Channel Partner Training
Channel partners are a cost-effective way to increase revenue, distribute your product, and break into new markets. And in today’s digital and multi-market world, channel partners are a necessity for developing a competitive presence online and on the ground.
But channel partnerships bring specific challenges and risks. Trusting a third party to sell, distribute, or install and service your product puts your brand on the line. You also run the risk of having to run interference – whether through having to provide frequent assistance and explanations to the partner, or by resolving issues with the final customer. Plus, your competitors or related businesses may be working with the same partners and competing for their loyalty and attention. As third-parties who are selling for you but not part of your core company, their loyalty is harder to earn and keep.
If you are currently working with channel partners, you may have already experienced some of these issues. And you may be wondering how to build channel partners in a way that brings more reward than risk.
Your success depends on channel partner performance. So, how do you overcome these challenges?
Channel Partner Training = Success
The answer to channel partner management begins with quality channel partner training. Starting with an effective partner learning program is the foundation of how to develop channel partners who will represent your brand passionately and effectively.
Channel partner training is a broad term. The specific partner training that you implement will vary depending on the responsibilities and current skills of your channel business partners.
Any business partner training course that you offer needs to include product training, since understanding the features of your product or service is the most crucial element to representing your brand effectively. Understanding the product has been shown to increase channel sales by 20%.
In-depth understanding of what your product or service can and can’t do also helps set accurate expectations from your partner and from their customers.
If you partner will be providing installation or follow-up service to the customers, then channel training must ensure that your partner is fully qualified to complete these tasks without constant supervision. Since they will be providing the customer training on how to use your product, their channel partner training course needs a train-the-trainer mindset.
If some agents of the partner will be selling and some will be installing, you may need specific agent training for separate tasks. Customization is an important part of any channel partner training program.
And if your partner’s sales skills are not on par with your company’s, or their sales methods are not in-line with what works best for your product, then channel sales training or even just general sales training may be needed. They also need a clear and up-to-date understanding of your company’s sales goals and KPI.
Benefits of Successful Channel Partner Training
- Accurate and effective representation of your brand
- Clear expectations from partners and customers
- Improved partner sales skills and results
- Increased partner loyalty and enthusiasm
- Decreased time spent answering questions/fixing problems on a day-to-day basis
Implementing Successful Channel Partner Training – Steps And Challenges
Developing the initial course work is just the beginning of a successful channel partner training strategy.
Measuring channel partner performance metrics provides you with information about how channel partner training is affecting your bottom line and which partners gained the most from training. Funneling leads to your higher performing partners is also important; doing this efficiently requires integration with your CMS systems.
Building on your reseller training and performance data to find and develop the best future channel partners is another part of the process.
If your company is global or grows into an international company, providing reseller training courses in multiple languages will be a logical next step, but can be difficult to complete in-house.
For manufacturers or companies who have only done in-person or business-to-business sales, developing a business-to-customer sales training program from scratch for the reseller channel organization may be difficult and time-consuming.
As you scale up your business, tracking which partners and which specific agents at your partner companies have completed channel partner training certification successfully can also be a time-consuming task.
These steps and challenges are why many businesses rely on a Learning Management System (LMS) company such as NetExam for consultation or complete administration of their channel partner training.
How Netexam Can Help
Developing your channel partner strategy plan: NetExam’s LMS consultants bring extensive training experience. We will work with you to develop a thorough understanding of your business objectives and help you develop your channel partner training roadmap.
Integrating channel partner training with your systems: NetExam is the first LMS company to partner with Salesforce. We also work with Oracle and Microsoft Dynamics. Integration is functional and fast. Funneling leads to top-performers through existing CMS programs is a snap with NetExam.
Providing up-to-the-minute access to data: You deserve to know how channel partner training is affecting your bottom line as you make real-time decisions. Which partners are most successful following training – which products, regions, and partners are leading in channel performance?
Keeping you from having to reinvent the wheel: For basic sales or systems training, NetExam already partners with third-party educational sources. Since we have access to stock training materials, you don’t have to spend time and money developing general course work for your channel partner training. This lets you allocate more resources to your specific product and service training development.
Customizing your channel partner training: The NetExam training program has a flexible interface that can support multiple student UIs simultaneously. We also provide course migration in 30 languages, offering you a uniquely global solution.
Offering flexible channel partner training services: NetExam offers a range of channel partner training service levels. Whether you are interested in LMS consulting or want an LMS partner to completely handle the channel partner management process for training and follow up, NetExam has the solution you need.
Helping you grow in the future: NetExam can help you find the perfect channel partners for scaling up your growth in the future. NetExam offers testing services for potential partners. This testing process identifies strengths and weaknesses and helps you choose the best partners for your product or service.
Netexam Channel Partner Training
- Integrates – First LMS company to integrate with Salesforce
- Offers course migration in 30 languages
- Provides up-to-the-minute data
- Customizes your strategic plan and courses
Contact NetExam today to get started on a better path to success with professional channel partner training.