SAP Solution Brief SAP Customer Relationship Management

Partner Channel ManageMent

Build STRongeR PARTneRShiPS foR STRongeR PRofiTS

Channel partners have the power to make or break your business. To build a more profitable and loyal indirect channel, you need a partner relationship management solution that helps you strengthen channel partner ships and optimize channel operations the SAP Customer Relationship Management application.

You depend on your channel partners. Thats especially true today, because indirect sales channels account for a growing percentage of revenue for many companies. But multitiered sales, service, and marketing channels have complex demand chains. That makes it even more important for you to build and maintain strong partnerships with all your channel partners, including dealers, distributors, agents, resellers, and systems integrators.

partner channel network and a more profitable company.

Drive Demand, Collaboration, and Value

Partner management functionality enables you to better recruit, ramp up, and manage channel partnerships throughout the entire partner lifecycle. SAP CRM helps streamline and optimize channel operations, resulting in a more profitable and loyal indirect channel. Channel marketing functionality helps you drive demand through channel partners. SAP CRM provides relevant information, marketing tools, and incen tives to channel partners, which help you motivate your partners to sell your products and services and not your competitors.

Channel sales functionality empowers your partners to sell more products more effectively. SAP CRM enables you to give your partners access to the same knowledge, tools, and expert advice The SAP Customer Relationship that your own sales force uses. And Management (SAP CRM) application helps you leverage your partner relation with insight into demand across all your ships and empower channel partners so sales channels, you can forecast future business more effectively. they can better market to, sell to, and provide service to your end customers. Partner order management functionality SAP CRM provides access to critical partnerrelated data so you can forecast helps you optimize partner ordering pro cesses and increase visibility into chan and recognize demand across all sales channels. You can enhance collaboration nel inventory. SAP CRM helps to inte grate your partners into your ebusiness with your partners, drive more revenue strategy and enables collaborative selling through the channel, increase value to customers, and reduce channel support across organizational boundaries. costs. The end result? A more profitable

energize channel partner relationships and enhance every facet of your indirect channel so you can attract, retain, and motivate the strongest partners with SAP Customer Relationship Management.

Channel service functionality enables you to turn service and problem resolu tion over to your partners and still pro vide consistent, timely service to end customers. SAP CRM equips your partners with the tools and expertise they need to manage service.

Everything You Need to Succeed

With SAP CRM, you can manage all aspects of indirect channels and seam lessly incorporate your partners into all aspects of your business marketing, sales, service, and ebusiness building a partner network that boosts your bottom line. Partner lifecycle management Register, profile, and monitor your part ners so you can manage them through out the partner lifecycle. With consistent processes from recruitment through rampup, your partners and you are on the same page. Partner training Make sure that your partners are prepared to represent you. They can register for and take courses online, request certification, and main tain qualifications. You can manage partner qualifications and certifications down to individual employees at each partner company. Partner planning and forecasting With tools for planning sales and strate gies, you can set goals and measure partner progress against those goals. With tools for analyzing your sales pipeline, your partners and you can evaluate future revenue based on open sales transactions.

Partner communication drive part ner effectiveness and foster loyalty by providing personalized and timely infor mation. You can target content to part ners via email or their partner portal home page. in addition, partners can search an online library for information and tools. Lead management Capture, route, and manage sales leads, directing each lead to the bestfit channel and partner. SAP CRM handles lead generation and qualification, automated lead distribution, and ongoing monitoring of partner leads. Collaborative campaign management design, manage, track, and optimize targeted marketing campaigns. You can work with partners to generate demand by enabling them to leverage your processes and expertise to increase campaign impact. Partners can tailor campaigns with their own branding, product mix, pricing, and target customers as well as adapt and personalize emails to end customers. Channel marketing funds Streamline channel marketing programs (market development funds, coop, and so on), increase the effectiveness of channel marketing expenditures, and help ensure legal compliance of funding practices. Partners use selfservice functions to submit and track fund requests and associated claims. Loyalty partner management leverage loyalty partners to generate incremental revenue and increase the value of loyalty programs to members. loyaltyprogram members can earn

Work in close harmony with your critical part ner organizations and build a collaborative and a more profitable partner channel net work and a more profitable company.
and redeem points for loyalty partner products and services. in addition, loyalty partners can register new members online and track the accrual and settlement of points. Partner locator enable your custom ers to easily locate a store, reseller, or service location. They can research products and services on the Web and then find a convenient partner location. Opportunity management gain complete visibility into each prospective sale and support consistent sales methodologies. You can collaborate with your partners to capture, manage, and monitor business contacts and account information of opportunities.

