Is training overlooked by the channel?

In an ever more competitive world what separates one reseller from another or one proposal from that of a rival? In the end, building successful relationships and long term partnerships is all about delivering solutions which meet the client’s needs, which help them to achieve their strategic goals and ensure a demonstrable return on investment.
None of this is rocket science and yet, there are fundamental factors that contribute towards achieving these goals that can often be overlooked and which could ensure a more profitable relationship between partners and clients in the longer term.

There’s a lot of discussion about the importance of marketing investment in partner relationships, but equally important is the emphasis that should be placed on training investments; and this chain needs to work at all stages of the sales process.
Just as it’s important for partners to receive training on sales and technical aspects of a solution so too should end users receive training on how to get the most from a new technology. In fact, ensuring that customers get the best results from what can be a significant financial expenditure is one of the most important factors in maximising return on investment. Technology solutions are becoming ever more complex and just as partners need to demonstrate their credentials through training and certification, they too need to invest time in training users on all the rich features and functions that their new systems offer.

The practical benefits of partner training
We believe that successful partnerships are about more than just recruiting the right partners; it’s also about investing in the long term relationships. This translates into sales training, so that partners can build on their skills for developing business, as well as education on the technical aspects of a solution. Offering seminars, workshops and training facilities, both in person and online, is about equipping partners with all the attributes that they need to provide a complete package including services and support.

In this compliance driven market, partners now also have to be well versed in the wider compliance issues that are driving demand for specific endpoint solutions. Wider awareness on the industry issues such as PCI DSS, GCSx 4.1, GPG 13 and changing regulations that are impacting both public and private sector, are now as important as technical know-how. We are seeing this through a growing need for a new breed of specialist support required to guide partners through the complex road to compliance.  

Ensuring that our partners have these skill sets at their disposal is also about making sure that they can add real value to their clients, to help them to work more productively and efficiently. It also opens up new revenue opportunities for the partner, allows them to become closely involved on an ongoing basis, and helps the IT manager to get maximum benefits from their new investment.