Mike Day: How to Build an Ecosystem Partner Program

Channel Journeys Podcast

This is a great time of year to evaluate your partner program and see if it’s serving the needs of your partner community. But what can you do better when you have a broad and diverse product portfolio? And how can you build a program to support the diverse partner ecosystem needed by your customers? Find out in this conversation with Mike Day, VP Global Partner Sales at GoTo. Mike shares his approach to build a partner program that scales for both a diverse range of products and partners.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Here’s what I learned from Mike about building a diverse partner ecosystem partner program:

1. Categorize your partners based on the motion of how they want to go to market.
2. Reach those partners by creating elements in your partner program that supports each of those motions.
3. Those elements include partner enablement, marketing, support, and contracts that allow them to be successful.
4. Structure your program to encourage partners of different types to work together.
5. Shift your thinking and branding from Channel Manager to Partner Manager, from Channel Program to Partner Program, from a Channel Network to a Partner Network.
6. Measure your Partner Net Promoter Score (NPS) to gauge partner experience with your program and your company.
7. Push for simplification and consistency in your programs, both internally and externally.
8. Allow for regional differences while still making your program predictable for partners.
9. Upskill your team by encouraging everyone to take 10 minutes a day to learn something new. Multiply that by 365 days and think how far ahead of the competition you’ll be, simply by investing 10 minutes in yourself.
10. Don’t be afraid to fail. Just fail fast, correct, and move on.

LINKS & RESOURCES

• Connect with Mike on LinkedIn
• Listen to Olli Fleischhut on How to Simplify to One Partner Program
• Try Impartner

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