Interactive selling and configuration guide customers and partners to the right solutions with online product con figuration tools especially important for complex, configurable products with multiple options. Partners can access multimedia content, guided selling, con figuration advice, and realtime pricing. Pricing and contracts offer consis tent, accurate pricing across all channels with support for price lists, tiered pricing, contract pricing, special quotes, discounts, and contracts. You can establish pricing rules, processes, and data centrally and deploy them across all selling channels. Point of sale and channel inventory Capture and reconcile pointofsale (PoS) information from distributors and retailers and track inventories held by channel partners to enhance channel visibility. You can execute whatif analy ses to predict the impact of pricing changes with respect to price protec tion programs. Quotation and order management enable partners to quote and order products and services online for them selves and on behalf of end customers and track orders through fulfillment. Collaborative showroom and distrib uted order management host a Web shop for collaborative online sales and marketing, giving customers a single point of access to purchase products from the entire partner network. You can optimize your ordering processes with support for distributed order management.

Service management enable partners to manage service requests, complaints, and returns to better support their end customers without relying on your support staff.

You Succeed When Your Channel Partners Succeed

A thriving partner channel is critical to your companys success. SAP CRM helps you enhance every facet of your indirect channel so you can attract, retain, and motivate your channel partners. With SAP CRM, you can: increase value to customers because they receive consistent information and service across all channels drive revenue and optimize your channel strategy with full visibility into customer demand and market trends optimize your price and inventory mix with full visibility into channel inven tory and resale information drive channel sales by working collaboratively with channel partners enhance the performance of your supply and demand chain by making all product, inventory, and customer information available in real time for channel partners Reduce channel support costs by empowering partners with selfservice functions

Partner and Channel Analytics

SAP CRM provides a broad range of standard reports and analyses that help you evaluate partner coverage, partner and channel performance, revenue and sales, the return on partner investments, partner gross margins, and partner utili zation. You can share relevant reports and analyses with channel partners.

Customized Portals for Partners and Channel Employees

With SAP CRM, you can build personal ized portals for partners so they can access information and business transactions. using their portal, channel managers can oversee all partnerrelated activities. They can manage partner relationships, collaborate with partners, and optimize channel operations. They can also monitor and analyze channel sales, service, and marketing performance. Partners access all of the power of SAP CRM from the partner portal selfservice functions, information, business transactions, and powerful analytical functionality. Partners can download and order collateral and docu mentation, enroll in training courses, and receive notification of upcoming promotions. They can also receive leads, purchase products, track orders, and access support information.

For More Information

discover for yourself how SAP CRM can help you attract, retain, and moti vate your channel partners. Contact your SAP representative today or visit our Web site at www.sap.com/crm.

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Summary With the SAP Customer Relationship Management (SAP CRM) application, you can man age your indirect channel and seamlessly incorporate your partners into all aspects of your business across marketing, sales, and service building a partner network that boosts your bottom line. Business Challenges Manage growing channel complexity deal with an increasingly competitive marketplace, which raises the importance of your partner ecosystem Meet customer demands for consistent treatment across channels fulfill partner requirements for simplified yet powerful solutions that make it easy to do business with you Key Features Partner management Better recruit, ramp up, and manage channel partners throughout the entire partner lifecycle Channel marketing drive demand for products by engaging in collaborative marketing and demand generation activities with your partners Channel sales empower your partners to sell more products more effectively by giving them the same knowledge, tools, and expert advice as your direct sales force Partner order management optimize partner ordering processes, increase visibility into channel inventory, and enable collaborative selling across organizational boundaries Channel service deliver consistent and timely service to end customers by enhancing service and problem resolution capabilities of partners Partner and channel analytics gain insight into, analyze, and act on your indirect channel operations and trends, resulting in more profitable and successful partnerships Business Benefits Improved ease of doing business to help ensure partner loyalty and success Extended marketing reach through comarketing programs Increased revenue through channel collaboration and consistency Optimized price and inventory mix with transparent channel inventory and resale information Lowered channel support costs by empowering partners with selfservice functions Find Out More
To find out how SAP CRM can help you drive sales through your channel partners, contact your SAP representative or visit our Web site at www.sap.com/crm.

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