If you’re on a GTM team, you know channel partners are fundamental to your success. With customer acquisition costs climbing, partner strategies matter more than ever.

For growth-stage companies, building a strong network of channel partners can change everything. It pushes rapid market expansion and boosts your brand visibility. 

The success of your channel programs hinges on one critical factor: Partner Enablement.

For sales leaders, the stakes are clear. You may already have a channel partner strategy, or you may be starting one now. Either way, enablement is essential.

Without it, the entire channel strategy unravels. 

• Partners underperform.
• Messaging becomes inconsistent.
• ROI can be difficult to measure. 

Of course, “enablement” is a big umbrella. You’re looking at training, content, messaging, communication, and knowledge sharing. 

It’s a lot. 

And neglecting any of these areas will have your partners struggling to sell.

In this post, we look at the core challenges facing channel partners today. We’ll review how AI is reshaping partner enablement and dig into examples of companies with winning channel programs.

Four Big Pains for Channel Partners Today

1. Your Messaging and Positioning Are Inconsistent

One of the biggest issues for GTM teams is to make sure your partner’s messaging aligns with your brand. Partners spend a ton of time communicating with joint customers. But when the messaging is inconsistent with your company’s voice, the outcome can be dismal:

• Eroded Trust: Your customers will get confused. Or worse, they’ll be skeptical when they hear conflicting messages from different sources.
• Market Confusion: When your messaging is inconsistent, the clarity of your brand’s value proposition gets cloudy.
• Stalled Deals: When your partners misrepresent the features or benefits of your products, deals can slow down while buyers figure out what they’re looking for.

Imagine this: you’ve perfected a messaging framework over months of testing. You’ve fine-tuned your value propositions and created collateral. Everything is perfect. But… your partner struggles to deliver your messaging effectively. Now you’re uncertain if the channel can do as good a job as your direct sales team.

The ultimate goal is to have your partners become clones of your sales team. To achieve this level of alignment, you’ve got to have a deliberate enablement strategy. And you’ll have to support it with tools, training, and now, AI.

2. Limited Access to Training Materials, Sales Assets, and Product Knowledge

Even motivated channel partners struggle without the right knowledge at the right time. 

You need to have training materials for:

• Delivering the right message to customers.
• Speaking authoritatively about what your product can do.
• Addressing competitor positioning and differentiation.

Without access to the right resources, your partners will defer questions to your internal sales team. Or worse, they’ll avoid answering altogether. When your partners have only limited access to your enablement content, their hands are tied.

The overall partnership challenge for any emerging vendor is to find a way to earn mindshare – for your value message to enter their mind when they are advising their customers. This is exceptionally difficult in an environment where thousands of vendors are all clawing for a finite amount of attention from a partner seller.

Geoff Guy, Partner Business Manager @ RunZero

This gap impacts your partner’s ability to close deals. It casts a shadow on their confidence and perception of your brand. Your partners need access to training materials, competitive battle cards, and product information. And they need it on demand.

3. Nonexistent Measurement and Murky Visibility

Another major pain point is the difficulty in tracking partner performance and measuring ROI. It’s a struggle for many to get a full picture of how channel relationships are performing. Unlike direct-to-customer sales, the partner ecosystem can be less defined. This makes visibility a real challenge.

You’re left constantly wondering: 

• Who is driving results?
• Which partners are performing well?
• What is the actual ROI on these relationships?

Sure, you might have a PRM and CRM that tracks who gets paid, but you still end up with so much guesswork. This lack of visibility hinders optimization. It also complicates decision-making when it comes to making investments in the channel. That’s why you need clear measurement frameworks (and tooling).

4. Partner Conflict and Channel Overlap

Channel conflict is often qualitative but equally damaging. It can be a toss-up. Far too often, multiple partners pursue the same accounts. This creates friction, lost deals, and frustrated partners. This problem is especially painful in industries like software. There, delivery can occur via multiple models. These include MSPs, MSSPs, technology partners, white-label solutions, OEMs, and integrations.

If you don’t resolve these conflicts, you risk wearing away loyalty and destroying relationships. This then makes it even harder to maintain a cohesive partner network. Just like territory overlaps among sales reps, channel overlaps demand careful management. It’s best when you can support this management with automation and clear partner segmentation strategies.

It is paramount for your pitch to include how you differentiate from your competitors, but what many vendors lack is an understanding of how the partner sells and what is important to them. In other words, a vendor-to-customer message is often significantly different from the optimal vendor-to-partner message. We make assumptions in what we think is important to them, or worse, we take our customer collateral and pass it off to the partner, thinking it’s all they need to become top of mind.

Geoff Guy, Partner Business Manager @ RunZero

AI and Automation: A Reality Check

Can AI solve these enablement challenges overnight? 

Lol, no. There’s no magic bullet to any business problem. 

AI cannot single-handedly fix inconsistent messaging, knowledge gaps, or partner conflict. What it can do, through automation, is to significantly soothe these pain points.

Here’s how channel teams are applying AI to automate channel partner enablement:

Four Ways Channel Partners Are Using AI to Improve Performance

1. Addressing Inconsistent Messaging with Standardized Content and Coaching

Many businesses are using AI to generate brand-aligned sales content for their partners. By leveraging existing collateral, partner leaders can automate the creation of messaging. And they can make sure AI tailors the messaging for channel teams. This means partners will receive up-to-date materials that reflect the company’s messaging. 

