Channelling a symbiotic relationship

High performing and successful businesses today, would acknowledge that a sure shot way to outpace the competition is the development of meaningful customer insights and practical ways to put that data into action. These companies understand the needs of their customers and deliver solutions in a way that the customer would want to buy. In short, success depends not only on the product but effectiveness and reach of its go-to-market strategy.  A distribution channel of a product or service therefore becomes a critical ingredient to sustain continuous growth, without losing customer focus.

At the most basic level, distribution partners enable companies to deliver their products and services to the end-user. On a more meaningful level, distribution partners act as a mediator between the company and the consumers. The channel community serves as the crucial link between the brand and the consumers as they bring in critical market insights for the company that help flourish and create joint business opportunities. Companies that have fruitful relationships with their channel partners stand to increased sales, cut down on recurring costs and improve customer outreach. More importantly effective distribution channel management can often bring benefits to participants across the value chain, by increasing the market share or capturing greater customer wallet through channel.

With the changing customer landscape, increasing digitization, and the increasing complexity of the distribution networks, it is essential for companies to interact with their distribution partners frequently and ensure that they have a robust channel program in place.  Apart from aiding seamless sale of products and services, this helps companies understand the market, the consumer attitudes and preferences and accordingly undertake necessary steps to implement the channel program successfully. Here’s how companies can navigate this complex net of distribution networks while implementing effective strategy to make their products and services available to the end- consumer:

• Focus on the depth of distribution rather than width of distribution – Ensure and empower the top channel partners on board to drive the volume rather than having all the channel partners who cut each into each other’s margins while delivering similar volume.

• Ensure channel hygiene (price difference in channels, cross territory sales) – Trust being the highest priority from a channel perspective is established only when you take measures that channel partners do not lose money due to cross territory sales and price wars due to 1) VAT Arbitrage 2) Deal prices 3) Grey vs Legitimate

• Ensure channel fill with the right products and work on hyper local activities to drive footfall to the channels – Ensuring that the channel has the right product mix and the sell through based business model driven by local and locally relevant initiatives – one size cannot fit all when it comes to a country like India

• Ensure high level of service support for Retailers – Today the channel partners are a brand’s biggest ambassadors and the primary sales driver. Being in the business of sales where service drives an important force it is very important for organizations to ensure that we give best service to their partners to keep their faith and in return influence the end customers too. Our Customers are important to us and this means both the end customer and the channel which in one form is our customer are taken care of.

A WIN WIN situation is therefore a must for every business partnership and as a brand it is our responsibility to ensure the same with our partners.

Hitesh Shah, Director, Channel Sales, BlackBerry India