Transcript:

Rick Currier (00:00) Well, welcome, Catherine. Nice to talk to you. Kathryn Rose (00:03) Thanks for having me. Rick Currier (00:04) Now I'm very excited today. I just recorded another episode on community, obviously someone who's kind of in communities. And now I'm talking to someone who's actually launched a community. So I'm really excited to talk about channel marketing association, what it's all about, how you founded it and more about yourself as well. Kathryn Rose (00:19) Sure. So, well, I, with my co-founder, Amy Bailey, we launched the Channel Marketing Association just a little over a year ago. I have my own company called ChannelWise. We provide on-demand expert advice to the channel partners and vendors and suppliers to help them accelerate their business growth. And we also run the popular coaching cafes at the industry events. And my friend Amy, we've been in the channel for a long time, she on the telecom side and I was more on the IT side. ⁓ She started her own company and events company a couple of years ago. And right after that, we started seeing like a lot of, you know, the downsizing and reductions in force and everything happening. And a lot of it really impacted our friends in channel marketing. And we thought, you know, we've got to do something. We've got to, you know, we've got all this. ⁓ you know, knowledge and this experience and we have these great networks, how can we come together and do something? So we decided we were gonna launch the Channel Marketing Association and we did our very first webinar just kind of as a test thing ⁓ in November of 23. Yeah, and we had like 300 people on it and we were like, I guess this is the thing, right? So we... ⁓ Rick Currier (01:30) Wow. Holy smokes, real quick, were those a lot of people you already knew, like your network, or were people just finding this webinar? Like, this is something I need. Okay. Kathryn Rose (01:40) these are both because, ⁓ know, I, again, we have a huge, you know, network in channel already, and it was talking about how to do more with less. And so that's where everybody's head was at the time. And then we noticed that there really wasn't, you know, the, the, the, the need was they wanted to kind of a safe space, a community that they could share each, you know, best practices and how they can all work together. No, we used to joke, the channel was like the same hundred people. just moved around. Rick Currier (01:45) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Kathryn Rose (02:10) And that's what it was, but now with cybersecurity vendors and the MSP space and all the different kinds of ⁓ vendors and suppliers that have come in, it's exploded. think Canalys, I Jay McBain talks about like there's 35,000 channel vendors out there now. So that's a huge number. so we wanted areas for people to be able to get their professional knowledge up. share best practices and just give back to the community that's been really great to us. So we started the channel marketing association and we did our very first in-person summit in 2024. And we had about a hundred marketers there. And right after that, we just started growing really quickly. So we have like over a thousand members now, which is crazy and wonderful too. And we're just really trying to figure out ways to serve the community. This year we doubled that we... Rick Currier (02:58) Wow. Kathryn Rose (03:07) over doubled in size. had about 230 people at our in-person summit. ⁓ give about, you we had about over thousand applicants for our channel marketing excellence awards. And so, you know, people are starting to really realize that channel marketing is an important piece and component of, you know, of really moving the channel forward and the business forward. ⁓ And so we're really, we're really proud of that, but, you know, again, just trying to serve our friends and our market. Yeah. Rick Currier (03:37) No, so when you did this webinar, did you have this vision of where this could go or was it like, my God, there's so many people in this webinar. This could become, did you just kind of experience it as it happened or were you always set out to create this giant community with events and webinars and everything to go with it? Kathryn Rose (03:54) It wasn't about the giant community at all. And I think, it still isn't, honestly, like we did the, you know, when we did the summit last year, we, the thing that people loved the most about it was the fact that it was very intimate, you know, and we decided that we're not, you know, gonna go over like 250, you know, maybe 300 at the most. You know, we really wanna keep it small because it's that community base. Rick Currier (03:56) Yeah. Hmm. Kathryn Rose (04:20) So it's not set up to do like 500 person events and things like that. We want to make sure that it's people getting the knowledge, right? That people are getting the experience that they want. So we started doing some in-person forums, like small, you know, small gatherings. did the Dell Technologies was kind enough to host us at their experience, their executive briefing center here on Hopkins and Mass at the beginning