One Expert’s Opinion: What Makes Partner Motivation a Challenge?

The rise of the cloud, line of business (LOB) buyers and non-traditional partner types have been disrupting channel alliances left and right. In the midst of such chaos, partner motivation has become a big focus for a lot of vendors and distributors.

 

Channel Marketing Journal recently had the opportunity to get perspective on the partner motivation issue from Larry Walsh, founder, CEO and chief analyst of The 2112 Group. Here’s his take on the problem:

 

“The problem isn’t that partners aren’t motivated; It’s that their motivations don’t always align with their vendors.’ It would be so much simpler if technology partners followed a car dealership model and only worked with one vendor. But to have market relevance, partners have to work with multiple vendors — seven primary vendors, on average. Therein lies the problem.”

 

When I asked Walsh to sum up the problem in one statement, he quoted this line from Dante’s Divine Comedy, “Abandon all hope, all ye who enter here.”

By Jeff Mesnik

 

> Read the entire article, One Expert’s Opinion: What Makes Partner Motivation a Challenge?, at ChannelMarketingJournal.com.