After deciding on how to track the performance of your partners, next step is to set clear expectations and communicate it to them. Expectations or targets should be realistic for the channel, particularly for new partners.
Most partners take nine to twelve and in some case eighteen months to achieve target levels of sales and profitability this is because there is a learning curve involved in understanding the product and how to sell it. Therefore asking a nascent partner to perform at the level of established partners is a recipe for disaster. As a general rule of thumb, new partner usually perform at half the productivity of established partners and cost almost double of established partners. So if you are using industry benchmarks to setup the expectation, discount the figures by fifty percent. After setting goals, these expectation should e communicated to partners, better still it should be the part of your policy document.
It is important to connect this performance data with partner incentive program. Partners should clearly understand what the incentives are for meeting or exceeding these targets and what are the consequences of not achieving the service level agreements. This is a very potent tool to control partner behavior.