Salesforce introduced the Sales Cloud Partner Relationship Management– a novel intelligent sales app, built on the native CRM platform. Sales Cloud PRM leverages Einstein AI to enable channel partners to close deals faster
Within hours of Marketo announcing its Marketo Accelerate program to empower partners, Salesforce has unveiled the Salesforce Cloud Partner Relationship Management Platform (PRM) app. The new intelligent sales app is built natively on Salesforce CRM platform and aims at empowering B2B companies to turbocharge channel sales.
Accelerated sales efforts will now be delivered with personalized experiences within the Salesforce ecosystem. Salesforce is empowering its partner community to gain better insights into their sales opportunities and generate maximized ROI leveraging AI and analytics. Earlier this month, Salesforce had announced the rebranding of Krux to Salesforce DMP that feeds on AI and delivers tangible ROI to marketing efforts.
The new app will enable companies that rely most on distributors and resellers–including those in manufacturing, high-tech, and telecom–trust Salesforce to supercharge their sales
According to Accenture, nearly 70% of a high-tech company’s revenues comes from indirect channels, and it will continue to grow. Moreover, companies are interested in investing 3-5% of their revenues into indirect channel incentives in coming months. The key point to note from this report is the growing emphasis on empowering ‘Line-of-Business’ owners to make smart buying decisions through rewarding partnership and joint opportunity programs.
Salesforce PRM Offers Accelerated Channel Performance and Better User Experience
Salesforce PRM app will arm partners, vendors, and resellers with fully-personalized sales tools and information to sell faster, smarter and stay agile in a hyper-growth market. Coding-based in-app marketing tools are time-consuming, and therefore, Salesforce PRM app could effectively blow away the disconnect existing between legacy partner portals and direct sales tools.
Mike Micucci, GM and SVP, Salesforce Products, elaborated on the disconnected bridge in marketing automation and CRM. Mike says, “Traditional partner portals tend to be pieced-together (with) legacy systems that are generic and disconnected from CRM. This results in substandard channel performance and ultimately a poor user experience.”
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The new PRM app will allow companies to easily build modern, branded partner communities with clicks, not code. In contrast to legacy partner portals that are built on inflexible, archaic systems creating disconnected silos, Sales Cloud seamlessly brings together both partner and direct sales functions.
Mike adds, “Sales Cloud PRM is the solution companies have been looking for—a turnkey app that enables them to extend the world’s best CRM to their partners.”
To deliver Sales Cloud PRM, Salesforce is bringing together new and existing technologies, including —
New Guided Setup Wizard
The latest feature enables channel managers to easily configure, customize and deploy their app in days. Using the interactive wizard, channel managers will be able to seamlessly configure lead distribution, deal registration, marketing development funds and AppExchange Components, such as Xactly for compensation management and NetExam for a learning management system. Additionally, channel managers will be able to automatically assign partners into tiers and provide targeted promotions and customized content based on those tiers.
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Lightning CMS Connect
This integration within Salesforce CRM allows channel managers to easily create a customized, branded partner experience faster than ever before. Terry Wise, Vice President, Amazon Web Services says, “Empowering our AWS Partner Network (APN) partners is a top priority for us.”
Terry adds, “As part of our strategic relationship with Salesforce, we count on Sales Cloud PRM to provide our APN partners with the tools and content needed to scale their business quickly on AWS.”
Channel managers will be able to drag and drop existing website content, graphics and videos ensuring that it stays as up-to-date as a company’s website. Lightning CMS Connect will be in beta in June 2017.
Representing one of the oldest customers of Salesforce, Tony Dyck, Director of IT Technical Delivery at Box says, “We were able to quickly deploy, and immediately saw an increase in partner engagement and efficiency, leading to an increase in sales coming from our partner channel.”
Sales Cloud PRM is ideal for companies looking to accelerate partner sales without unnecessary cycles and cost.
Einstein Content Recommendations
The AI layer comes to the rescue of sales reps, leveraging machine learning to surface files that enable channel reps to be more productive. For example, if a partner views a new product description document, Einstein will be able to recommend files, including logo graphics, product placement instructions and pricing documentation for that new product.
Neil Burch, Enterprise Applications and Business Analytics, CalAmp identifies the advantage of working with Sales Cloud PRM. Neil says, “We will be able to quickly and easily increase partner collaboration and gain visibility into our channel so we can accurately forecast our indirect sales.”
Channel Marketing Automation
The new app extends the power of Marketing Cloud to every partner, enabling them to build, track and analyze email campaigns to deliver 1:1 customer journeys on any device. Companies will be able to ensure partners are using the right messaging and collateral by empowering them to be their own marketing department.important to fully capture our opportunity for revenue growth and expansion in our channel business by providing our partners with 24-hour access to product resources, lead management, deal registration and support.
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Explore Data and Derive Actionable Insights with Customizable App for Sales
For an accelerated sales pipeline, it is important for companies to fully capture existing opportunities for revenue growth and expansion within channel business. Providing partners with full-time access to product resources, lead management, deal registration, and support is the most desirable way to achieve the pace.
The announcement extends the world’s #1 SFA, Sales Cloud, even further to empower companies to accelerate their sales with smart, customizable apps for every sales function. Sales teams of every kind are improving forecasting and collecting cash faster with Salesforce Quote-to-Cash. Field sales reps are accessing their CRM with the Salesforce1 mobile app while on the go. Sales managers are exploring data quickly and getting actionable insight with Sales Wave Analytics.
Currently, digitally powered sales reps are using Einstein High Velocity Sales Cloud to quickly identify the best leads, eliminate busy work, and boost pipeline to increase sales. New Guided Setup Wizard, Einstein Content Recommendations, and Channel Marketing Automation are expected to be generally available in the second half of 2017.
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