Why You Need RelayWare
It seems an obvious statement to make, however whilst adopting an indirect channel strategy brings many benefits in terms of cost, reach and solution augmentation, it brings with it many challenges not faced when selling through a direct sales force:
- Lack of control
- Lack of accountability
- Lack of influence
- Limited association between investment and return
But it goes much further:
The customer lifecycle is generally well understood and leads to a purchase and repeat business. The partner lifecycle is inherently more complex, less often well executed, program-enabled and data- and communications-centric. A well executed partner lifecycle management strategy:
- Identifies the right partners, in the right place with the right products and services to address your target markets
- Assists in segmentation and targeting
- Supports effective recruitment and on-boarding
- Necessitates structured learning, enablement and certification
- Requires ongoing, targeted incentivisation and long-term strategic loyalty development
- Facilitates truly collaborative sales, marketing and customer support activity
- Supported by 24×7 access to communications, information, tools and resources
- Requiring continual performance management
- Leading to performance optimization
- And a copntinuation of the cycle
Just as CRM was designed to automate sales and marketing processes associated with the management of the customer lifecycle, RelayWare PRM is designed to address the far more complex partner lifecycle which is, to a much greater extent program-enabled and data- and communications-centric.
Failure to execute a holistic Partner Relationship Management strategy that addresses the partner lifecycle holistically leads to a host of serious problems that we encounter time and time again.
