Yet this buying experience, good or bad, is hugely important.  Indeed, it could be the unique selling point you use to differentiate your product from the crowd.

In the UK, mobile phone network provider Orange has gone down just this route. A series of very simple posters show a boy with orange hair and tie telling you that if you want to know how to do elementary things, like changing your ring tone, simply go to an Orange shop. A spokesman said: "We found that 90% of mobile phone users were using only 10% of the functionality."  These ads are a great way for Orange to build foot traffic, and to take the mystery out of mobile telephony.

Orange is not alone. Look at how the luxury car marques such as Mercedes and BMW have started controlling their routes-to-market.  Mercedes now goes direct in some cities. These car makers understand that they are not delivering on brand promise unless the consumer gets excellent customer service. And they know your brand experience starts on the forecourt.

Yet these companies remain in a minority.  Sometimes companies fail to acknowledge the strength of their channel offering. 

Take food retailer Tesco which allows you to buy over the web paying £5 for delivery.  The great trick about the Tesco site is that you can not only see what you last purchased online, but you can also see what you purchased on your last in-store visit.  These pre-existing lists save consumers huge amounts of time.  Tesco hasn’t latched on to the value of this to its customers as a time saving convenience in its promotions.

Business-to-business suppliers are particularly bad at getting beyond the naked product. Take the computer industry, where naked product, price/performance communication still prevails. This is extraordinary given the huge, hidden costs that companies incur in buying and implementing IT.  Costs that many users are increasingly aware of.  And focusing on price/performance merely allows the operator with the lowest price to clean up.

You could argue that this reflects the lack of control that IT suppliers have over the IT channel. How can you promise a certain level of service in these circumstances?  This perhaps is why so few companies feel able to promote the total customer solution in their advertising and communications.

Of course, one answer is franchising or even vertical integration, where the supplier owns the outlets.  As industries mature and become more predictable, so these routes start to look more attractive.

But how can you talk about the customer experience when you don’t have that much control over your channel?
I would argue that even if you are selling through third party intermediaries, you can do a great deal to ensure that the service your customers get is something to boast about.

One answer is accreditation schemes which recognise those intermediaries who have real skills and add real value.  Such schemes are becoming more and more frequent.  Although even where they are effective, suppliers seem curiously reluctant to promote their benefits to potential customers.

And some suppliers are moving to reward third parties for adding value.  In the IT industry Cisco, and soon HP, will have schemes which reward value, rather than simply reselling.  In this way, and through education and training, suppliers can make a quantum difference to how well their channels deliver.

But perhaps one answer is to start with the customer. Do you know what your customers think of your intermediaries? Why and how do they buy from them today?  You just might find that your product already enjoys huge USPs, thanks to your channel!  If so, isn’t it time to go out and shout about them in the market?