Don’t just sell what you’re given

If you're relying on vendor playbooks, soft MQLs, and same-old content, you're not building your business; you’re just renting it.

We all know the IT channel is built on relationships. But relationships alone aren’t enough anymore. Not in this market. Not with this much noise. Not when everyone has access to the same campaigns, is fighting for the same MDF budget, using the same lead metrics that rarely convert.

Right now, more than ever, it’s time to get serious about your go-to-market. That goes for both partners and vendors. Because unless your GTM reflects your voice, your market, and your value, what exactly are you building? Let’s look at the three elephants in the room when it comes to channel lead generation today:

1. Still chasing MQLs? You're running in circles.

The obsession with soft MQLs is a hangover from another time. A form fill doesn’t mean intent. A golf day attendee doesn’t mean a deal. A webinar registration doesn’t mean engagement. Yet we’re still building pipeline reports around these signals as if they are some guarantee of revenue.

Sales teams, on both sides, are frustrated. They want real opportunities. Conversations that lead somewhere. Buyers who’ve shown they're ready, not just clicked a link out of curiosity. Sales interest that doesn’t fade with the leftover pizza on the spiff day.

Vendors need to stop measuring channel success on volume alone. Partners need to demand more than a list of names. Quality is the only metric that counts.

2. Vendor campaigns aren’t a strategy (and neither is blind execution)

Too many MDF-funded campaigns are built to tick proof-of-performance boxes, not win deals. They’re often product-centric, difficult to adapt, and rarely focused on what customers actually care about. They also tend to favour events, which assumes all the work has already been done to warm the audience up to get them there in the first place. This, in turn, leads to an industry-accepted (largely unspoken) 50% dropout rate, causing last-minute panic to get any bum on any seat.

Yes, MDF is valuable. But if the campaign doesn't reflect your market, your customer, and your brand, the return is limited. Vendors may see ‘reach’, but partners see little pipeline. And that’s bad for everyone.

It’s time for a shift. Partners need space to build a GTM that’s truly theirs. Vendors need to empower this, not override it. That’s where real alignment happens. That’s how you stop campaigns from becoming copy-paste exercises and start building long-term growth.

3. Standing out is the new lead generation

The market’s noisy. Buyers are bombarded daily, and generic messages get ignored. If your GTM - whether you’re a vendor or a partner - sounds like everyone else, you're invisible.

Differentiation isn’t optional. It’s your only strategy. What makes you worth paying attention to before procurement starts? What’s your point of view on the market? Why should buyers trust you to help them make sense of it?

This can’t be faked with templated content. It has to be earned with insight, relevance, and a clear voice. It also can’t be faked with ‘wacky’, ‘out there’ marketing if it doesn’t truly reflect what you’re about. A brand is for life, not a campaign.

The bottom line: GTM is where channel value is built

We talk a lot about the value of the channel. But that value comes from shared ownership of outcomes, not just shared effort.

• Partners: If your entire strategy depends on vendor campaigns, your business is just an extension of someone else’s roadmap.
• Vendors: If your partners can’t stand on their own feet in front of customers, your channel isn’t scalable, it’s fragile.

You don’t need a bigger budget to fix this. You need a better plan. A clearer message. A way to consistently engage buyers who want to hear from you. The vendors and partners who win in this market are the ones who invest in a GTM they own.

So ask yourself: If the playbooks disappeared tomorrow, would your pipeline still move? If not, now’s the moment to fix that.

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