Are Your Partner Communications Laughable?

The full version of this article was first published at: Are Your Partner Communications Laughable?


There is another 80/20 rule at play in channel programs. It seems that eighty percent of companies flat out don’t communicate proactively with their partners. The other twenty percent barely do. I wish I could say I was embellishing, but the marketer in me is constantly shocked by the lack of ‘to-partner’ marketing and communications among the prospects and early stage customers we work with. When I used to work with agency clients on their marketing strategy, I would set this simple premise: If your company has a product or service that genuinely brings value to companies, it is our job to find more of those companies to help, and then to move them toward that value. Why should your approach to partner communications and marketing be any different? Your Partners Are Paying Attention On any given day, it is reported that we get exposed to nearly 10,000 marketing messages. That leaves very little, if any, attention span to divert elsewhere. In fact, at INBOUND 2016, HubSpot CEO Brian Halligan was quoted as saying, “We compete for millimeters on the infinite internet shelf.” Translate that concept to your channel sales reps. They are constantly bombarded by messages through always-on technology. Calls, texts, emails and tweets. Colleagues, customers and prospects. Business and personal. Oh, and suppliers. Lots of them. Each of them, like you, is vying for those precious few moments of attention that an individual partner contact has to give. In that vast sea of noise, you need to be…
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