Imagine if you walked into the office one morning and, all of a sudden, were expected to build and deliver a compelling presentation about a new, company-wide initiative that, before that moment, you had never even heard of. What would you be feeling?
Panic is probably an understatement.
Unfortunately, that’s the exact scenario that partner sellers often find themselves in.
The organisations they partner with give them a new set of products to sell and stories to tell. Frequently, however, partners aren’t given the context or support to do so effectively—which significantly limits their ability to achieve the outcomes both organisations are aiming for.
Don’t leave your partners scrambling. Instead, focus on enabling them well. When you do, they’ll supercharge the outcomes that matter most: Deals are 53% more likely to close when a partner is involved. More than that, they’re 46% more likely to close faster.
Maximise the potential of your partner sellers by:
Prioritising channel enablement
Whether you’re just stretching into channel selling or have built a robust partner sales function, enablement is a pivotal piece of the equation—it’s the lever you pull to develop your partners into consistently high performers.
It comes down to whether or not you’re getting consistent performance from your distributors. When you’re not, enablement needs to step in.
But how do you enable channel sellers? And how should enablement step in?
It may seem like a difficult question to answer. After all, your partners work in all sorts of different environments.
Some may operate very similarly, making it easy to adapt your internal programmes to suit their needs. Others may operate drastically differently, which may require a heavier lift on your end.
Whatever their differences, your partner and internal sellers look increasingly similar when it comes to their goals. Both are laser-focused on generating pipeline, closing deals, and meeting quota—and both look to you to supply the materials that help them drive those outcomes.
“Our partners are an extension of our team,” said Erica Haas, senior director of commercial enablement at Crown Bioscience. “I want my internal sales team to have all their tools in one resource—it’s one of the main things we love about Highspot. That’s what we wanted for our distributors as well. We wanted it to be easy for them to use.”
Channel enablement shouldn’t differ too drastically from internal enablement. There will be key variances, of course, but with a personalised approach and an intentional, intuitive enablement architecture, you can create custom programmes that serve your partners in critical moments.
How to tailor your channel enablement programming
Partner sellers are swamped. They’re balancing conflicting priorities and different demands, and more often than not, your solution just won’t be top of mind.
To cut through the noise, you need to make engaging with your materials easy. More than that, you need to enable partners to sell your services effectively and efficiently. To do so, you’ll need to make sure that your programmes:
Meet partners where they are
Most of your partners are likely working with other organisations, many of whom might not make the process very easy. To stand out from the crowd and ensure your partners prioritise you in their deals, simplicity is key.
[Partners] have a lot of other companies they may be distributing for as well. You need to be easy to do business with. We all work with sales teams. They’re target- and compensation-driven. They want to find a way to hit their targets efficiently. So do our partners.
To win mindshare, help partners operate efficiently by:
- Making engaging easy: Leverage partner licenses to loop partners into Highspot without exposing internal data. Every partner gets the benefits of a unified platform, including relevant content, guidance, and learning at their fingertips.
- Building trust in your content: Content bookmarked across Highspot is automatically updated when the original item is altered. When partners work from the platform, they can see that they have the latest and greatest resources (and you can trust that they’re using the right versions, too).
- Simplifying the lift: Partner licenses grant access to key capabilities that streamline partner workflows. Supply features like Digital Rooms—and create Digital Room templates for key partners—to simplify the process of sharing content, engaging buyers, and selling your product.
Supply relevant, quick-hit content and context
No two partners operate the same, which makes it difficult to develop enablement programmes that can truly account for these degrees of variance.
“One of the unique challenges is that you’re dealing with different types of partnerships. You have to take into account the variability that goes into building that partner journey.
The right enablement architecture helps you (and your partners) account for this variance. Let’s say, for instance, that you’re in charge of enabling your organisation’s global partner sales function. To start, you should:
- Streamline the content search: Configure your global lists to include categories that your partners might fit into—different industries, regions, and personas. Set global Spot policies and require content authors to select the relevant item properties when publishing content. It’s a simple change, but it makes filtering relevant materials that much easier for your partners.
- Bundle resources based on key categories: To serve a global audience, you can segment your partners by region, creating a new Spot for each. Be sure to add global lists to those Spots, so partners can filter based on other key categories. Within your regional Partner Spot, for instance, partners could drill down further to find content by industry or persona.
- Walk partners through guided experiences: Create a region-specific Sales Play that outlines what partners should know, say, show, and do to tell your story and sell your products. Set those Plays as the Spot Overview for each region—there, it’ll showcase the foundational knowledge, messaging, and content that your partners need to succeed.
Segment your partner Spots by region, industry, or another shared category. However you organise them, they create a trusted source of truth that your partners can quickly and easily reference.
No matter the size of your partner sales function, developing a channel enablement strategy will always feel like a monumental task.
“It’s really easy to get overwhelmed in an enablement role with partners,” said Shelley. “Just realise that it’s a continuous improvement journey.”
Developing impactful channel enablement programmes will never be an overnight process. Take it day by day and celebrate the small wins—they’re what brings you one step closer to a high-performing partner sales function.
