Tips for Managing a Successful Channel Partner Strategy Through an Acquisition

Tony Beller

Mergers and acquisitions are a common thread throughout the IT industry, but what can be a euphoric and opportunistic time for investors and technologists can often lead to a time of uncertainty and concern for channel partners. An acquisition should herald growth, an expanded portfolio to tap into, new people to deal with and even more streamlined processes. Why do they strike fear into the partner ecosystem, and how can companies manage successful channel program alignment during the transition phases?

Communicate Immediately

There is often channel paralysis when shareholding is changing hands because, while companies are good at communicating to their staff and their investors what the change means to the business, they often neglect to create a clear picture for their channel ecosystem, and by this, we suggest not just resellers but also OEM, sales and even training partners.

Forthright and upfront communication needs to be delivered immediately. Your business has agreed to purchase another because its solutions add value to yours, they expand your portfolio or grow your customer base. These are positives for your channel, so getting that message into their inboxes or having these conversations with their leadership straight off the bat is critical.

Managing Integration

Acquisitions can be process intensive, a bit like bringing together two households. Both parties have a kettle, a sofa and a set of steak knives; you now need to decide which ones are the best suited to your new home and will last the longest with the least disruption. While employees are urged to carry on business as usual, there is a deluge of technology, sales and management processes being changed in the back end.

Critically, channel integration must be as high up the value chain as payroll integration. Yes, there will likely be some channel overlap, which will make the process more straightforward. However, it’s optimistic to think you will be able to throw all partners into the same pool and business will carry on. This shift is made more accessible if the primary program that partners will be migrated to is already running like a well-oiled machine. If it’s not, you must be open to taking best practices from the business you’re merging with and marrying it to your program.

Re-Energize and Ignite

Let’s focus on the concept of being a well-oiled machine for a bit. Our business has led several acquisitions over the last few years, but instead of creating a patchwork of channel programs, we opted for a one-size-fits-all approach. It worked for a time, but over the last 18 months, as we have expanded our technologies and opted to lead with innovation, we also noticed the need to reinvent our channel program.

Talking to partners has been central to this change. All businesses profess to be customer-led, but if you execute through a channel, your partners are often the ones that own the voice of the customer. It has only been through speaking to existing partners, and those who have become part of our organization through acquisition, that we’ve gleaned better insights into how diverse and fast-growing our channel ecosystem is. The next step is taking those insights and turning them into actions.

Your channel is the link between sales and business realization. And to achieve this, you need to re-energize your existing partners and ignite confidence in your new ones. Define your program outright, offer timelines for complete onboarding and map out all the resources you will provide them with to achieve this as quickly as possible.

Put Value on Paper

Our channel mantra is to make sure we meet you where your business model is. This then translates to …