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Want to Sell Solutions, But at the Velocity of Transactions? Connect Your Sales Plays to Provide a “Path” to a “Destination” (Part 4 of a Series)
A common concern among sales executives is the “velocity” of their sales approach. As we’ve been talking about in this series, concern about “velocity” often keeps tech vendors from trying to sell “solutions”. In this series, I’ve been talking about the 4 Steps to “Sell Solutions at the Velocity of Transactions.”
- Step 1 Use “Vision-Quest Marketing” – to generate awareness and inbound inquires
- Step 2: Use “Destination-Based Selling” to provide a clear end-state and accelerate buying decisions
- Step 3: Provide a “Yellow-Brick Road”– to give customers a prescriptive “Path” for getting to this “Destination”
- Step 4: Use “Sales Plays” to create specific “Steps” on this “Path” that your marketing and sales teams can communicate and sell
Now that we’ve established a “Destination” and a “Path” for your customers, what should technology vendors do to get customers to adopt their Solutions and Products? If you looked at 10 sets of marketing materials and sales tools from across the industry for storage, networking, management, converged infrastructure, virtualization and cloud solutions, you would assume that the answer is – “build tools to sell your product/service”?
But as one of my professors in college used to say, “If you put that answer on your paper come Q day, you’ll get a BIG RED X, (Heh, Heh, Heh).” (more…)
Channel Not Ready to Sell? Maybe You Are Training Them Too Much Like Your Own Sales Reps… (Part 3 of Series)
The last 2 weeks, we’ve been talking about channel partner enablement and the gaps in industry practices that limit technology vendors’ success in creating revenue through their channels.
Channel Not Ready to Sell?
- Perhaps You are Violating One of the “5 Natural Laws of Channel Enablement”? (Part 1) discusses these laws and the Law #1 regarding enabling partners to do something
- 2 Simple Steps to Enable Channel Revenue (Part 2) focuses on Law #2 and the formula for success in Channel Enablement that goes beyond just training, to tools
This week we will focus on Natural Law #3 – Channel Sales Training ≠ Vendor Rep Sales Training
Stop and think about that statement for a minute. Do you think it is true? I’d wager if you asked 10 colleagues in the tech industry this question over lunch, you would get nearly universal disagreement. However, what I’ve seen working with tech vendors and their channels over the past 20 years is that,
while the sales training needs for your channel partners and vendor reps sales are similar, they are different in some important ways that require tech vendors to train their channels’ sales team differently than how they train their own sales reps…
Channel Not Ready to Sell? Perhaps You are Violating One of the “5 Natural Laws of Channel Enablement”? (Part 1 of a Series)
Channel Not Ready to Sell? First of a 5-Part Series
- Part 1 – Perhaps You are Violating One of the “5 Natural Laws of Channel Enablement”?
- Part 2 – 2 Simple Steps to Enable Channel Revenue
- Part 3 – Maybe You Are Training Them Too Much Like Your Own Sales Reps…
- Part 4 – Perhaps You are Not “Packaging” Your Enablement Within Your Channel Program
- Part 5 – Do You Make Your Training Real with “On-the Job” Training?
One of the critical success factors in GTM Program is how well a technology vendor engages with the channel to jointly sell. The channel enablement team must face a broad set of challenges, ranging from how to onboard new partners, assure that partner sales teams, their SEs, and often their consultants have the information they need to be successful. And these tasks need to be supported in introductory and advanced versions, for multiple products and solutions. As if this wide-ranging charter is not enough of a challenge, “enablement” teams must deal with the inevitable tension between Sales Organizations and Field Readiness teams that train sales reps and SEs and feel that Channel is never “enabled enough” and don’t factor in that partners are not required to take vendor training (or to sell their products…).
In my experience, many of the common approaches to channel “enablement” are ineffective, and part of the many outdated, “Boxed” set of practices in the tech industry that have evolved over the years, based on the old world of hardware-centric selling. These practices limit vendor success and revenue. Providing proven alternatives to these types of practices is a big part of the Andrews Consulting Group focus, to help technology vendors “Climb Out of the Box”, and accelerate revenue for their products and partnerships. Check out my post, “Are You Executing Outside of the Box? – The Checklist”, to see see how your organization compares to these practices.
So how can technology vendors address these challenges, and drive more revenue through their channel?
A good way to think of best practices for channel enablement is in terms of the 5 Natural Laws of Channel Enablement below. In today’s post I will talk about overall needs for channel enablement, and Natural Law #1 in more detail. (more…)
“Climbing Out of the Box”™ 