of June. And we had about 30 really high level channel folks there and it was just a great experience for everybody to be able to, you like I said, share best practices and camaraderie and, you know, learning from one another. We had a New York Times bestselling author, my friend, ⁓ Dr. Angela Jackson, who talked about her new book, The Win-Win Workplace, because as you probably can imagine, with all the changes and... ⁓ AI coming in and the reductions in force and all the different things and people are getting acquired, all that kind of stuff, that from a leadership perspective, it can be very challenging to manage through that too. So we try to take care of the community, not only giving them the skills for the job that they're doing now, Rick Currier (05:19) Mm-hmm. Kathryn Rose (05:31) but even potentially the job that they could be doing moving forward. And of course, you don't want to forget about the leaders who are having to lead through this change and not only take care of their teams, but also themselves. So, you we're just trying to, you know, certainly as I mentioned, you know, really making sure that we're giving back to the community. Rick Currier (05:42) Yeah. And you mentioned an author and book, and I definitely want to get into your book that you have out. But before that, you know, any surprises or key learnings as the community has grown and it's become its own thing? Like, what's been your biggest takeaway? Kathryn Rose (06:02) Well, I think a couple of things. we did last year, we did the very first state of channel marketing report and we did this widespread survey and really checking in on like the, know, kind of keeping our finger on the pulse. One of the things that was kind of surprising is more than 60 % of our channel marketing folks didn't have a very like well baked out ideal partner profile. So one of the challenges of channel marketing over the years has been ⁓ Rick Currier (06:09) Mm-hmm. Kathryn Rose (06:33) marketers have been pretty good about saying, we really kind of have to hone in, you know, find the right, you know, find the right partner. And then you have sometimes leadership. It could be the fact that they have a direct side that's more of a numbers game. So they don't kind of get it, you know, or they've just gotten a bunch of investors for like, you know, we got to get more partners, more partners. And the marketers like, whoa, hold on, we need the right partners, you know, so it's been a little bit of that. So we're really, you know, trying to help our community get that message across to and how to build your IPP. have a big, a new thing launching in the fall, but we built ⁓ a GPT. We built a specialized AI ⁓ tool that will help marketers build their IPP. ⁓ Yeah. Rick Currier (07:16) interesting. Now, is this just for people in the community or is this something that anybody can access? Kathryn Rose (07:21) Well, there is a light version for people on the outside if they wanna access it, but obviously the members will be getting the full thing. we started with that and then events. The channel does a ridiculous amount of events and it's ridiculous. But what we're finding is that partners still love going to them, right? I think Canals talks about like three, I wanna say it's like 342 and I think I might even be shrinking the number. Maybe it's in the 360 range or something, but. Rick Currier (07:24) Okay. Kathryn Rose (07:49) they're of channel events and that's only the ones, the bigger ones, right? That's not even like the regional road shows and things like that. And so ⁓ the important piece of it is, that, you you could spend millions and people spend, I think the average was around $250,000 on events. And that's not even all in with the travel and all that kind of stuff. And of course, when you think about it, ⁓ the toll it takes on your personnel, not even the budget, right? So it's like, Rick Currier (07:52) Mm-hmm. Kathryn Rose (08:17) How are you finding the right events? ⁓ you really tracking the ROI, whatever that is for you? It could be that you want brand awareness. It doesn't have to be a dollar for dollar even, you know? And we found out that ⁓ more than 40%, almost 50%, didn't really have a great way to track the ROI of events. So these are things that we feel like should be part of what channel marketers are able to do. you know, because most of it comes out of their budget. Right. So, so I think those are the things. And then of course, with AI, right, we're, you know, we're in this AI era and everything's AI, AI, AI, and, you know, more than 60 % at our last count said that they were, you know, a lot of them didn't really even start doing it. But now we're at like the 60 % where they're sort of dabbling in it and stuff. And so, you know, in trying to figure out how to best serve the community, Rick Currier (08:48) Mm-hmm. Kathryn Rose (09:12) these are the different kinds of things, levers that we're pulling on this year and probably into next, especially with AI to make sure that again, channel marketers have all the tools that they need to be successful. Rick Currier (09:24) So I think when most people