How do you motivate and incentivize your partners?

When you are crafting your own goals for a successful partnership, make sure that you can mould them in a way that aligns with and moves the needle for your partner’s own internal and company objectives. There is no better motivation for your partner than your plan aligning with their core business objectives and internal measurements for success and recognition. When your partnership strategy can make your partner’s core business objectives easier to achieve, everyone wins.

Motivating and incentivizing partners can be achieved through the following strategies: 1. Measure the partner's results to recognize and reward their achievements. 2. Communicate with partners to know their expectations clearly and understand their challenges, needs, wants, demands, and preferences. 3. Equip partners with the knowledge, skills, and tools they need to sell and deliver your products or services effectively. 4. Keep up the partners with the changing market trends and customer demands, offer new and improved products or services There are a suitable number of strategies that can help increase sales, reduce costs, improve customer satisfaction, and maintain a competitive advantage

Yes, this is very important to achieve success. I have managed a network of channel partners where we had multiple international brands that were involved. Here, the key was to ensure that each brand got its respective positioning and its goals and values and expected deliverables were communicated, understood and implemented as per guidelines by the channel partner network.

Partners can be incentivized through different means: 1- Financial: This could be commissions, SPIFFs, Implementation or services revenue, marketing funds, etc. 2 - Support: Training and enablement, dedicated support, sales and marketing support, etc. 3 - Exposure: Access to communities, marketplace, content syndication, etc. Align the incentive with your goals of the partnership program and incentivize for the outcomes that you want to see from the partnership.

Destacar la virtudes de cada miembro de tu equipo es ayudar a realzar sus fortalezas. Ser siempre claro y comunicativo es esencial, saber expresar las necesidades sin juzgar a los demás y reconociendo el esfuerzo de cada uno. Es bueno tener en mente que un socio o compa?ero enaltecido es un gran valor para la organización.

Training and support, as per standards of the resp. brand are essential. At all times, the partner teams need to have a clear backup, and defined systems and processes they can fall back upon to ensure that they are supported to go out the promote your brand and products to their customers / audience without having the risk of customer issues.

Don’t forget that products are purely that, what people really relate to is a deeper understanding of the pains and helping resolve those using whatever means necessary. Training is important but so is effective listening and unbiased questioning.

Beyond sales and use case support, take into consideration where your solution fits within your partner’s sales cycle - would it be deployed for the end customer right at the start? Is it an add on that gets purchased after initial implementation? Based on this information, it makes sense to enable and support the partner’s pre and post sales teams as well.

Equipping partners with the necessary training and support is essential for their success in selling and delivering your products or services. Offer a variety of resources such as online and offline training sessions, webinars, manuals, videos, and demos to build their knowledge and skills. Additionally, provide tailored technical, marketing, or sales support based on their specific requirements. This comprehensive support system enhances their confidence and competence, fostering a sense of loyalty and commitment to your brand. By investing in their development, you strengthen the partnership and drive mutual success.

Once your goals and values are aligned, remember that motivation isn’t one-size-fits-all. Each partner is driven by different incentives—some thrive on financial rewards, while others respond better to recognition, co-marketing, or exclusive resources. Customize your incentives to hit those specific drivers. Use data and regular feedback to refine your approach and keep the rewards meaningful. When partners feel seen and supported, engagement skyrockets. Personalize the experience, and you’ll foster deeper relationships and drive stronger, more consistent performance.

Rewards need to be segmented for sales and management teams with the partner network. This ensures that all active stakeholders get direct benefits of performance and there is collective effort to drive results.

Beyond revenue, it's important to cheer your partners on! It's critical to say "Thank You" and to show appreciation - share wins - talk about victories and celebrate that success!

Rewarding partners based on their performance and valuing their feedback are key strategies for maintaining strong relationships. Track their achievements and offer incentives like commissions, bonuses, discounts, prizes, or recognition programs to acknowledge their contributions. Actively seek and incorporate their feedback, demonstrating that their insights are valued and can lead to meaningful changes. This dual approach of recognizing performance and respecting input significantly enhances motivation, satisfaction, and loyalty, ultimately fostering a more engaged and committed partner network.

Incentives are always appreciated but the remuneration sits with the partner and their employees. Vendors are tasked with making the products and services competitively priced in the first instance . Feedback however costs very little and can actually transform how people behave and approach situations.

Finding ways to introduce partners to other partners, shedding light on how they can collaborate and feed off their different strengths, is an important step in building an orchestrated partner ecosystem. This is a role that both partner managers and sales reps can play. Have a diverse Partner Advisory Board is another way to drive this with your strategic partners.

As vendors realistically you will not create a partner community but more a series of audiences. Partners are largely competitors of each other and therefor may be reluctant to have the utopian relationship that vendors think should exist. However, bringing these audiences together are also key when delivering messages and seeking collective feedback which is valuable in shaping the channel.

This is very essential. Community development can also include invites to events and economic support in case of challenging situations that an individual can face. Regular meet-ups, and annual trips for new experiences and collective bonding are essential.

Building a sense of community among partners can drive engagement and collaboration. Networking Events: Host regular networking events to foster relationships between partners. Collaborative Platforms: Develop online platforms for partners to share experiences and best practices. Partner Conferences: Organize annual conferences to update partners on new developments and strategies. Community Forums: Create forums for partners to discuss challenges and solutions. Mentorship Programs: Pair experienced partners with new ones to provide guidance and support. Social Activities: Arrange social activities to strengthen bonds and create a collaborative culture.

Una comunidad puede ser muy poderosa. Por eso muchas veces es importante poder generarla, e interconectar a los socios para producir un ciclo virtuoso en las relaciones y generar una retroalimentacion entre todos.

Encouraging co-innovation and integration with your partners is another way to motivate them. Leverage their market knowledge and technical skills to help differentiate your offerings.

Build your USP, based on your key strenghts and unique factors. Create joint learning seminars, webinars and conferences to ensure that the best practices are available, taking active feedback on existing brand positioning and product usage from customers and build an innovation roadmap which will help to continuously drive innovation.

Innovation is a given, in todays world businesses simply cease to be relevant when not continually evolving. Differentiation is often the wholly grail and typically lost by people simply hooking on product specifications - addressing people’s challenges and then demonstrating the value / benefits suddenly provides you with scalability and reference ability which can distinguish you very quickly into experts.

Innovar en esta epoca tan competitiva, es imperativo, y ademas nos ayuda a mantenernos vivos y activos. La empresa que innova y se trasnforma, tiene grandes posibilidades de tener exito. No innovar, es poner una fecha de caducidad.

You need to be flexible and accommodating to the needs of your partners. Their goals, business models and targets may change and so being aware and genuinely interested in these factors helps you to maintain a good relationship. You may need to flex up or down on activity, expect more or less, provide more or less to help either side. This builds long term relationships. Focus on building long-term relationships with your partners based on trust, mutual respect, and shared values. Invest time and effort in nurturing these relationships to ensure their sustainability.

Adaptarse y evolucionar, es una cuestion basica, tanto en los negocios, las empresas y la vida misma. Replicar el patron en todos los niveles es algo sumamente positivo. Ojo !, no se trata solo de adaptarse y evolucionar, tambien en la evolucion deberia estar la aceptacion y definicion de los errores, de lo que esta mal, para asi poder evolucionar en algo mejor