Following a major internal restructure, 212F assisted in changing behaviour in a multinational IT industry vendor’s sales channel to keep resellers engaged and advocating their products, with an incredible 272:1 ROI.
% Retention
ROI
The way to market for this vendor in this competitive industry is via a reseller sales channel. An industry where indirect sales teams sell products from multiple vendors. Our client is one of these vendors. This cluttered market means it is critical that our client find avenues to successfully communicate with hundreds of local sales teams, and that resellers understand and buy in to the new brand to promote and sell their products over and above competitors. It is a relationship channel, where top of mind equals success for vendors trying to influence these indirect sales teams.
The IT industry has a long history of using incentives and promotions to drive reseller sales teams to move products and our client needed a program under the new brand to engage and motivate resellers in order to achieve their corporate sales objectives.
Following the business directional change, the vendor had to ensure the new incentive program investment would target resellers who would provide the most financial impact, driving a positive ROI result. The program structure would reward the best-performing individuals and reseller partners whilst focusing on future growth, not just on current performance.
Previously, participants only earned merchandise rewards. To add impact, the new program’s reward on offer had to ‘wow’ both individuals and reseller management teams. The brand was looking for an offer that drew attention to the client. As this was a trans-Tasman reseller market, the program and reward offering must be available both in Australia and NZ.
Our challenge was to develop a program that would take our client’s new brand to the top position in the IT sector, ensuring their partners were selling their products ‘first and always’. This meant the incentive program must reward participants emotionally and financially by getting something back for their hard work, and just as importantly, recognised for their loyalty to the brand.
Due to the disruption of how resellers would now engage with the new brand, the rewards program had to have its own visual identity, as well as continuing to enforce the new brand. The vendor needed to set themselves apart, to define their brand in a way that conjured up emotions of lifestyle, rewards, and freedom. The offer also needed to cut through both the Australia and New Zealand markets.
212F created a ground-breaking and engaging program that encompassed the new values of the company – with positive ROI results! The innovative channel program, with creative rewards and once-in-a-lifetime travel experiences for high performers, built quality and profitable relationships with business partners of all sizes.
The program employed a tiered points structure, allowing a focused budget towards aspirational rewards to simultaneously promote the new lifestyle brand that the client wanted at the forefront. Incentive trips were strategically added to the program to build relationships between internal teams and teams, and were redeemed for points, meaning relationship development activity came out of the program budget.
The effect of moving from simple, cash-based incentives to emotional and memorable lifestyle experiences and prepaid gift cards, alongside frequent travel incentive trips, drew immediate attention from the channel. These rewards recognised high performers, allowing participants to stand apart from competitors and peers alike.
212F’s internal technology platform designed to manage complex sales data and attribute points into a central destination portal ensured that participation and engagement within the program skyrocketed. This was supplemented by strategic communications deployed via a multi-channel marketing plan, using frequent, personalised communications to ensure that both engagement and sales soared.
The new structure of the program captivated resellers and promoted this IT vendor as an experience and lifestyle brand that values partner relationships. The client and 212F succeeded in developing a newly aligned brand identity with attractive rewards that drove performance and created a solid market proposition.
After three years of rewarding its partners with incentive experiences that assist in driving sales and increasing market share, the rewards program is one of the most innovative and successful programs in the IT industry and a great achievement for 212F.
Given the challenge of developing a reseller incentive program in an industry that was only just recognising the entrance of this new brand into the industry, the rewards program delivered on its founding objectives, as well as validating the overall strategy of needing a reseller program to drive reseller acceptance and behaviour. Objectives met and resulting outcomes included:
OBJECTIVES MET AND RESULTING OUTCOMES INCLUDED:
• The program pulled new partners to the brand, reducing
the acquisition cost of new partner signup
• Increased market share in the ICT industry
• Increase of customer loyalty and engagement through sales,
conference and incentive trips
• With over $100 million of product sales claimed through the
program and a total program cost of $370K including rewards
a significant ROI of 272:1 was achieved.
• Partner involvement and progression: In the FY2016 program,
50% of gold partners moved up to platinum partner
• Strengthened relationships between the IT vendor, distributors
and partners
• Through conferences and luxury travel incentive trips, partners
strive to get on these unique experiences, especially for the
partners who have been part of these unforgettable trips. They
would want to continually achieve the sales target to remain
as top achievers
