “Primary Product”
- The Engine – your product is a key part in driving the decision for the overall solution – a “Secondary Product”
- The Steering Wheel – your product is part of the car and not thought about as a separate buying decision at all – a “Tertiary Product”
Question #2
Another reason is you can sell a Car as a “Product”, is that the value a car provides is obvious to the buyer, (not just the salesperson!). Most people are familiar with what a car does and why they would want to buy one. Think about the last time you were confused by a new concept or product. You had questions on the big picture, and wanted to understand the “Forest”, before you got into the “trees” If someone tried to sell you “Product” (the “trees”), and listed a bunch of features, you would not have been receptive…
Question #3
A final variable is where an individual buyer is in the buying process. You may have noticed that car commercials often feature cars taking high-speed turns in the woods on a sunny day, usually with happy, attractive passengers. Car companies are trying to appeal to car buyers early in their buying process with a feeling like, “Wow, I could see myself in that car.” They are operating at the beginning of the customer buying cycle – trying to create a case for a change in the status quo.
Now imagine yourself talking to a salesperson in a dealership showroom (I know that can be painful). He/ she would realize that if you had taken the time to come to the dealership to see the car, you were past the “Why” stage, and they would ask you where you were in the buying process and what questions you had about the car. If an individual decision maker is past the “Why” stage, then that is a great time to sell “Product”.
Figure 2 below shows how these 3 questions come together into a single visual you can use to determine if your product and customer are likely to be receptive to “Product” selling.
Figure 2: The 3 Indicators for “Solution Selling”
Solution vs. Product in High Tech
But how does this apply to the world of high tech? In general, what I’ve seen is that many categories of products have moved from the left of this diagram to the right over the past 10-15 years. Figure 3 below shows criteria that you can use to see where your technology product category is on this continuum, and provides context on why that change has occurred.
Figure 3: When is a “Solution Sale” Needed in HighTech?
What we’ve seen in the industry is an increasingly complex “architecture” being built that consists of many technology vendor product offerings that have a need for sophisticated system integrators to architect and deploy. In that context, it is more difficult to “push products”, since buyers increasingly want to design products into the architecture, rather than buy them reactively based on maintenance cycles.
I welcome any comments below — And make sure you “Follow” our blog (look for the “Follow” link on the upper left) and have your say.
The Solution Blueprint: A Visual Tool for Connecting With Your Customers (and accelerating product revenue…) Part 4 of Series
Part of a Series: Helping Your Channel Sell Solutions (So They Can Sell More of Your Products…)
- What 3 Questions Indicate Whether You Need to Sell “Solutions”? (and when does selling “Product” work better?…) Part 1
- Do Your Product Business Units Lead to (Product) “Push” Marketing (and Missed Revenue)? Part 2
- The Three Types of “Solutions”: Which One Do You Use to Market and Sell? Part 3
- Today’s Post – the Solution Blueprint (Part 4)
- What are the Steps to Create Solution Messaging? (Part 5)
Last week I talked about the importance of using solution messaging to connect to your customers and build a strong foundation for your GTM program, in my post, “The Three Types of “Solutions”: Which One Do You Use to Market and Sell?”
But how do you create a strong solution message? A method that I have often used successfully is “The Solution Blueprint”. Before I dive into describing the tool and how to use it, let’s back up and talk about some of the challenges that we typically encounter when we develop joint solution messaging with our alliance partners: (more…)
“Climbing Out of the Box”™ 