Partner Networks Blog
Partner Networks Blog - June 2008
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New in Summer 08 - Account, Contact and Activity Sharing
Jun 16, 2008Share Data and Processes for Sales and Customer Collaboration with Companies Using Salesforce
:: Instantly connect with other companies (business partners, suppliers, and customers) via Salesforce
:: Easily opt in and out of cross-company data sharing
:: Share leads, opportunities, accounts, contacts, activities or any custom object
You may be wondering: How can you securely and easily share data with another company that is also using Salesforce? Or, how can you coordinate with other companies you do business with on revenue and customer-sensitive business processes? It’s all possible with Salesforce to Salesforce in Summer ’08. Salesforce to Salesforce is a powerful service that enables companies to efficiently connect and exchange data with their partners within the Salesforce application. Salesforce to Salesforce provides secure, customizable, and efficient data sharing through point-and-click connections. Integrating and collaborating with your extended partner network has never been easier.
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Dell Approves $200 M in Deals Registered by Partners
Jun 15, 2008
Recently, the VP and General Manager was interviewed. He discussed his partner program and most importantly he focused on what's in it for the partner. Click here for the full interview. The interview shows that Dell is truly a channel focused company. I recommend that every channel chief have this kind of direct communications with their partner constituents. Dell has adopted channel sales and channel marketing best practices to drive partner success.
Here are some of the highlights:
When we launched PartnerDirect on December 5, it included deal registration for our registered partners. Since that time, we have approved over $200M in deals with our partners. Eighty-two percent of the deals submitted by partners through deal registration have been approved. With registered deals, we work very closely with the partner to ensure they own the deal and we collectively win the business for Dell through the partner who invested and brought the deal to us.
I think the ultimate evidence of listening to and acting on partner feedback is PartnerDirect. We built this program on partner feedback. Based on feedback from thousands of solution providers, we developed new features for channel partners including a partner portal—www.dell.com/partner—partner logos and marketing materials, 100-percent dedicated sales and customer care, certification paths and training, credit options, and deal registration serviced by Salesforce.com partner relationship management tool.
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Reporting on Accounts Owned by my Channel Partners
Jun 10, 2008Recently, I have been asked: "Elay, how do I run a report in salesforce showing me accounts owned by my partner users?" Hmmm, I thought, this should be an easy thing to do. It is once you understand custom report types. Let me explain.
1. Create a custom report type based on the Accounts objects. To create a custom report go to Set up > Create > Report Types. Don't join the accounts object with any other one in this custom report type.
2. Edit the layout in the section called Fields Available for Reports at the bottom of the Custom Report Type
3. On the drill down of the edit, select the add fields related via look up link. This will let you add user type to the page layout of this custom report type. (refer to the image below to show you where to look for this link, it took me a while to find it) Hey Tom, maybe you should make the link a bit more obvious. :):)
4. Then, run a report using this new custom report type and add in the filter partner user.
This will surely help you drive more channel sales and channel marketing improvement in your businesses. For more information on Salesforce Partners or any of our tools designed to drive greater channel revenues visit the main Salesforce Partners website. Special thanks to Andrew O'Driscoll from Apprivo for showing me the light.
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New in Summer 08 - Reports for Channel Partners
Jun 3, 2008REPORTS FOR PARTNERS
Give Channel Partners Critical Insight Into Their Business
:: Share reports with channel partner users
:: Create custom reports for the channel
With Salesforce Partners, you have been able to analyze and manage your channel business by using Salesforce’s configurable reporting and dashboards. Now with Summer ’08 you can extend reporting to your channel partners giving them critical visibility into the business they are doing with you. You determine the types of reports they can run but the partners can run the reports they need. Your partners finally have insight into how they are performing.
Note: This feature is available with the Gold Partner Portal licenses but is not enabled by default for Salesforce Partners customers. User profiles must be configured to grant partner users with the permissions to run reports.
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New in Summer 08 - Channel Partner Self-Service User Administration
Jun 3, 2008Delegating User Management to Your Channel Partners Eases Administrative Burden
:: Channel partners manage their users themselves
:: Channel partner user data is always kept up to dateTurnover of partner sales representatives is extremely high and trying to keep track of who is in or out is a time consuming, manual process that is not strategic to your business. Without having correct information on your channel users, you cannot accurately scale programs and forecast revenue. With delegated user administration, your channel partners can add, activate & deactivate sales reps as needed so you always have access to the correct user data and the time to focus on developing successful relationships with your partners and creating revenue-driving channel programs.
Note: This feature is available with the Gold Partner Portal licenses but it is not enabled by default for Salesforce Partners customers. User profiles must be configured to grant partner users with the permissions to manage users.
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New in Summer 08 - Content for Channel Partners
Jun 3, 2008CONTENT FOR CHANNEL PARTNERS
:: Get direct channel partner feedback on your content and sales tools
:: Let channel partners subscribe to critical content
Channel partner extranets are filled with documents in complicated folder structures that make finding the content partners are looking for a challenge. You want to get the right collateral and sales tools out to your channel to make them more productive and successful. But do you know what documents they are using most frequently and how do you find out what information they like or feel needs improvement? How do you make it easy for them to find what they are looking for?
With Content in the Partner Portal in Summer 08, you can publish “featured content” to channel partner workspaces ensuring that when your partners are looking for content they'll first see the materials that you've marked for their attention. With tagging and categorization you make it easy for partners to search for content and their search results show relative rankings providing immediate visual cues as to the relevancy, popularity, or value of different documents. Channel partners can subscribe to content so they always have the latest and greatest version.
For the first time you can know what channel partners think of your content through their ratings and comments. Now you can make sure the best content is kept relevant and is specifically updated based on partner feedback.
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Salesforce to Salesforce - Self help guides for customers
Jun 1, 2008I have updated this post with all the new features we've released with the Winter '10 release. Please note some of the features will not be activated until October 14th (after all instances are upgraded). With Winter '10, we've released a number of must-have features requested by our customers including:
- Sharing Attachments (October 14th)
- Connection Finder: find and connect with partners using Salesforce.com
- Log Errors in Connection Audit (October 14th)
Salesforce to Salesforce is free for all customers, including Group Edition customers. No additional charge to send invitations, accept invitations and share records!
Below, I have listed all the necessary documentation you will need to configure the Salesforce to Salesforce service. It includes an implementation guide, FAQ and self-help demos.
Your support rep or CSM should be your primary touchpoint (along with your AE), but if you have product specific questions please email them to: s2s@salesforce.com and we will try to get back to you within 48hrs.
Self help guides:
Self help videos (Adobe Captivate):
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