After an intense week at Arab Health, I can’t other than reflect how this single event, a melting pot of international business, makes the world smaller. The pattern became clear for me already the first day at this massive event; Close to a hundred percent of the exhibitors were having an indirect sales model. They were all there to attract new distributors and build even stronger relation with existing partners. And a vast majority of the visitors were distributors, looking for new, innovative and attractive products to sell on their market.

People from all around the world who were in Dubai to meet each other and do business. Then, they all fly home with great expectations of future revenue. But the world has gone digital, flying is now more expensive than before the pandemic, and people continue the conversation through different digital channels. Sales enablement will never become as physical as it was back in the days, why more and more moves into a digital scatter of interactions – with different result. Some succeed, others fail.

Running an indirect sales model comes with challenges beyond traditional direct sales, both in terms of geography (where the model not seldom is used for global reach where we can’t have our own local presence), but in particular from the fact that we have low, or no, control over the selling organization. The more complex the products are, the harder the challenge gets.

Enabling distributors through training, getting them up to speed in product knowledge and value propositions, as well making sure they have all marketing and sales materials needed, is hard.

Large companies have all platforms and support in the world, since growth drove the demand and they could afford it. Small and midsize companies although most often have less capabilities, and they either use what they have – like emails, or shared Google drives or Dropbox folders. Some might have added a partner login on their webpage that leads to a file storage, but here it quite often ends.

With all these alternatives comes the same issues, which we can see hurt companies today, in terms of untapped opportunities and ultimately loss in sales. Some of the reasons behind this are:

    • The distributors have a hard time to find the relevant information in the cascade of all files and folders, and they will hardly enter and use the material live in front of a customer. Best case, they might download for future usage, which means the files are all dead in the same moment. What if they all had an easy access with a click, and could show and share to customers live in all meetings?
    • The holy grail in all execution, in making things happen, is empowerment, aka giving people the direction and the tools to make it happen. But to make things happen we also need to know where and when things do not happen. With processes and systems that brings zero visibility into the utilization, the organization becomes blindfolded and cannot drive the aspired behaviors in the channel. If we want distributors who sell our products, they need to learn all about them – and spread the word to customers, a lot. But do they? What would we do different if we knew what each partner is doing with our material?
    • With less data it simply becomes hard to put any accountability for the partner enablement on anyone. It becomes as good as it gets, measured as more or less revenue generated from each individual distributor. When we talk to Medtech companies, we always hear the same; Some partners are successful, and others are not. We might be on something here… What if we could run the channel in the same way as we do with the sales in a direct model, with leading indicators predicting future success, and on which we can act upon in-time.
    • Engagement comes from a combination of push and pull. With a lack of visibility and accountability, there will be less push. And, if the threshold for the distributor is too large, there will be less pull. Less engagement from both sides, which sounds like a credible root cause behind eventual lower numbers. This is where it ends, or it might be a new beginning, since any organization who wants another result, will need to do something differently. What would sales do if they had all knowledge? And how much can the distributors sell, if they have all information and love to use it?

After hundreds of meetings with CEO:s, Export Managers, Sales Directors, Marketing executives and others just in this single week at Arab Health, it’s clear that many share the same struggle.

The difference that makes the difference is, and will always be, execution in terms of driving change.

Personally I come from the intersection between leadership and technology, and I have a strong belief that we become stronger, faster and smarter with modern technology. This is why we started SP_CE almost four years ago, and this is why I so much love to meet companies who want to make a difference.

Like Mölnlycke Healthcare, Metrum Cryoflex, Visaris, Optomic, Whitebox, Enthral Medical, Teena, Ladycomp, Daysy, Irras, Genesys Spine, Speed Care Mineral, b-rayZ, Creative Labs, Mediq, Kultzer Dental and iLoq. They are some of all innovative companies, who chose our technology to manage their interaction with partners and customers.

They can ensure the chain is no longer broken.

    • They have one single source of truth, with all product material, training tutorials and marketing collaterals in one central repository.
    • Each distributor get their own space with easy access to all relevant material and training, and can share it with customers.
    • The sales organization can follow the traction and can now drive engagement where it’s needed the most – both on the partner side and with end customers.
    • Updates can be done with a click and the changes are automatically reflected everywhere and everyone is notified. No more emailing 50 distributors with the hope that they share it throughout their organization and further to every customer. This means time saving, but it also makes sure we can stay compliant.

For anyone who’s thinking of building your own partner portal, here’s a guidebook for you, including a valid checklist with functionality and features you would need. If you instead have thought of buying a software to manage your partners or distributors, here is a buyer’s guide for you.
If you want to see a live example, you can find it here in this LinkedIn post from Mölnlycke Healthcare.

We all know that the healthcare sector is critical, and this is why new innovation and great products should reach and succeed in the market. Like Mölnlycke’s double gloving system Biogel® in the LinkedIn post above, that helps saving lives in OR:s. The more hospitals replacing old alternatives with a better, simply makes a difference.
This is why sales in Medtech matters, and why companies invest and go to events like Arab Health and Medica. And, with a software like SP_CE, they also get the power to drive sales and partner success all 365 (or 366) days a year.

/Jonas Hammarberg, Founder & CEO of SP CE

Seeing is believing.

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