A new research report from Tendo Communications reveals the major obstacles and strategies for B2B channel marketers and partner marketers. In Q4 2021, Tendo polled B2B partner and channel marketers across major industries to uncover:

• Top challenges with implementing partner marketing programs
• Vendors’ most successful marketing strategies and investments
• Partner marketing priorities for 2022

Read on for highlights, or download the full report, B2B Partner Marketing Insights 2022.

Top Challenge: Lack of Resources for Execution

Partner marketers ranked their biggest challenges, and, no surprise, a lack of resources for execution emerged as the #1 hurdle. Partner marketing is often under-resourced compared to customer-facing marketing programs, even though it drives significant revenue for many B2B organizations.

Decisionmakers Emphasize Different Challenges

Decisionmakers on partner marketing teams prioritized their challenges a bit differently from their direct reports and other team members:

• Difficulty obtaining data to measure success: Wrangling data from partners is the top challenge for 94% of decisionmakers in charge of partner marketing campaigns and content and for 60% of leaders who oversee partner communication and relationship management.
• Difficulty gaining partner attention or participation: For decisionmakers on partner communication, recruitment, and relationship management, this was the top challenge, along with “a lack of focus and execution from partners.”

View the partner marketing report for a deeper analysis of these findings—and four guidelines to navigate partner marketing challenges.

Partner Marketing Successes and Priorities

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated a massive shift to all things digital—events, marketing strategies, and collaboration platforms, to name a few. Partner programs followed suit in 2021, with vendor teams relying more on webinars (as in-person partner events disappeared) and digital content to engage, educate, and empower partners, who can in turn do the same for their customers.

• 82% of partner marketing decisionmakers on campaigns and content cited “Events and webinars” as their most successful activity.
• Decisionmakers ranked “content assets” (71%) and “partner training” (65%) as their next two most successful activities.

But the top two strategies flip-flopped for 2022: Content development is now the top priority, with webinars/events in second. Successful vendor marketing teams want to create a wealth of content that their partners can customize and share with prospects.

The Big Takeaways: Invest in Digital Content—and Digital Experience

Partner marketers agree: They need more resources to support partners’ digital marketing execution, and they must put content at the heart of their support strategy.

Looked at holistically, these survey results also point to another takeaway: To achieve success in a competitive landscape, vendors must improve the digital experience for partners. To increase program success, they must make their programs easier to participate in and put partner needs and goals first.

That’s one of Tendo’s key recommendations, based on our deep experience with supporting partner marketing teams. Read the full report for our insights and guidelines to take your channel marketing efforts to the next level.

Get the Partner Marketing Report

For deeper insights into partner and channel marketing challenges, successes and priorities, download Tendo’s report, B2B Partner Marketing Insights 2022.

To learn more about how Tendo Communications can help your partner marketing program succeed, contact us today.