ChannelWave Readies PRM Release

PRM pioneer ChannelWave is prepping its next major release to ship late this year, adding tools to help vendors and partners better deal with co-op advertising and marketing funds.

"This is a $50 billion-plus heartache every year," said Drew Williams, vice president of marketing at ChannelWave, Cambridge, Mass. "It's a disaster trying to figure out co-op in local markets. Typically, for every dollar spent, the vendor will refund, say, 50 cents. This system is ripe for abuse. . . . We'll provide a tool that helps manage that process."

In theory, PRM systems make distribution relationships more efficient by facilitating lead referrals, ordering, invoicing, billing and even payment, PRM proponents say. These are not bad things in a world of lengthening buying cycles and shrinking IT budgets. Ideally, such systems also alert the vendor to problems in the process, enabling a company to work with partners to remedy failing promotions, for example.

Diane Krakora, principal and founder of Amazon Consulting, a Mountain View, Calif.-based consultancy specializing in channel issues, said companies are slowly buying into PRM, and are taking a modular approach. "That's why [ChannelWave President Chris Heidelberger is brilliant,he says, 'Buy the cup of tea, don't try to boil the ocean.' Everyone else is trying to sell the big suite," she said.

The key to PRM success is getting people to actually use the technology, to input data and use the system as both a repository and a resource. Partners will, in fact, use anything that puts money in their pockets, Williams said. "Right now, when a partner files a [co-op claim to, say, IBM, it can take eight to 12 weeks to get the money. . . . This tool will cut that turnaround time," he said.

Also new to ChannelWave 6 will be support for wireless devices and desktop synchronization. "If a partner does a lot of work in [Microsoft Excel, we have to make it easy for him to get that data into the system to avoid double-keying. We'll have tools to very easily export Excel files into the system," Williams said. The company is also working to strengthen metrics and reporting tools.

Williams said the new release will bolster ChannelWave's "dashboard" view of channel activity. "If the vendor can go into the database and see which partners are not doing as well as others,maybe one is doing a great bundling promotion,the vendor can target a campaign to get other partners going. I can fire off an e-mail campaign suggesting actions that might earn a lagging partner an additional five points," he said.

Nik Nesbitt, managing partner at MarketRace, a Denver-based integrator and PRM consultant, said ChannelWave has done a good job motivating partners to use the technology.

"If you use this as your way of communicating with partners, that's where they go to get all their information. . . . We strive to create a partner portal, so if people are required to go through training and certification, they go to that portal, for leads they go to that portal. You get them out of the binders-and-paperclip mentality," Nesbitt said.

Other PRM vendors are not standing still. Comergent, Palo, Alto, Calif., recently updated its PRM lineup with an online price-negotiation tool and updated dashboard. An interactive parts catalog feature lets users view graphical representations of products and drill down to get their pricing/availability.

Both Comergent and Channelwave base their modular offerings on J2EE.