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the business and enhancing their professional knowledge and skillset,” Rasmussen said. Revenue & Engagement When introduced to the EPOS AMPLIFY Partner Program, partners will be tiered by revenue and engage- ment level to ensure optimal support of the individual partner’s key competen- cies, as well as understanding of their needs and growth potential. “The tiers are registered, silver, gold and platinum. The higher a partner’s engagement with the program, the bigger their chances are to progress to higher tiers,” explained Rasmussen. Through EPOS AMPLIFY, partners gain special access to dedicated resources that they will need to hit given measures, drive engagement and increase their value to their custom- ers. This includes a full suite of training and e-learning resources to sell EPOS products with expertise. “In terms of operations, EPOS uses a two-tier distribution model,” Rasmus- sen said. “This means that we sell to our Tier 1 distributors, who in turn sell to Tier 2 resellers. These resell- ers then take our product to the end customer end user. “On the enterprise side of the business, our products appeal to a range of professional needs, from global businesses needing to provide thousands of employees with high quality headsets to SMEs. Our custom- ers are really anyone for whom audio excellence is essential – from customer service centers to educational institu- tions,” he added. Changing & Evolving The EPOS AMPLIFY Partner Program encourages participation from a range of partners and is created for them to differentiate themselves in a rapidly changing and evolving market. “Rather than focusing on evaluat- ing partner levels from revenue targets only, the program emphasizes heavily on involvement and engagement for the EPOS brand to foster return on invest- ment and, ultimately, amplify growth,” Rasmussen explained. He continued, “When designing the program, we wanted to balance the quantity (revenue) aspect with the quality (educational opportunities), as one of our main goals is to make sure that people understand the nuts and bolts of our products.” Partners will be measured by their capabilities and engagement through a range of activities and be rewarded for the focus and investments they make in working with EPOS. “Depending on their commitment, the partner program features a tiered system with a clear path of how to optimize the membership and progress beyond entry-level,” Rasmussen said. “Partners will be rewarded with a range of benefits including Product Sampling Program, Market Develop- ment Fund (MDF), Reward Program, dedicated account management, local marketing support, and much more. At our highest levels, we are really engaged and involved with our partners when it comes to developing sales and marketing plans.” Geographic Strength While EPOS is truly a global company, its primary areas of focus are North America (including Canada, Latin American and the United States), Europe and Asia-Pacific. “We see most of the opportunity in Europe and the United State and Canada, so that is typically where we focus our efforts,” Rasmussen acknowl- edged. “That said, we are hopeful that most of our partners will leverage this program to the fullest, as it is really designed to be mutually beneficial.” Because each tier of EPOS AMPLI- FY has a different set of requirements and rewards the payoff is different. “For example, a registered member – the most basic level – only requires minimal registration, an annual revenue agreement with EPOS, a full direc- tory of contacts and displaying EPOS products and branding on their website. As far as rewards, these members have access to our Brandzone, deal registration, special price support, certification and e-learning resources,” Rasmussen said. “Meanwhile, our most-advanced level is platinum which requires all the above, plus certified experts, attendance at our annual partner conference, a quarterly business review and more,” he continued. “These members are much more engaged and are incentivized accordingly. Their rewards include the Product Sampling Program, dedicated account and marketing management, and access to our VIP Program.” Easy Ramp Up Rasmussen said getting started in the program is easy. It is available to all EPOS channel partners via their local EPOS account representative. “Once they are signed onto the program, they get access to the EPOS AMPLIFY Partner Portal – an easy-to- use online portal that connects partners to EPOS and empowers them with a single go-to destination for necessary resource,” Rasmussen said. In terms of new partners and growth, the company numbers have been consistent over the last few years. “Even though EPOS is a new company and brand name, we’ve been in the market for years now,” Rasmussen said. “Our numbers have really stabi- lized since we are more focused on increasing engagement. That said, we are never opposed to new partners and growing in the future.” Measuring success will involve several metrics, Rasmussen said. “An important one for us is measur- ing engagement with the program – to determine this, we will look at the program’s registration numbers, as well as the engagement with the partner portal. Another way we will measure the success is our partner’s satisfaction,” he said. “We’ll be actively engaging with them to gauge how they feel about the program and their growth within it.” Ultimately, he concluded, “our goal is that EPOS AMPLIFY is to be the most preferred partner program out there.” o CHANNEL MANAGEMENT 50 CHANNEL V ISION | May 2021