Channel partner training is a program designed to educate and develop a company's partners, such as distributors, resellers, or value-added resellers, to effectively promote, sell, and support the company's products or services.
The training may cover product knowledge, sales skills, marketing support, technical training, compliance requirements, and more.
The purpose of the training is to equip the partners with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed in their roles as an extension of the company's sales force.
The training may be delivered through various methods such as online courses, in-person workshops, virtual training sessions, or a combination of these.
The Importance of Channel Partner Training
Channel partner training is essential for several reasons:
Increase Sales
Channel partners are an extension of your sales force, and the better trained they are, the more likely they are to sell your products or services effectively. Training helps them understand your products' unique features and benefits and how to position them in the market.
Improve Customer Satisfaction
Channel partners are often the first point of contact for customers, so it's important that they have the skills and knowledge to provide excellent customer service. Training helps them understand customer needs and how to address their concerns effectively.
Build Stronger Partnerships
By investing in your channel partners' training and development, you demonstrate your commitment to their success. This can help build stronger partnerships based on mutual trust and respect.
Ensure Brand Consistency
Training helps ensure that your brand is represented consistently across all channels. Your channel partners will have a clear understanding of your brand values, messaging, and tone of voice, which will help them communicate effectively with customers.
Increase Market Share
By equipping your channel partners with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed, you can increase your market share and grow your business.
Reduce Risk
Channel partner training can help reduce the risk of legal or compliance issues. Training on compliance requirements and regulations can help your partners avoid legal issues and protect your company's reputation.
Eight Elements of an Effective Channel Partner Training Program
A channel partner training program typically includes several key elements:
Product knowledge: This includes information about your company's products or services, their features, benefits, and unique selling points. Your channel partners need to have a deep understanding of your products to sell them effectively.
Sales skills: Your channel partners need to know how to sell your products or services. This includes skills such as prospecting, qualifying leads, presenting, objection handling, and closing deals.
Marketing support: Provide marketing collateral and training to help your channel partners promote your products or services effectively. This includes materials such as brochures, presentations, and email templates.
Technical training: If your products require technical expertise, provide training on how to install, configure, and maintain them. This will help your channel partners provide better support to customers.
Support processes: Your channel partners need to understand how to get support from your company. Provide training on how to access support, submit support requests, and escalate issues.
Partner program training: Provide training on your partner program, including how to register deals, track commissions, and access resources such as the partner portal.
Business planning: Provide training on how to develop a business plan and set goals for your partnership. This will help your channel partners align their activities with your company's objectives.
Compliance and regulations: If your industry is heavily regulated, provide training on compliance requirements and regulations. This will help your channel partners avoid legal issues and protect your company's reputation.
eLearning for Channel Partner Training
Over the past several years, the introduction of powerful new SaaS-based technologies has helped shift channel partner training strategies for many companies away from in-person, classroom-based training in favor of online learning (eLearning) programs.
Not only is eLearning more cost-effective than in-person training, but it provides elements of convenience and flexibility that in-person training cannot offer.
About LMS Portals
At LMS Portals, we provide our clients and partners with a SaaS-based, multi-tenant learning management system that allows you to launch a dedicated training environment (a portal) for each of your unique audiences.
The system includes an embedded course authoring tool that enables most anyone to build engaging courses quickly and easily.
We offer a complete library of ready-made corporate training courses. So you can build your own courses, utilize our off-the-shelf library, or some combination of the two.
If you choose to, you can create Learning Paths to deliver courses in a logical progression and add structure to your training program. The system also supports Virtual Instructor-Led Training (VILT) and provides tools for online coaching and social learning.
The combination of our platform features and services make LMS Portals the ideal choice for channel partner training programs.
Contact us today to get started or visit our Partner Program pages