think about community, think networking relationships kind of comes at the top. what I'm hearing is there's actually a lot of education. Education is a huge part of what I'm assuming is going on inside a channel marketing association. How much of it is one versus the other? And I assume they both really support each other in how you deliver them. Kathryn Rose (09:45) They do, and I think one of the biggest misconceptions, and I'm gonna disabuse anyone out there listening of this, this is not easy. You can't just throw together a community. Community is like, it's like a very delicate plant. You have to feed it, you have to water it, you have to make sure it gets enough sun, whatever it is. Rick Currier (10:00) Mm Kathryn Rose (10:07) it's very important that you do that. And so for us, that's what it is. So we have our networking opportunities, we have meetups, we have the forums, we have the summit. And Amy and I go to a number of shows and we're always doing something. And of course we have our online community where people can chat and share best practices, but it can't just be that. Right? ⁓ It has to be more than that. you know, when we first started, we're like, everyone's going to come in and share best practices. Well, that didn't exactly happen because people are nervous. Like, well, should I share this? I'm not sure. You know, that kind of thing. And, you know, oftentimes we we discount how much we know. We were like, everybody knows this. That's not the case. And that's one of the things that Amy and I have uncovered as we're going is that, ⁓ you know, anonymously people will be like, yeah, I don't really track ROI, you know, but they would never say in a in a community like, hey, I don't track ROI for fear of people going what, you know, even though, you know, 60 % of them don't whatever. So ⁓ it's, ⁓ it's important that when you're when you have a community that you offer the different opportunities for networking. But you're also you also kind of have to take the lead because people are looking at you for that. So that's what we're that's we're doing. we're you know, the courses we're writing books, we're Rick Currier (11:11) You Kathryn Rose (11:28) doing a number of things. have some great partnerships that we're working with and ⁓ we have great sponsors and stuff like that. So yeah. Rick Currier (11:35) Tell me a little bit about the Excellence Awards, because I actually saw this on LinkedIn recently. A partner marketer at Microsoft had actually posted her acceptance of one of these awards. Tell me a little bit about what it is, what does it mean to the community, how do you apply for one, everything. Kathryn Rose (11:52) Yeah. So, you one of the things that we, you know, that we don't really get enough of, especially in channel marketing, you know, salespeople get their president's club or they get, you know, they get their big commission checks and hey, I'm a salesperson. So I'm, I'm with you. started marketing and, went to sales, but, ⁓ but marketers don't really get that pat on the back or anything like that. So we decided that we were going to do that. And so we, launched the channel marketing excellence awards the first year. Same as this year, we had nearly thousand applicants. And ⁓ basically we look at like, how visible are you out there? Like, ⁓ you on LinkedIn? Are you posting a lot? Are you contributing to the greater good of the channel? ⁓ Are you well regarded in the different circles? How long have you been in the channel? How are ⁓ you different kinds of things and criteria that we do? So we started the first year ⁓ and last year and it's just been super rewarding to see people get that recognition ⁓ for their actual performance in this industry. You can't really, well, you can't at all graduate with a degree in channel. Rick Currier (13:13) You Kathryn Rose (13:13) There is no ⁓ courses out there really for channels. So it's such a niche, but it's a really great community niche and it drives trillions of dollars of revenue. So it's like, we wanna make sure these people get the recognition they deserve for the hard work that they're doing. Rick Currier (13:35) I want to switch a little bit to the book I referenced earlier. We have a brand new book out. AI in the Channel, is that the name? Kathryn Rose (13:42) Your first 30 days with AI Channel Marketing Edition. Yes. Rick Currier (13:45) There we go. So this isn't your first book though. Kathryn Rose (13:49) No, this is my tent. Rick Currier (13:50) Wow, okay. Alright. Well, I mean, you couldn't have been more timely with a title like that. Tell me a little bit about the book. Kathryn Rose (13:56) Well, my first books years ago were, everything that I tried to do is very tactical and practical. And years ago, the first books that I wrote were like the step-by-step guide to Facebook and Twitter and YouTube. Because back then that was the big thing, like marketing changed, know, not as quickly I would say as AI has entered, but quick enough that it went from like billboards and TV and radio ads to Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn and YouTube. And so ⁓ a lot of the marketers got