The purpose of the indirect (partner) sales channel is to achieve certain revenue targets and increase market share. It makes sense to assign responsibility for building indirect channels to the person responsible for meeting those targets. It is so obvious that most businesses ignore this fact. Businesses delegate the channel-building task to someone low in the food chain and wonder why their initiatives aren't working. It is, therefore, critical to assign a single owner to this task, usually a VP or director of sales.
The initiative owner will also need a dedicated team for channel recruitment, partner engagement, sales and support training, etc. How big or how small should the team be? It depends upon the scope of the channel and the role it will play in the sales cycle. Let’s answer these two questions.