Improving Partner Portals

A partner portal is essential to the relationship between vendors and their channel resellers.

Portals act as bridges for resellers to obtain access to marketing resources, pricing details, sales promotions and sales information.

But partner portals can be complicated and difficult to navigate, solution providers say.

“There are a few vendors that get it — Digium and Cisco come to mind — and some are moving in that direction” toward making their portals simpler, and easier to navigate, said David Johnson, vice president of sales and marketing for The Fulcrum Group, a Keller, Texas-based solution provider. “But still, too many vendors have huge, nearly impossible-to-navigate partner portals that discourage partners from having access to the latest information and training.”

The following are five ways solution providers say vendors can improve their partner portals.