caught flat-footed a little bit because they had the strategy, but they didn't understand the tools, right? Same thing today with AI is that most of the marketers that I know, the seasoned marketers, they have all the knowledge. They understand what they need and how they wanna do it, but using a tool like AI, unless you really understand how to speak to it and how to give it... the information it needs to return to you the results that you would want ⁓ that would actually save you time, ⁓ you're gonna think this is junk. And that's what happened with me. The first year I was using and I was, I just feel like, yeah, give me a blog post or hey, rewrite this or do stuff like that. And my friend Julie, who I co-wrote the book with, she's been a friend of mine on my journey for many, many years. She was with me when I wrote those first books way back. And she... I said, Julie, this is terrible. It was coming up with stuff like, we're gonna delve into whatever, or in today's digital landscape, was like, ugh, you And it took me so long to edit and stuff. And she's like, with respect, Kat, you're doing it wrong. She's like, you're not talking to it right. You're not giving it what it needs and stuff like that. So she had written a book, ⁓ a beginner book for AI for small business people. And I said, can you work with me and we'll do one for the channel marketing community. So we did. So we wrote it and ⁓ we just released it. ⁓ But, we've given out like, you know, some review copies and things like that. We're getting really great feedback on it. And ⁓ because it's written for channel marketers, by channel marketers. So it's like, it's not this what's an LLM, you know, not for nothing, but I really don't care how the sausage is made. I just want to make sure that I can use what this tool is to make my life easier. And Rick Currier (16:11) Mm-hmm. Kathryn Rose (16:18) With everything in tech, again, reductions in force, budget reductions and everything, people are gonna have to do more with less and this is the best way to keep your sanity and use a tool that's really meant to help ⁓ you do and you're able to be more strategic because you're less tactical, right? When you employ these strategies. So that's what we're working on and that's what we did. And then we, of course, we launched a course to go with it. Rick Currier (16:45) Cool, tell me a little bit about the course. Is it application based on what to do with this information now? Kathryn Rose (16:50) Yes, exactly. So we walk folks through, it's not exactly a replica of the book, but it's, you know, in some ways it's close. It's like, you know, the top 10, 15 use cases that we know channel marketers do all the time and how they can use the tool. You know, we give them the prompts, we walk them through everything and it's very practical because at the end it's like, okay, now it's your turn. Take this prompt that we just did and worked on with you and put it into your... you know, your context for your company, for what you need, and then you get the, ⁓ you know, you get the output that you would want. So that's, you know, that's what we are doing. And again, it's a certification. It's the first industry recognized certification. So we're really proud of that. ⁓ And the fact is, is that, you know, there's so much movement again with RIFs and with all the things that I think there was a statistic I saw the other day, it was like 88 % of all job descriptions now. Rick Currier (17:33) Interesting Kathryn Rose (17:46) say they want AI proficiency. There's no real way to prove it though, but you can when you say, I've gotten certified. So that's what we're trying to do is set our folks apart. When they're applying for jobs, when they're looking for different kinds of things, when they're hiring people, gives them an idea of the fact that this person understands how to use AI in the best way. Rick Currier (17:48) Yeah. Is there an example use case that you can tease out or just, you know, for people listening, something to take away just to think about how do I actually utilize AI in the channel? Like anything you can give them. Kathryn Rose (18:24) Yeah, I mean, I think one of the biggest things is ⁓ just the practical stuff that you do all the time, like QBRs. If you're doing ⁓ quarterly business reviews with your ⁓ partners, you're able to kind of take and solidify that information and you're them scorecards. I not all marketers do that, but a lot of times they're involved in those kinds of things. MDF. ⁓ You can use it to write MDF rules. You can use it to ⁓ give your partners the ideas of how they could use the MDF. Then they can give you the information back and then you could use it to say whether or not this was a successful use of your MDF. Events, ⁓ utilizing it to look at what cities are good to do events in and how to calculate the ROI of an event. We have a custom GPT that we wrote specifically for our members that they could put information in to get that. Just easy stuff like battle cards. You can go in and you can ask it to create a battle card for you and your competitors and things like that so partners can get that. One