Cross-Vendor Partner Funding: Trends & Popular Practices Kris Fuehr, Channel SpecialistLori Stutsman, PresidentExtra Mile Marketing, Inc.

Agenda

The 360o View

3 Vendor Program Personalities

Vendor vs. Partner Perspectives

3 Best Practices

1

2

3

4

5 3 Trends

The 360o View

To partner Through partner With partner

The Sergeant: Persistent recruiting, profiling, analysis+ Recruiting is essential (boot camp) - Partners jumping through hoops, getting value?

The Salesman: Revenue/ROI-oriented, Channel “ATM” + The know what marketing/sales tactics work - May not invest in longer-term programs (training/cert)

The Loyalist: “Circle of friends”, in-person approach + Satisfaction, great for stable market - Shifting market, trouble reaching breadth

3 Vendor Program Personalities

Where are you spending on your program?

Investing on the Pyramid

Trend: Gravity pulls investments to the top (especially during a leadership change)

Tip: Commit to a “SB via channel program” budget line item.

Depth

Breadth

Send me more leads!

I need access to cash to invest in lead-gen

Partner and Vendor perspectives

With the right partners and rules of engagement.

I rely on partners to reach into new markets and nurture their customer

relationships.

They deliver my message where my products are a likely recommendation

And I need some visibility to prove ROI on my partner investments

I need to keep my people in the field with customers--not at their

desk.

I shouldn’t have to know someone to what a vendor expects of me.

If I do X, do I get Y?

I sell solutions based on customer needs, not

products

Give me an account

manager!

How partners learn about your opportunities

Partners represent ~9 Vendors

Winning partners: You have <2 minutes to prove real value in your initiative

“Does this directly build my business?” “Do I stand a chance of getting funded?” “How much paperwork is there?” “Is it worth my time?” “Who else, like me, is doing this?”

Valuable to partners? You decide: GadgetsRUs will be launching a new partner community on May 1st The portal will include new online training, events and collaborative community for networking. Qualified partners will also have co-marketing opportunities.

Feature a lead action!

GadgetsRUs System Integrators Today, you’ll find 18 selected ISVs in the security and monitoring market. Their packaged solutions complement our products and can advance your customer security solutions. Kiosks Inc, B2BMetrics, EyeCams and many more in our new partner community! www.Gadgetpartners.com

Feature a lead action!GadgetsRUs Partners targeting small-business: Find co-marketing opportunities and customizable templates for our newest campaign around security solutions. We’re in market May 15 and you could be too. Apply for co-funding up to $5000. $500,000 will be awarded to partners committing to a reach of least 1500 clients by June21st. in our new partner community! www.Gadgetpartners.com

3 best practices:

1. Programmatic. Be predictable. Consistent communications & programs

2. Flexible. Not all partners want to spend on the same bizdev or win the prize that you selected.

3. Collaborative: Combine efforts with strategic partners (Maybe the person sitting next to you?) for broader offerings

Overall, simplify! We are all over-communicators Do you ask too much of your partners?

Should your MDF criteria be a secret?

Motivates all partners, funds some- Discloses your priorities.

- Gets partners going the right direction,

- Attracts new partners

Deliver via your field, post to your site, blog about them, offer a contest

Disclose your limitations too: “Limit 25.” “Max $” “Expires $”

“We could never do that in our company” What if all other vendor programs did?

Programmatic means opening up

Using Contests to Ignite Channel Activity

Marketing awards program example:

Call for entries open to allGreat buzz

Systematic entries & scoringDisclosed criteria, judged objectively

Identify & reward top performersFeatured on partner portal and events

Showcased best practicesPublished case study to inspire more partners to do the same

3-year running programReal traction in year 2

Source: 1 to 1 Magazine

Turning on the Channel Marketing Engine

• Packaged menu of proven approaches: Mailings, flyers, event materials

• Design templates to customizeProfessionally designed, aim for 80% customization flexibility to partners

• How-to guidance on “what works”Share your market insights and bake in your selling points but don’t lead with the product

• Marketing self-service engines with “credits” as rewards

• Discounted services: Vendor negotiated rates so Partners can buy lists, access telesales, design affordably

Flexible

Program: Can your program fit a brand new product? A brand new business model?