So you don’t have to worry about miscommunication.

The process usually involves AI taking your base sales materials. From there, it creates customized drafts for your partners’ unique needs. 

The result: brand-aligned content delivered quickly. This enables partners to communicate more effectively and consistently.

AI also powers real-time coaching. 

Partners can access instant answers to product-related questions, messaging guidance, and brand positioning. Tools like 1up provide on-demand training and coaching. This gives your partners immediate access to your organization’s collective knowledge. So your partners can confidently engage with customers. 

And they won’t need to escalate questions to your sales team.

2. Measuring Partner Performance with AI Analytics and Insights

AI can aggregate and analyze data from partner relationship management (PRM) systems and CRM tools. It can process large volumes of channel activity. This means you can uncover trends and measure the effectiveness of your partner relationships. You can also identify the ROI for each individual relationship.

The channel typically generates vast amounts of data, from deal velocity to opportunity volume. And AI can distill this information into actionable insights. It can highlight for you which partners are excelling, which campaigns are performing, and where you need to optimize more. 

PRM tools like InPartner and AllBound are great examples of platforms that leverage AI to enhance visibility into channel performance. This helps organizations make smart, informed decisions.

3. Giving Partners Access to Personalized Assets On-Demand

Partners need enablement resources: sales collateral, battle cards, product datasheets. And they need it at the moment of engagement. AI-powered systems allow partners to retrieve the exact materials they need in real time. This improves their ability to rapidly respond to customer questions.

Beyond accessibility, AI also aids in personalization. Partners can request customized content tailored to specific industries, competitors, or customer segments. For example, a partner could ask for a competitive differentiator document focused on the MarTech landscape. By automating this process, AI can significantly enhance partner productivity and engagement. Tools like HighSpot and 1up are leaders in this space.

4. Managing Partner Conflict and Channel Overlap

AI is also being applied to cut down on channel overlap. You see these features appearing in CRM tools like SalesForce and Hubspot. Because it can analyze account data and map territories, AI can suggest optimal partner assignments. This drastically reduces conflicts and improves coverage. 

For example, AI can continuously analyze CRM data and identify when partners are pursuing the same account or overlapping in a given territory. If both Partner A and B are logging opportunities with the same Global 2000 prospect, an AI system can detect the overlap early + alert the channel manager.

AI can also score and prioritize deal registration based on factors like partner track record and past performance. For example: If multiple partners register the same deal, AI can automatically recommend which partner is best positioned to win. This reduces subjective decision-making and ensures faster, fairer conflict resolution.

Though still in its infancy, combining AI with CRM data to manage overlap and conflicts shows strong potential. It’s proving to strengthen partner relationships and improve overall channel efficiency.

Examples of Strong Partner Strategies

CrowdStrike and Its MSPs

CrowdStrike’s Accelerate Partner Program exemplifies AI-enabled channel success. By providing specialized tracks for MSPs and MSSPs, CrowdStrike offers:

• Automation tools for efficiency.
• Volume-based incentives.
• Adaptive licensing structures.
• A strong, supportive partner ecosystem.

The results are clear: these guys have high partner engagement, significant deal volume, and loyal MSP relationships. Both partners benefit from predictable revenue streams and a strong incentive framework.

HubSpot and Its Solution Partners

HubSpot’s Solution Partner Program empowers agencies and consultants. They can resell and support the HubSpot CRM and inbound marketing suite. 

Key elements include:

• Comprehensive training and onboarding materials.
• Clear visibility into partner performance.
• Opportunities to earn substantial revenue through referrals and services.

HubSpot demonstrates how AI, training, and visibility combine to strengthen partner performance. This combination helps the company expand its market reach through its partners effectively.

Shopify and Stripe Partnership

Shopify integrated Stripe into Shopify Payments. This created a seamless solution for merchants. 

Benefits include:

• Streamlined payment processing directly within the Shopify ecosystem.
• Boosted adoption of Stripe through Shopify’s extensive partner network.
• Time savings for merchants and a frictionless experience for end customers.

This integration illustrates how technology partnerships, alongside enablement and automation, drive mutual growth. And all the while, they make the customer experience smooth and simple.

Put AI to Work to Ensure Your Channel Partnerships Stay Strong

Obviously, channel partner enablement has always been a cornerstone of successful partner strategies. 

But now, in the AI era, it’s taken on new dimensions. 

Today, sales leaders can leverage AI to tackle four critical partner challenges: inconsistent messaging, limited access to enablement resources, difficulty measuring ROI, and partner conflict.

No. AI is not a cure-all. 

But it does provide tools for automation and real-time coaching. It offers personalized content delivery and advanced analytics. So it helps your partners operate more like an extension of your own sales team. 

Combine AI with thoughtful enablement strategies. That way, you can unlock the full potential of your channel networks. 

Which means you’ll drive revenue. 

You’ll increase market penetration.

And you’ll improve brand loyalty.

Leading companies like CrowdStrike, HubSpot, Shopify, and Stripe are already demonstrating the power of well-executed partner programs. They’re integrating AI and automation to enhance partner performance and simplify workflows. And of course, they improve outcomes.

For growth-stage companies that want to scale through channel partners, the message is clear: invest in enablement, embrace AI thoughtfully, and create a partner ecosystem.

That way, you can make sure that every partner has the tools, knowledge, and confidence to sell your product as effectively as your internal team. 

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