of the greatest things is localization. As we expand globally, I was just in Paris and we did a meetup there. The number one challenge. Rick Currier (19:23) Hmm. Kathryn Rose (19:45) for folks in other regions is the translations. Not only the translations, the, when I say localization, I mean, it's like, you know, some of the terms of phrase we use in English don't translate over there. People don't know what game changer means. you know what I mean? So it's different kinds of things like that. So AI is trained really well and it's getting there. It's better now. ⁓ and it's getting there, but it's trained much better than just Google Translate to give you that true localization. So being able to localize campaigns quickly ⁓ is really good, but just your normal stuff like white papers, eBooks, all those kinds of things. And we walk through all those examples ⁓ in the course and in the book. Rick Currier (20:38) You mentioned MDF. I obviously work with a lot of partner marketers that are dealing with MDF programs. Huge challenge and I wanted to kind of talk to you about some of the challenges out there. What are you seeing work well with MDF programs or do you have any advice with people that just struggle with MDF programs, whether they're giving out MDF or receiving MDF? What are you seeing? Kathryn Rose (20:59) MDF has evolved so much over the years and we're actually launching a course on that too, just by the way, because most people don't even understand what it is. They do not even understand. They think it's some kind of like a slush fund or whatever. Well, that's not exactly true. There are rules. There are legal rules around it, which is why you can't just use it for anything. But some of the you use it for, you're like, what? Why can you do that? So I think the The number one thing that we always recommend with MDF is first understanding what it is in regard to your organization. Some people call it SPF, some people call it MDF, some people call it JDF, BDF, there's all these different terms, Contra dollars, I mean, just number one, like understanding the different terms that people are using and how it's being used. So that's first. Second, think applying it, across the board gets really challenging. ⁓ And ⁓ trying to figure out the best ways to use it. Every organization has their own rules around it. It gets very complicated and can be very cumbersome. But it can also be a really great way for you to expand your reach in your marketing. So again, it's understanding completely the rules. I always recommend to that marketer spend time a lot of time with their sales leaders, with their finance people, because the finance, the CFO of your company or those folks, they're going to be the ones explained to you. Look, this is what you can use it for. This is how to get it through quicker. ⁓ Really making sure that you understand how that can, how it can work. One of the things, and I'm not going to take it on this year because it's a lot, but one of the things I really want to tackle pulping in 26 is really trying to figure out a good way for MDF to be more standardized and also work better for partners. You have a challenge that, ⁓ you know, when you really dig into the research out there and there's, and, you know, I'm kind of a geek, so I, I really dig into a lot of this stuff. vast majority of partners do most of their business in the, in the last quarter and first quarter of the following year. calendar year and that makes sense right because people's contracts are usually up on a calendar year and stuff like that but the vendors MDF is doled out quarterly and they're like well why does anyone use it well you know really ⁓ two reasons one is they they do it all quarterly so the partners are really busy trying to onboard new people and you know just just thinking about through their business the second thing is you know outside of like an actual phone call campaign. And even that can be a little bit challenging to like drill down in one quarter. Most of the activities these people are going to do, events, social media, whatever it is, you're not gonna get those results in one quarter. So you're expected to spend the money, report back on the money, get reimbursed for the money. Sometimes they give it up front, but a lot of times the partner has to dole it out and they get reimbursed. And so now you have a problem where they're not getting the ROI fast enough, right? So that's one of the things that I really wanna look at. If there is a way from an industry best practice perspective that we can look at this more from how it works best for partners rather than how it works best for us. Rick Currier (24:37) You think AI can play a role in helping solve that problem? Kathryn Rose (24:41) No, not really. because I mean, it can play a role with if I upload my, you if I upload my my results, you know, but if I don't have results for two quarters and I'm supposed to submit it this quarter, that's not going to help. It's more of like looking at the at the overall MDF best practices and seeing if there is a way that it can be a rolling. Rick Currier (24:56) Yeah, it's. Kathryn Rose (25:07) fund or something, ⁓ just re-imagining it a little bit different because it can be super useful, ⁓ if it doesn't work for the partner, if it's onerous for the partner, I mean, I do think AI can help with the rules, right? ⁓ Now, a lot of times you have to, even today, you have to fill out like ⁓ a Google form or whatever and you have some person sitting there going, this looks good. But if you can build an agent, Rick Currier (25:09) Yeah. Kathryn Rose (25:36) that has all the custom rules and everything else built in, the partner can fill out the thing and it can automatically say, yeah, hey, this is great. And then when they have their results, they go back into that same thing, they put the results in, and then it builds them a deck and it builds the salesperson or the marketer a deck that they can go back to their leadership and say, hey, this was the outcome. So in that case, I think it can. I don't think it would help sort of rewrite the rules though, no. Rick Currier (26:04) Yeah, you know, certainly if someone internally is pushing a better process, you know, they might get squashed. But if they're coming to them saying, hey, we're working with an association and this is a new standard they put out as a best practice, like, I think that helps add credibility and weight to that internal push. Kathryn Rose (26:16) correct. 100%. That's why we're saying like the channel marketing association, we'd like to take the lead there and say, this is our recommendation from our research. And then we have some really incredible companies that we work with, ServiceNow, Dell, D &H Distributing, ⁓ Fortinet, CloudFlare. We have Lumen, Comcast from the telecom side. so, you Rick Currier (26:26) Yeah. Kathryn Rose (26:46) with the help of those folks, because it's not just me saying it, right? I mean, everyone's saying that this system doesn't work great, right? So if we all come together and we can show that there could be a potentially better way, all it takes is a few of these bigger vendors to buy into it and accept it, and then it becomes best practices across. that's one of the goals. Things that are gonna make the lives easier of our members. but also the channel community stronger, because if we make them stronger, we are able to get the MDF deployed, it's able to be used, the partners are more successful, then the channel becomes more successful, right? So that's what we're trying to do. Rick Currier (27:31) So that's definitely exciting and as we close up here, anything else that people should be excited for, whether in the second half of the year or just in the vision of where Channel Marketing Association is going? Kathryn Rose (27:40) Ooh, we have a lot of things. so July, we have the AI in the Channel Summit. It's a virtual summit. So it's two days and it's all of these incredible people who have come forward and said, I'm gonna show you under the hood of like how I'm using AI to be successful. it's like, it's for channel marketers and sellers. We have a couple of CEOs who have implemented AI workflows throughout their companies. Some of them for three years, which most of us weren't even thinking about it then, right? So they're all willing to come together and show people how they can use it. Again, that's targeted to channel marketers and sellers. have a, again, we have the book and the course, the AI Essentials course. And then in the fall, we have a couple of forums in Northern California and Southern California. So we'll be there. And then we have our big ⁓ channel marketing virtual summit that we have ⁓ in October. And that's gonna be. just channel marketing and we'll have some AI stuff in there, but it'll be all different stuff about channel marketing. ⁓ And then we'll have the opening of the ⁓ excellence awards and then we'll do our call for speakers for the AI, excuse me, the channel marketing association summit for 2026. So we have a lot of good stuff happening, you know, and we're just really blessed. We feel really grateful for the support that we've gotten for the members that we have. and everyone really working together has just made it so much more fun and rewarding. Rick Currier (29:10) Awesome. And I know you said trying to keep it small and intimate, is there an opportunity if someone's not in the Channel Marketing Association to still join? Kathryn Rose (29:18) absolutely. mean, we're not restricting the membership per se. Like I said, we have over a thousand members, but it's like some of the bigger like in-person events and things like that. We're trying to keep them much smaller and more intimate so that people actually get a really good experience and can learn from each other versus sitting in a room with a thousand people hoping that someone's listening kind of thing. Rick Currier (29:38) Yeah, no, I love it. love it. Big community, but intimate, intimate gatherings to really connect with folks. I mean, that's absolutely everything I love. So, Catherine, thank you so much for coming on. This has been great and I really appreciate the time and busy second half of the year. Good luck. Kathryn Rose (29:46) Exactly. Thanks, Rick, appreciate it.