Some companies track ‘disqualified leads’. What about the Channel? Who qualifies SaaS Partners?
Last week at Sales 2.0 several vendors described how they track and measure disqualified leads in the sales funnel. It is an interesting concept because it implies that the company understands what a qualified lead looks and feels like in the first place. It also hints at the growing convergence between Marketing and Sales but that is another subject.
On the channel side, how many vendors proactively qualify their partners (meaning are they actively culling partners that aren’t productive)? This may mean a conundrum for SaaS companies, particularly those in the early stages of selling and deploying their applications. How do you convince partners to invest time and resources when the sales model isn’t clear?
Most early SaaS companies take a more reactive approach and recruit partners with the HOPE of recurring revenue. After a few months or maybe after the first year of sales (multiple by 7 to get the equivalent in dog-years for premise solutions), early stage SaaS companies often find that their ecosystem is full of partners recruited because they were ‘friendly’ or ‘family’ but have demonstrated limited ‘sell through’ momentum and success. They are left with the unfriendly and less than fun topic over the phone (not even over coffee or drinks) to politely ‘disengage’.
It is true that SaaS applications are easy to deploy and derive early value for customers. It is certainly logical to have a low-barrier to entry from a partner model perspective. It does, however, make some sense to at least develop the profile of the ideal partner. Not only based on their geography or reputation but take a closer look at their business model, how they provide value to their (yours-to-be) customers and the shared domain expertise. The profile of the ideal partner is a recipe of some blend of these 3 elements.
Some up front, thoughtful work about aligning the vendors’ SaaS application, domain expertise and the partner’s capabilities will save some grief on the back end of partner ‘disqualification’.