Solution providers around the world are expecting a good year in 2026. According to the Channelnomics Partner Confidence Index report for the first quarter, resellers, integrators and managed service providers in North America and Europe are highly confident about their growth prospects, expecting revenue to climb between 10% and 14%. But solution providers don’t expect to grow on their own. They’re looking for support and contributions from their technology vendors.
What Partners Expect from Vendors
Near the top of their wish lists is for vendors to invest in the adoption of new or improved channel management technologies such as partner relationship management (PRM), through-channel marketing automation (TCMA) and partner incentives management (PIM).
Topping the list for partners is the adoption of artificial intelligence tools and resources by vendors in their relationships with resellers and service providers. They want vendors to deploy agents to streamline processes, automate routine tasks, and make activities such as systems design and quoting easier, faster and more accurate.
Third on the list is updating channel management automation (CMA). Partners want vendors to improve their portals, accelerate and streamline information flows, enable easier bidirectional data exchange, and simplify the accounting for earned status, incentives and rewards.
Forty-three percent of partners want to see more AI in their vendor relationships, and 34 percent want improvements to the applications and tools used by vendors to enhance ease of doing business.
Ease of Doing Business: The Key to Partner Performance and Revenue Growth
Channelnomics research has found that no other factor has a greater influence on partner performance and revenue generation than ease of doing business. Vendors with clear and simplified processes, straightforward requirements and usable applications achieve three times greater partner performance than vendors considered difficult or cumbersome to work with.
While vendors often believe that incentives such as steeper discounts and backend performance rebates will motivate partners, they frequently overlook how reducing complexity helps partners move faster in the market. Vendors may struggle with the complexity of managing their own systems, but partners must learn and manage dozens of systems across the many vendors with which they work.
The simpler vendors make these systems, the easier they make it for partners to go to market with them consistently. This is one reason many partners will bypass difficult vendors offering high margins and rebates; they can move faster and often make more money with vendors that may be less profitable on paper but are easier to work with.
Another driver behind this demand for system and capability upgrades is the changing composition of partner organizations. Millennials and Gen Z employees now dominate many of these companies. As digital natives, they have high expectations for how applications and systems should function and feel. They expect access to cutting-edge tools that make their work more efficient and productive.
Modernizing Channel Automation
Channelnomics has found that vendors are responding to the call for system upgrades. Nearly half are looking to upgrade their incentives management systems. Another 25 percent are planning to replace their existing PRMs, and 45 percent are working to improve their current systems. Half are seeking to adopt or enhance their TCMA capabilities. And 45 percent are either adopting or expanding their use of AI in partner relationships and channel management.
The Competitive Risk
The indicators are clear: Vendors that fail to improve their channel management automation and make it easier for partners to engage with their systems risk seeing partners drift to vendors that can better meet their digital expectations.
Larry Walsh is the CEO, chief analyst, and founder of Channelnomics. He’s an expert on the development and execution of channel programs, disruptive sales models, and growth strategies for companies worldwide.
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