Recent Articles
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For Effective Presentations, Flip Them Upside Down
If your puzzled about how to make an effective presentation, the good news is that all the information you need probably is already at your fingertips. The better news is that it may just be that your presentation is upside down. Does this sound familiar? In the first slide after your title slide, you show…
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Making Channel Promotions Work Better
For most channel partners, admitting that you compete on price is almost like confessing sin. Most channel “coaches” implore partners to avoid such behavior. The reality is that helping clients take the best advantage of current manufacturer and software provider promotions has long been a competitive advantage for the best integrators in our industry. Licensing…
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Dell Plays IT Long Ball
One of the luxuries of being a private company is the opportunity to plan on a much longer-term basis, as opposed to having to obsess more about the results for the next financial quarter. While currently engaged in the complex acquisition of EMC, Michael Dell at a Future Ready event hosted by Bloomberg this week…
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Channel Marketing Requires Pleasant Persistence
“I threw $10,000 out on that last marketing event,” complained one VAR owner to another. “I got absolutely nothing out of it.” The other VAR owner looked at him and asked, “What was your last marketing activity before this event?” The first owner thought for a moment. “About a year ago, we sent out a…
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More Self-Reliance Leads to Brighter Channel Future
It is often said that necessity is the mother of invention and nowhere is that more apparent than the “Fifth Annual State of the Channel” report issued by the IT industry trade association CompTIA. The report makes it clear that solution providers in general are much less dependent on IT vendors than at perhaps any…
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Making Channel Partner On-boarding More Efficient
By Jim Somers The relationships between vendors and channel partners are like marriages, and sadly, it’s not uncommon to see one out of two fail to deliver long-term success for both parties. The first 30 to 90 days are critical to the future success of a new relationship. The companies that most effectively work with…