What is a partner portal for retailer? 9 unbeatable advantages

The term partner portal comes from the B2B sector (B2B = business-to-business) and refers to a web platform through which information is provided for sales partners. Think, for example, of large automotive companies such as VW or Toyota. In order to reach the various reseller, in this case car dealers, a secure interface is needed via which up-to-date image and media material can be delivered in a straightforward way. This is exactly the task that apartner portal fulfills.

How is a partner portal for retailer implemented?

For a powerful partner portal, of course, you need appropriate server capacity. What used to be done by local servers is now increasingly being realized via data centers. A partner portal is therefore normally based on a cloud infrastructure.

The content provided can usually be accessed via an address on the Internet. So you only need a modern browser and no additional software. A partner portal differs from a conventional website in that one must first go through a registration and authentication process in order to receive activation. Once this process is complete, users can log into the portal with their data and access target group-specific content.

What you see from a content hub as a registered sales partner is, of course, only the front end. If you want to learn more about the backend and the systematic management of documents and media files, we recommend our article on Digital Asset Management. In this article, however, we will limit ourselves to the portal through which shared content is delivered.

9 Advantages of a partner portal for retailer

Setting up a dealer portal has many advantages for companies, so the additional costs should pay for themselves quickly. In the following, we have listed the most important advantages so that you can get an initial overview.

1. Increased accessibility

With a content hub, you ensure that the most important data and content is always kept up-to-date and centrally available for your sales partners. No matter where a retrailer is, he can always access the portal.

2. Gain distributors

Via a central partner portal for retailer, you can activate additional distributors, make products and brands even more visible, and thus increase sales.

3. Keep control

Only those files that have been previously checked and approved will be delivered via the dealer portal. This way, you always keep control over your digital content.

4. Safe environment

Customizable authentication defaults can be used to secure the content delivery environment for specific purposes.

5. Better understand target groups

By using tracking technology, it is possible to track who has downloaded or accessed which content and when. Statistics modules are used to process and analyze this data so that valuable conclusions can be drawn about the behavior of your sales partners.

6. All data types

Ein gutes Portal zeichnet sich dadurch aus, dass es alle gängigen Datentypen darstellen kann: von der Vektorgrafik bis zum MP4-Video, von der PowerPoint-Präsentation bis zum PDF, vom Rohdatenformat bis zur Photoshop-Datei.

7. Custom download templates

To meet the specific requirements and areas of application of the sales partners, completely different download templates can be created for image material, e.g. for web and social media uses or for print media such as magazines, flyers, posters etc.

8. Customizable design

With good solutions, the user interface of a partner portal can always be individualized and adapted to the desired corporate design.

9. Less e-mails, more time

The constant availability of a content hub greatly reduces e-mail inquiries from sales partners looking for specific content. This saves you time and resources.

Who uses a content hub for retailer?

The actors who create, manage, and share the content typically come from corporate departments such as marketing, PR, technical documentation, or quality assurance, while external users are composed of groups that usually fit one of the following terms:

• • Sales partner
  • Seller / Intermediary
  • Retailer / Wholesaler
  • Online retailer / mail order company
  • Sales representative
  • B2B customers
  • Salesman / Specialist salesman
  • Importers / Exporters
  • Distributors

In the case of internationally operating companies and large corporations, the partner portal is naturally designed to be multilingual. Most of the content will then also be delivered in the language of the respective sales region. In English, by the way, one speaks of a partner portal. Solutions specifically for retail are called retailer portal or retail portal.

What can be downloaded through a partner portal?

The list is long, of course. We will limit ourselves here to the most important document types that arise in practice. These are:

• • Visuals for products (product photos, product videos, illustrations, animations, etc.)
  • Product texts and product presentations
  • Sales promotion material
  • Logos, banners and lettering
  • Operating instructions / user manuals
  • technical data sheets and safety data sheets
  • Manuals, brochures and catalogs
  • Article master data
  • Material master data
  • Spare parts data

For companies that offer many different and / or complex products, the partner portal is often connected to a PIM system (PIM = product information management). This facilitates data maintenance and, if necessary, also enables direct publishing, i.e. the automated creation of documentation.

Automatic product recognition with the teamnext – Media Portal

Product photos are probably available in every partner portal. However, the information about which product or products are shown in which version on which image is sometimes not so easy to determine for those who manage the images, especially if the product range is large and similar-looking variants exist. Wouldn’t it be convenient if the products displayed were automatically recognized?
With the solution we have developed at teamnext, this is possible. After training with the appropriate image material, our AI* automatically recognizes your products and ensures the correct keywording without any intervention. This saves a lot of time and increases the findability of your product photos.

* AI stands for artificial intelligence.

Test the partner portal from teamnext

The portal solution we developed particularly fulfills the functions described in this article. Well-known customers such as the traditional furniture manufacturer THONET rely on it.

If we have made you curious and you would like to try out the various functions of our solution, the teamnext | Media Hub with Media Portal, then you can get started right away by starting a free 14-day test phase. In addition, you can of course book an appointment for a free online product demo with one of our experts at any time. Simply use our contact form for this purpose.