The full version of this article was first published at: Do This Before Selecting Your First Channel Partner
When searching for your first channel partner, it’s important to make well-informed decisions. It comes down to two crucial components: gaining knowledge, and evaluating the potential channel partner to determine if they meet your criteria for partnership. That means you need to know what questions to ask, and what areas of their business to look into closely. It also means that before you choose your initial partner, you need to have a robust evaluation process so that you’re choosing the best channel partner for your needs.. Know What You’re Looking For Your channel partner needs to fit your business needs and help you sell your product. It’s a great idea to have a set of criteria to see how each prospective partner stacks up against the others. When creating your ideal partner profile, consider these four areas so that you can ensure you add partners that are the best complement to your business, and can help bring value to your customers. And remember, here is not really one size fits all for channel partners. Training and Experience What are the current training plans for their employees or any other channel partners? If you have a set of training tools to use in the channel, you should have some confidence that there will be follow through. Likewise, you want to know that if your staff needs any aids for selling the partner’s product offering, you won’t be left empty-handed. Get an idea of their current experience as well. In the…
Read More: Do This Before Selecting Your First Channel Partner