In early 2020, it became obvious that the world was on an accelerated path to major change. To ensure their customers and partners could continue to connect with Dell Technologies during these times of uncertainty, the Executive Briefing Program (EBP) established a virtual-only solution to meet the need head-on.
What is an Executive Briefing?
An Executive Briefing is a personalized experience, designed to help partners and partners customers create a digital strategy. Regardless of where partners are in their digital journey, one thing remains constant; an Executive Briefing engagement allows for collaboration one-on-one with Dell Technologies’ executives and experts to engage in candid conversations around industry best practices and insights tailored to their unique business needs and challenges. Some of the program’s key offerings include:
● Center-Based Briefing
● Field-Based Briefing
● Virtual Briefing
How did Dell Technologies make a typically “in-person” engagement resonate virtually?
In establishing their Virtual Offering, the EBP set out to provide global sales teams with an experience that was interactive, customized, and valuable to partners and partners’ customers alike. Elements of the in-person briefing offering such as agenda creation, discussion leader alignment and preparation, gifts and feedback remained, while additional features were added to elevate the virtual experience:
● Moderator – a virtual facilitator, designed to assist in ensuring a well and seamlessly run meeting. This resource is aligned to help with transitioning between discussion leaders, introductions, monitoring the live chat and capturing customer interaction for follow ups.
● Technology considerations for video conferencing platforms, including but not limited to the creation and hosting of all virtual meetings, development of discussion leader best practices to encourage interaction and dialogue, customer test calls, etc.
A Silver Lining
Transitioning to a virtual model allowed the EBP access to more partners and partners’ customers than ever before; they were able to renew their focus on alignment in the partner community, committing to an increase in channel activity globally. This was best achieved by establishing new partnerships and maintaining momentum with existing partners and customers. To support these efforts, the EBP created a targeted effort around partner briefings through several key initiatives:
● Documenting the partner experience through a video series. This consisted of short, consumable videos with a chronological outline of the briefing process, along with insight on how best to engage, with testimonials from members of the channel team.
● Creation of an EBP partner portal site. Here, members could go in and detail not only how and when to engage, but also the various styles of partner briefings, thereby creating a pseudo drill-down, if you will, of the complete, end-to-end process.
● Internal customization. This included development of partner-specific discussion topics, along with education on the partner eco-system designed to help deliver the best end-to-end experience to all partners.
These efforts proved to be successful, resulting in a significant increase in channel activity from the previous year. From October of 2020 through March of 2021:
● Channel Briefings accounted for 24% of all Briefing Accounts (a 9% increase YoY).
● Confidence levels amongst partners increased by 18%, up to 97% from 79%, with a cNPS score of 68.
● 94% of partner account executives felt that an Executive Briefing improved their relationship with their customer/partner.
The EBP was able to evolve its offerings by adapting to change and meeting the needs of Dell Technologies’ partners. Again, they are on the precipice of change as many organizations explore returning to site. Customer engagements will surely continue to evolve, encompassing both in-person and virtual experiences, but also looking to a new hybrid approach, taking the best of both offerings to allow for a dynamic and flexible customer experience of the future.
Learn more about Dell Technologies’ Executive Briefing Program
Interested in learning more about the EBP? Then visit the Executive Briefing Program here
