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In our recent channel chief roundtable the Partner Engagement Lifecycle was one of the many topics we attempted to tackle and wrestle to the ground. Our goal was to collaborate across the 15 channel chiefs in the room – from Google, SAP, IBM, Westcon, Cylance, Avaya, F5 Networks, DocuSign and additional well-recognized companies – to develop some answers or at least establish best practices across several areas.

We've talked about the first three pillars of partner experience, People, Enablement and Infrastructure. Now, using the responses from our annual State of Partnering study, we're closing on the final elements. Coming in fifth place is (drum roll) channel model.

Moving Beyond Email

We recently held another of our infamous channel chief roundtable events where a dozen channel leaders across company size and channel maturity gather to discuss trends, opportunities and challenges they’re facing in growing a partner ecosystem. The topic for this session was driving the partner experience – why, how and where vendors can enhance the partners experience, increasing engagement and ultimately leading to more channel sales.

Partners want systems and tools. Make infrastructure a priority.

In this year’s State of Partnering study, we asked partners all about the elements affecting their experience with vendors. These elements sorted into six pillars, with partner infrastructure coming in third place. Partners were also asked to rank the importance of elements comprising infrastructure. The result: a virtual tie between simply ‘having a partner automation system’ and ‘having all the systems tied together with single sign-on (SSO).’ These are together at the top of the list because not only do partners expect automation solutions, they want them. These systems provide access to the tools, materials and people they need to be successful with your products.