Building Your Channel Strategy: Finding Your Focus
In our first instalment, we explored how successful channel programs begin with introspection—understanding your value proposition, knowing your customer and refining your sales process. Now that you've established this foundation, it's time to get tactical about your channel approach.
For technology businesses the right channel strategy can dramatically accelerate market penetration and revenue growth. But success hinges on precision—knowing exactly who you're targeting and what you're offering.
Who Are Your Channel Partners, Really?
The most common mistake I see technology businesses make is casting too wide a net. "Anyone who sells to our target market" is not a channel strategy—it's a recipe for wasted resources and disappointing results.
Your ideal channel partners have specific characteristics:
They already have established relationships with your target customers
They possess the technical credibility to represent complex solutions
They have complementary offerings that create a complete solution
Their business model aligns with your sales cycle and pricing structure
For a broadcast technology company, this might mean focusing on systems integrators specializing in media production workflows rather than more pro-AV resellers. For a SaaS company offering content management solutions, specialized digital agencies might be more effective than broad software distributors.
Take the time to create detailed partner personas, just as you would for customer profiles. What does their ideal business look like? What capabilities must they possess? What gaps in their current portfolio would your solution fill?
Market Research: The Overlooked Powerhouse
Before approaching potential partners, invest in understanding their world. Market research for channel development goes beyond knowing your end customers—it means comprehending the partner ecosystem itself.
Talk to potential partners without trying to sell to them. What challenges do they face? How do they evaluate new vendors? What support do they need to be successful? What competing solutions are they already carrying, and why?
This research often reveals surprising insights. Perhaps what you assumed was your primary competitive advantage isn't valued by partners as much as another aspect of your offering. Maybe your planned support structure misses critical needs that partners consider non-negotiable.
In the broadcast and professional video space, technical certification and hands-on training might be far more valuable to partners than SPIFs or other financial incentives. In SaaS, implementation support and customer success resources might outweigh MDF programs.
Crafting Your Service Offering and Pricing Model
With clear partner personas and market insights in hand, you can now develop a service offering tailored to channel success.
Your channel program should include:
Clear service definitions: Precisely what do partners get from you, and what do you expect from them?
Other stuff that we can help you with … 😉
For technology businesses, this often means creating specialized bundles or configurations exclusively for channel distribution. It might mean developing co-branded implementation services or developing specialized training programs for partner technical staff.
Building Your Channel Team
Even the most brilliant channel strategy fails without the right people to execute it. Building a channel program requires specialized skills that differ from direct sales or product development.
Your channel team needs the following skills (not necessarily people):
Channel account management skills: Relationship-focused and an understanding of your solution and your partners' businesses.
Channel marketing specialism: Partner-focused marketing differs substantially from end-user marketing.
Technical enablement: Partners need deep technical support to represent complex solutions effectively.
Channel operations support: Managing partner agreements, certifications, deal registration, and commissions requires operational focus.
For many technology businesses just beginning their channel journey, this doesn't necessarily mean hiring a large team immediately. Start with channel leadership that brings experience and relationships, then build incrementally as your program grows.
The Path Forward
Building a channel strategy is not a one-time event but a process that you progressively develop and iterate over time. In our next and final instalment, we'll explore how to launch, measure, and optimize your channel program over time.
The foundation we've covered—defining partner personas, conducting market research, developing your service offering, and building your team—sets the stage for successful execution. The Channel Sherpas can help to focus your efforts precisely rather than pursuing every potential partner, dramatically increasing your chances of channel success.