Training Channel Partners: How AI Just Became Your Secret Weapon

Sales cycles are moving to a "digital first" approach. Prospects do more online research before talking to salespeople, who get involved later in the process. Enablement systems need to keep up with this shift.

Soon we will all have the ability to have our own "digital twin" handling Zoom calls for us. What would Douglas Adams think?

Watch this 3.45 minute video demonstration showing how salespeople can practice their messaging and sales skills using A.I. tools.

A.I. is here and bots are beginning to interact with reps, helping them with onboarding and sharpening ongoing messaging skills. Reps can practice their pitching, objection handling, qualification and more. They can practice in a safe environment where they can make mistakes, so they don't make mistakes when they talk to real customers.

When it comes to creating effective sales and marketing messages, geography matters. A pitch that works well in one market can fall flat elsewhere. Here's an example...

Re-skilling sales teams through targeted training, mentorship, and practice is essential for overcoming modern sales challenges and achieving sustained success in the post-pandemic era.

Here are updated programs I am currently providing.

Managing remote teams globally requires different approaches. There's not a one size fits all approach, but with a few brief workshops with the team and some coaching, remote teams can smash their goals. This can usually be set up for success within 2-3 months of the right kind of help.

What is Team Coaching?Team coaching involves a collective approach aimed at enhancing the overall performance of a team. Unlike individual coaching, which concentrates on personal growth, team coaching focuses on the group as a cohesive unit.

Like it or not, many of us are responsible for selling and the best way to grow a book of business is to have a system to find, qualify, close and grow customers. From lawyers to consultants to entrepreneurs raising money, having a business development system will make things easier and that goes for any customer-facing roles.

The wine from Petersons started flowing and breakout groups listed out the biggest pros and cons of fractional sales roles (and any fractional role, in fact) and lessons learned for increasing the likelihood of having a successful part-time hire.

Getting sales teams to convert from being transactional to consultative continues to be one of the biggest challenges organizations face, especially with the ongoing pivot towards subscription, or platform-based, models. Organizations who fail to make this transition stand to lose big time. According to Saleforce’s annual State of Sales Report, 79% of business buyers agree, it’s easier than ever to take my business elsewhere. Yet at the same time, 78% of business buyers seek a trusted advisor that adds value to their business, not just a salesperson.

The business world has gone global, but leadership training programs have not. Many leadership resources overlook the challenge of applying their teachings globally. Traditional management models assume a universal approach, but anyone working across diverse regions knows that what succeeds in one place can fail somewhere else. Today, startups all the way to large enterprises interact with employees, partners and customers around the world and this is where a new approach to leadership training comes in.

Leadership courses that do not adequately address cross-cultural competence fall short in preparing individuals for international and global roles. And there are more of these roles today than ever before. This shortcoming results in significant challenges and missed opportunities in growing business overseas.

Has this ever happened? An employee comes to you with a problem, say a client is asking for something outside of the project scope, and you think, here we go again. Immediately you respond, "don't worry, I'll handle it." You do this because you have a ton of things to do and solving the problem yourself is the fastest way to fix the situation.

Lead gen is a mess. Always has been. Today it’s fractured, complicated and maddening but this kind of chaos also creates opportunities for those willing to think differently and experiment.

Everyone who interacts with customers needs sales skills, but it doesn’t mean they need sales training. Let’s talk about Hannah.

In the world of sales, training is often seen as the key to unlocking performance excellence. And while that's true to some extent, there's a missing piece of the puzzle that can elevate sales training initiatives from good to extraordinary. That missing piece is a clear team purpose.

Lead nurturing tends to get complicated fast and there are plenty of marketers who will tell you that you need to build a comprehensive buyer's journey that covers the intricate experience each prospect takes. But not every business is ready for complex lead nurturing. Here's what companies need to crawl before they walk.

Channel sales and marketing has more moving pieces and it's harder to get accurate data than marketing and selling directly. This means that the need for strong channel managers is critical. Below is an overview of how The Channel Institute trains channel marketers to help them deliver successful and repeatable partner marketing programs. We call this framework: P.A.C.K.A.G.E.S.

Business partners are not all created equally. MANY partner programs fail to take this into account with programs that assume all partners have similar skills sets, goals and marketing and sales teams. One of the foundational modules we cover in our channel training programs is called the Partner Growth Matrix. The chart is shown above, and the big idea here is that this framework helps channel managers understand the key traits and skills partners possess at each stage of their development.

The moment marketing hands a lead over to a sales team is the ultimate test of collaboration between these two historically warring tribes. When things go wrong, millions of dollars of sales pipelines fail to materialize. Getting it right is holy grail of sales and marketing team collaboration, but it requires facing difficult truths and re-inventing sales and marketing roles. Consider this statistic: On average, only around 27% of B2B leads are actually qualified, according to a recent report by MarketingSherpa.

A recent WSJ piece on the topic of Office Outsourcing has reignited the globalization debate. The headline pretty nails it: Next Wave of Remote Work Is About Outsourcing Jobs Overseas. Most of the conversations are about the politics of globalization, but for many of us, that (cargo) ship sailed a long time ago. The real story is what happens once a global team is in place? What are the challenges or hiring and managing international remote teams? If done wrong, hiring overseas with the goal of saving money can be one of the most expensive decisions a company can make.