Materials: The partners have a variety of ways to get their “foot in the door” and they know customers best. Rule of thumb: 80% flexibility with your theme and selling points. Lock only 20%.

MDF Spending: Partners spend their money differently

Don’t expect to play the lead: Your product is statistically a “likely recommendation” but if your partner doesn’t win the business at all, you both lose. It’s hard, but let the partner lead.

What’s behind your lock?

Everything is locked: We offer a walled garden community with partners only. We talk conceptually about what we offer as benefits

Limited: Only content or transactions are hiddenWe disclose the following publicly:

- Specific offers (Both to & through partners)

- The explicit benefits (not the category, but the actual benefit)

- One example of each of our key assets

- A demonstration or video orientation walk-through of our program

Collaborate with other vendors

Share resources:Marketing templates

Marketing support staff

Webcasts

Training

Consulting

Who’s next to you here in this roundtable?

Joint Business Planning with Partners

The Metrics Revenue

Points system per activity

Certifications

Quarterly reviews

1:1 Joint business planning?

The Reward Exclusive opportunities

Grandfather into certain programs (but disclose this!)

Vendor-negotiated Pricing: Reduce their cost of business

Programmatic rewards: e.g. “credits” to their marketing account activities.

Business Planning Templates and Aides

Review then fund

Winning partner plans include: - Target market, Key differentiators

- Media

- Timing

- Budget split (Partner/Vendor)

- Deal size

- Estimated close rate

- Commitments to sharing metrics with vendor and capacity to follow-up leads

Quarterly partner reviews for allocation is standard (top partners) - 80/20 philosophyprevails

More and more partners are seeing the value in 3rd party associations like HTG, Trend Micro events and other cross-vendor activities. (skewed to this population?)

Vendor innovations generally came in 4 places:- Reducing risk: Our company actually gives VARs a "lead guarantee"

and this has REALLY increased the interest in our programs. Many now offer an entry level version of their partner program that does not require any fees.

- Reducing overhead: We take the "strain" out of vendor fund claims by doing it for them and producing ROI reports and the like.

- Enabling flexibility:

- Getting local

Trends from our interviews…

Extra Mile Marketing has worked with over 5,000 technology companies, and can create customized marketing collateral to accelerate demand generation among existing and new customers. We’ll help jumpstart a new campaign or nurture current marketing practices with tools like:

If you’re interested, contact Lauren Jansson at Lauren@emminc.com or (425) 746-1572.

www.ExtraMileMarketing.com

Questions?

HTG Member profiles

Size facts about members*- Average size- 20.3 employees

- Average revenue- $3,576,669

- Product/services split- 63% services

- SLI estimates that members put 2.1-3.1% of revenue to marketing, but should be spending closer to 5% of revenue based on 63% services

Straw poll estimation about membership at large- Average size- 10-12 employees, range is 2 to 272

- Average revenue- $1MM-1.5MM, range $250K to 60MM

- Product/services split- 60% product/ 40% services

* First numbers courtesy Service Leadership Institute Q4- 2008 Benchmark,

Ways partners are trimming budgetsPartners moving to: How vendors can help:

Social networking, Associations and networks

Vendor involvement in existing communities like LinkedIn and your associations:

Make better use of SEO Provide SEO insights, metrics and SEO services at vendor negotiated rates. Offer keyword buys as incentives to managed partners

Local events Consider Partner Pavilions and “Event-in-a-box”

Print in smaller quantities Provide templates in Word or other non-agency format

Utilizing templates from vendors Provide flexibility, even offer “ala carte” images, messages and page layouts for partner to assemble

Referral marketing Help partners network through association to your company