A typical Digital Marketing Tools to Support Your Partner Marketing Initiatives
According to Gartner, on average, marketers will use 7.2 different channels to drive exposure, awareness, and top-of-funnel interest for their organization. Channel marketers are no different, often needing to leverage multiple different channels and tools to not only recruit partners but also leads to being distributed to partners. The overlap of functionality and features offered by various marketing tools means that organizations no longer need to invest in different vendors, instead opting to segment out user permissions or build functionality groups so different parts of the company can take advantage of the already purchased functionality. Distinct parts of the same company can now use the same tools to support different business units. By doing so, organizations no longer need to manage branding requirements, build templates in different tools, or worry about version controls. Another benefit of leveraging the same tool to support different parts of the company is that data is not siloed in any one place. Companies can build relevant and useful data sets faster because the data accumulates faster. Let’s dive into a few of the distinct types of tools that are stereotypically viewed as direct marketing tools, that channel marketers can use to support their indirect revenue efforts. Marketing Automation:
Marketing automation has lots of overlap in terms of features that are needed to support a partner marketing program. Understanding partner behavior, personalizing outreach, scoring users and AB testing are all components of a sophisticated marketing campaign that can be applied to channel marketing. Sophisticated partner marketers know that competing for mindshare with a partner is already hard enough, so tailoring the messaging they receive to what they are showing interest in is a simple step that can be taken to move the needle. Use this scenario as an example: Partner sales rep logs into your partner portal and reviews a case study in the security vertical from one of your organization’s customers. 24 hours later they receive an email with a piece of industry research related to your company’s security products in North America. A week later, they receive an email with an incentive that outlines any deal registration submitted from the security vertical that is accepted and closes in 90 days and gets a $500 SPIFF. This entire process can be automated using your existing marketing automation solution in place today. Social Media Automation:
Chances are that your company is already using some type of social media automation platform to ensure that social activity stays at the levels necessary to capture impressions from followers. Some marketing automation solutions have this type of functionality also built into their solution sets. Besides just automating the posts out to your followers, social-specific solutions also allow organizations to monitor mentions, hashtags, and engaged followers to ensure they are always able to engage with their community. Social media is all about building relationships, and social media automation platforms are a wonderful way to put social engagement at the forefront of your channel marketing strategy. Paid Advertising:
Paid advertising is not something that typically comes up in most partner marketing conversations, however for organizations who need to try something a bit different to recruit partners, or support partners in ABM initiatives paid channels can be very lucrative. If a certain partner is trying to close a larger end customer, your organization might look to support them with some specific creative campaigns launched specifically for that end customer on LinkedIn. Or your channel needs help recruiting partners. Google Ads and remarketing might be a wonderful way to draw attention to your company when partners are searching for specific end solutions for their customers. Think creatively when it comes to supporting your partner program with several types of technology. If your organization is still in the early days of validating a channel model, it does not make sense to invest in a partner relationship management solution but put together a couple of things your organization has already invested in to validate early assumptions. Request a demo today to know more about Vartopia's products and services. 
