Effective Partner Recruitment How To: Part 2

Now that you understand your geographic requirements and you’ve figured out what your ideal partner looks like (see previous post), it’s time to think about how to recruit the right partners.

The partner recruitment process is similar to a sales process: you need to know how partner candidates are progressing at any given time. A good partner relationship management system, like Channeltivity, enables you to track targeted partners and see at a glance where they are in the process and when you expect they will close.

A Good Recruitment Process is Step One

Here are some points to consider as you set up your recruitment process:

• How will partner candidates be entered? This can be done manually and/or via a form on your website so potential partners that come to you aren’t lost.
• Who will be on point for contacting and engaging partner candidates?
• Which elements of the partner profile are required? Which are just “nice to have”?
• How will you collect information on the partner recruitment targets you speak with?
• What will be the process for collecting and presenting to the management team the results of your recruitment efforts?
• What will be your process for establishing the partner agreement and onboarding new partners?

Don’t make a mistake of implementing a PRM system before your processes are in good shape. You don’t want to automate inefficiencies.

Step Two: Synch Your Partner Recruitment Process with Your PRM

As your ramp up recruitment, you’ll be accumulating a lot of data, and a PRM system makes it simple to put that knowledge to work. You can assign targets to other members of your organization, and as they collect more information about potential partners, it can be easily compared to your ideal partner profile. Anyone working on recruiting can quickly see how well a candidate measures up. Synching your PRM with your CRM solution, like Salesforce.com, makes it even easier to look at all partner data collected in your organization.

In addition, anyone with access, including the executive team, is able to see recruitment data as needed, run reports and measure results of the recruitment process.

Finally, a major time-saver offered by Channeltivity is the ability to send the partner agreement electronically. Partners can also sign electronically and return it all inside the PRM system, where it’s stored as part of their record, easily referenced whenever needed.

A well-thought-out recruitment process, coupled with well-designed PRM software, allows you to easily manage and maintain information on how your partner recruitment process is performing. You have the confidence of knowing your process is working – or if it’s not, where to focus in order to improve it.