Partner Experience Key To Boosting Indirect Sales Says Leading Analyst At ImpartnerCON 2016

SiriusDecisions’ Laz Gonzalez keynotes at PRM leader Impartner’s inaugural global customer conference, outlines top reasons PX is a priority for channel chiefs

As Customer Experience (CX) has moved to the front of the CEO agenda, Partner Experience (PX), has become a top priority for companies selling through the channel, a leading industry analyst said recently at ImpartnerCON, a conference of global SaaS Partner Relationship Management (PRM) leader Impartner customers. In a keynote at the event, Laz Gonzalez, group service director, channel strategies, for global B2B research and advisory firm SiriusDecisions, outlined five key reasons channel chiefs consider improving their partner’s experiences to be one of their top priorities:

• The channel is an engine of growth
• Increasing competition for partner mindshare
• Partners are more selective about investing in vendors, with PX as a primary decision driver
• PX directly impacts experience (CX)
• Evidence shows that PX directly impacts partner engagement, performance and loyalty

“In 2016, ease of doing business is one of the key reasons partners add or drop a supplier offering,” Gonzalez said. “Unfortunately, many B2B leaders who employ a multi-channel model are still only in the early stages of defining partner experience requirements or are struggling with developing and setting goals.”

During the presentation, Gonzalez highlighted common drivers of poor partner experience and counseled attendees to focus their partner experience efforts on the following top pillars:

• Product and profit: develop products that are channel-ready vs. products for customers and then selling them through the channel.
• People and alignment: Create the organizational infrastructure and governance supporting requirements definition and management.
• Programs and tools: Equip partners with quality support, effective enablement tools as well as simple and straightforward programs.
• Processes and technology: Improve processes to reduce difficulties in doing business with partners.
• Promotion and communications: Effectively manage the flow of the right messages to the right partners through the right media.

In closing out his session, Gonzalez encouraged attendees to begin the process of building a roadmap to PX excellence by assessing which maturity level best represents the organization’s starting point for each of the PX pillars. While a number of solutions are available on the market to help companies access their partner journey, for more information on SiriusDecisions PX Maturity Model (https://www.siriusdecisions.com/CSRIntroducingtheSiriusDecisionsPartnerExperienceMaturityModel.aspx), click here.

Gonzalez delivered his remarks during the keynote address to more than 100 attendees at ImpartnerCON, a three-day business management conference providing insights and tools for companies to maximize their channel program and optimize their use of Impartner’s PRM technologies. The conference is being held in Snowbird, Utah, from Feb. 17-19.

About Impartner
Impartner delivers the industry's most advanced SaaS-based Partner Relationship Management solution, helping companies worldwide manage their partner relationships and accelerate revenue and profitability through indirect sales channels. Impartner PRM is the industry's only turnkey solution that can deploy a world-class Partner Portal in as few as 30 days, using the company's highly engineered, three-step Velocity onboarding process. For more information, visit www.impartner.com.