While some companies rely solely on direct sales, many gain a significant amount of revenue through other channels – in some cases, such as producers of consumer goods, close to 100% of revenue may come through their retail channels.
For those consumer companies it’s common for them to do joint marketing with their retail partners. P&G, for example, may contribute co-op dollars to support a supermarket chain’s advertising of P&G’s products.
In the case of the supermarket, that’s a fairly straight forward arrangement. After all, the chain is marketing all the time and P&G can piggyback on it.
But what if your channel partners aren’t marketing?
That is the case for many B2B companies. They may be selling their equipment through distributors and dealers who are doing little marketing.
Many software companies have channel partners who resell, install (if the software is on premise), integrate, configure, and do training on their software. But while software companies are especially adept at today’s increasingly-digital marketing programs, many of their partners (who may be professional services firms at heart) often are not.
And when the channel partners aren’t marketing they’re both being hurt because the software vendor is losing out on sales, too.
In those cases, software vendors (and other B2B companies) need to go beyond just contributing dollars to their partners. They need to show them the way.
They need to educate their partners on what marketing even is (many people think it’s just advertising and promotions, or social media), why it’s important, and the impact that it can have on their rate of growth. They can explain the impact that their marketing programs are having on their revenue. And they also need to educate them on the most effective marketing programs, and how to successfully execute them.
But knowing what to do and actually doing it are two different things. Marketing programs live or die with consistent, excellent execution. If the partner doesn’t have staff experienced in managing modern marketing programs, they may also need consultants, freelancers, and agencies to help them.
At revenue & associates, we’re helping companies empower their channel partners. Please let us know if that’s something that you need help with.
