How to really enable and empower sales

Sellers don't want additional tasks, forms, or complexities — they just want to sell.

Partner teams must focus on helping them sell by providing clear, specific enablement materials, reducing friction, and enabling smarter, more automated workflows.

Cut out unnecessary steps and manual tasks that take up time, introduce human error, and create disengagement.

TACTICS

The ELG sales workflow

Some weeks ago, Will Taylor, ex-Head of Partnerships at Reveal, shared a bold (but true) statement on LinkedIn:

Here’s what he shared on LinkedIn (we recommend that you also read his original LinkedIn post):

Make it EASY for your sales team to engage. Here's how your current workflow is NOT easy:

You (partner person) have a revenue target.

You constantly look for ways for partners to help move the needle.

{ 👆 takes up your time + prone to human error }

When you find an opportunity, you approach a seller with reasons why.

{ 👆 takes up your time }

You either give them a concise message (nice! ⭐) or it's long-winded and they lose interest.

{ 👆 takes up your time }

They are probably polite and accept help, but you still have to do a lot of the work to send a message / type it for them to the partner.

{ 👆 takes up your time }

You give them all of the enablement, one pagers, joint value props, to have a prep convo with the partner.

{ 👆 takes up your time + they likely don't care enough }

The list goes on. Including many opportunities for human error.

Feel icky yet? 🤒

There's a better way. Sales & marketing teams have loads of automation, so why aren't we having the same operational excellence within partnerships?

Partner teams already have 16+ jobs (Greg Portnoy posted about this this weekend). So why are we taking on even more administrative burden?

Depicted is a simple, example workflow that you could implement with automation tools:

Sellers deal goes stale.

A partner could help out.

Instead of doing the above 👆 and spending time and many opportunities for human error...

Implement a workflow that simplifies this for you.

Then think... layer in AI/auto-personalization of messages... and you open up a LOT of operational efficiencies.

Maybe you'll only have 15 jobs after you do this 😉.

MEME OF THE DAY

In our ELG era

Just for fun, we asked ChatGPT to turn Taylor Swift’s “Shake it up” into a song about sales and partnerships. Here’s a fragment of what we got as a result, sorry not sorry:

I stay up real late
Got partners on my brain
That’s what people say, mm-mm (x2)

I build too many collabs
But they always land
'Cause that’s just how we grow, mm-mm (x2)

But I keep connectin'
Can’t stop, won’t stop partnerin’
It’s like I got this network in my mind
Sayin’ it’s gonna be alright

'Cause the partners gonna thrive, thrive, thrive, thrive, thrive
And the deals gonna drive, drive, drive, drive, drive
With the ecosystem alive, 'live, 'live, 'live, 'live
We scale it up, we scale it up

The network’s gonna grow, grow, grow, grow, grow
And revenue will flow, flow, flow, flow, flow
With the partners in the know, know, know, know, know
We shake it up, we shake it up

I never miss a touch
Leveragin' so much
That’s what they don’t see, mm-mm (x2)

We’re scaling side-by-side
Co-selling on the ride
And that’s what they don’t know, mm-mm
That’s what they don’t know, mm-mm

But I keep buildin'
Can’t stop, won’t stop growin’
It’s like I got this ecosystem in my mind
Sayin’ it’s gonna be alright…

STUFF YOU CAN'T MISS

- October 9: The Next Era of Ecosystem Technology — TOMORROW

360Insights and GTM experts like Hannibal Scipio (Forrester), Cody Sunkel (Partner Fleet), Maisa Fernandez (ServiceNow), Bob Moore (Crossbeam) and many more, will dive into how ecosystem orchestration is reshaping go-to-market strategies. Save your spot here.

- October 14-16: GTM2024

Join Pavilion at The Fairmont in Austin, TX to get ahead on your 2025 GTM strategy, learn about market trends, and boost your GTM strategy. Get your ticket here.

- November 11-14: Web Summit
70,000 people will gather in Lisbon, Portugal for one of the biggest tech conferences in the world, featuring speakers from leading companies across nearly every technology vertical. Book your ticket to join them here.