Competitive Intelligence Case Study
Redesigning a Channel Partner Marketing Strategy
There’s no question that channel partnerships are a competitive realm – and that’s why this ERP vendor sought to revamp their partner program. Looking to align with best practices and understand how other software companies were benefiting their partners, our client hired Aqute to perform in-depth competitive intelligence research on competitors and non-competitors alike.
Competitive intelligence services delivered
Discovering best practices
Becoming or maintaining a successful business requires one to constantly refine their strategies and adjust their programs to better align with market trends. Our client had a clear and ambitious vision, which was to understand the best practices in the industry and figure out what potential partners were gaining from other software companies’ partner programs.
They wanted to investigate the ‘what’ - which was the benefits that partnering companies were receiving from these relationships, as well as the ‘how’ – which were the best practices of the most successful partner programs with strong reputations in the market.
Benchmarking and competitor analysis
We focused our efforts on 2 direct competitors and 5 non-competitor software companies, each chosen for their glowing track records in managing partner programs. Although the 5 weren’t in direct competition, these companies were a big part of our research as they served as important benchmarking tools. Looking into their practices gave us insights into strategies that could act as a standard to compare our client’s own standing and potential for improvement.
Studying the direct competitors also provided an extra perspective within the same industry niche. The analysis helped us recognize market trends, key selling points, and strategies that were successful in fostering relationships with their channel partners.
Fieldwork insights
Our key competitor analysis strategy was conducting primary telephone fieldwork. We actively reached out to dozens of partners linked to each of the 7 target companies for one-on-one interactions. These helped us understand the benefits and potential downsides of the existing partner programs from a user perspective – what they liked, what shortcomings they found, and how the program contributed to meeting their sales objectives.
At the same time, we also explored how competitors managed potential conflicts between direct sales teams and partner sales channels. We even engaged with customers to understand their preferences, gaining insights into situations where customers preferred to work directly with partners rather than with software companies. These tactics helped us both understand the unique selling propositions that partners might offer and how to ensure good relationships even in times of conflict.
Shaping a responsive partner program
Our competitor report acted as a guiding light for our client’s channel team to make smart decisions and create a new and improved partner program. The insights gave them a useful framework for redesigning their existing program and helped them gain an understanding of factors such as commission expectations from partners, additional benefits that would appeal to partners, and successful structuring of tiers within the program itself. The research also included information on appropriate staffing for the program, including how to work out coverage ratios and identify key roles within the structure.
This well-aligned, better-structured, and responsive partner program resulted in a boost in the client’s market presence and established stronger partner relationships.
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