partner prospecting

Partner prospecting: The art of finding and building alliances

6 min read

Feb 29, 2024 9:03:48 AM

No matter how big your partner network is, the goal is always to make it even larger—sometimes to boost your chances of success, other times to explore new territories or industries. Let's dive into ways to structure this process and outline the steps to achieve success.

Define who you should work with

Before you jump in and start proposing meetings, it makes sense to take a step back. You should first take a look at what your Ideal Partner Profile looks like. Consider who you are already working with, who is delivering the best results, who is bringing in leads, and who is promoting your company. What are their common traits? It is worth defining the following:

Industry they work in;
Size of the company (either in terms of people or revenue);
Product fit - if what they are selling can fit what you are selling;
Geography - which regions are they focusing on;

This will help you clarify which partners you should go after. Once you have this defined, you should also consider what value you are delivering to them. This will help you later on when you pitch to the company. Consider leads, marketing, referrals, training, and anything else you can provide to increase their business. To give you a few examples:

If you are a software house specializing in eCommerce, you might want to connect with marketing agencies specializing in the space. They will have the same clientele and likely not be competitors to you. Many times marketing agencies need to support their clients by building a store. Sometimes they see that the current store is not developed properly and can guide the customer in your direction.
If you are offering a marketing tool (e.g., a marketing automation platform), you could connect with freelance marketers, marketing agencies, and software houses working in the same industries as yours.
If you are offering a product for hotels, you could consider partnering with consultants and hotel-related services (e.g., cleaning, accounting, room management software). Even if they might not bring in that many leads, at scale, it could be quite successful. Remember - not only do they speak to the same demographic, but they also attend trade shows, meetups, and generally network in the same space. If they are aware of your solution, chances are they might recommend it to somebody.

Prepare a list of potential partners

Once you have defined the Ideal Partner Profile, you should start working on a list of people/companies to contact. There are many ways to do so, but you can use these 5 strategies to get you started:

Use LinkedIn Sales Navigator to find all connections that fit the profile you defined. Connect with them and ask for a meeting.
Attend trade shows, conferences, meetups, and build your network. If you are shy (as am I), there are a few tricks to help you out:
1. Listen to the presentations and write down questions for the speakers. Approach them with the questions; this might lead to a longer conversation where you actually get to talk about your solution / partnership;
2. Do your research and select a few people you would like to interact with ahead of time. Write down questions you have for them - if you see them at the conference, it will be much easier for you to start the conversation;
3. Connect with the people who are attending the conference ahead of time. Propose to meet them. It is much more difficult for somebody to say no once they’ve already agreed to a meeting;
4. Set KPIs for yourself. Make a plan to talk to at least 10 potential partners and don’t leave until you do. Having a goal is a great motivator to overcome your fears.
5. Remember - even though you might think of yourself or your company as insignificant - this is not the case. You are interesting. You are valuable. You can always provide them with a different view of things, and people grow by speaking to others. Your “leads” are there to meet people - how are they going to do so if you don’t approach them?;
6. Ask the people you know to introduce you to new people;
Check your competitor pages - who are they working with? Who is promoting them? Not only on their page but also on their social media pages. This can give you a lot of inspiration on who to approach.
When checking their social media profiles (especially LinkedIn), make sure you check who is reacting and commenting on their posts. You might easily gather a lot of potential partners this way - just by silently observing them.
When talking to potential partners, if you already have a strong connection with them, don’t be afraid to ask if they know other companies that might want to become partners. Maybe they will even introduce you.

Do your research

Once you have a list of potential partners, you should prioritize them and put them in small batches. For example, 5-10 partners each week to reach out to. Once you have these short lists, you should spend some time researching them - get to know their solution, how they present themselves, what drives them / what are their values. This will help you reach out to them in a more personalized way.

There is an added benefit of doing this - once you feel you know the company, you can consider the value you are bringing to them. Think of why they would want to partner up with you. What are you bringing to the table? Write these observations down and use them in your conversation with them.

Approach them

You have 3 easy strategies to approach new potential partners.

Find the person responsible for the partnerships in a given company by using LinkedIn Sales Navigator. Remember not to use InMails as most people don’t read them. Send a personalized connection message and expect that only a handful will reply (you should expect a 20-30% acceptance rate). In your message, do not focus on your solution but on the value for them. Let them know you are considering them for a partnership, but don’t spam them with facts about your company. Find some detail that might attract them enough to meet with you. Maybe use a good statistic from a different partner (”other partners from your industry typically receive the first lead from us within the first 3 months of the partnership” or “we’ve been partners with X for 7 years straight, I would love to show you how we can work together in a similar fashion”).
Find the “Become our partner” page on their website. Typically it has a form or an e-mail address that will direct you to the person responsible. Sometimes they even mention the Partner Manager / Head of Partnerships by name on their website or allow you to book a direct meeting with them.
Observe them (and their Partnership Managers) on LinkedIn and see what trade shows they are attending. If you already have a connection on LinkedIn with them, this might be an ideal ice breaker: “Hey, are you going to be at X? I am planning to attend and I would love to meet you and talk about a potential partnership”

Pitch your partnership

Once you have a meeting scheduled, you need to prepare a presentation. It is a good idea to have some slides ready that explain your product, the market you are strong in, and the general idea behind the partnership. Make sure to leave room for custom slides that will focus on two things:

What they can get from the partnership - focus on what is the value for this specific company. Will they get leads? Marketing? Exposure? Know-how? MDFs? Everything and anything that could convince them to join.
Proposed goals for the partnership for the first year - if you manage to come to the meeting with a plan that will already specifically define what both parties should aim for (in terms of deliverables and value), you have a much higher chance of securing the partnership. Obviously, leave room for negotiations / changes to the plan. Maybe they already know they will not be able to provide you as much as you wanted. Maybe there are other areas that are important to them that you did not consider. Maybe there are marketing options available that you did not think of.

Optionally (but highly recommended), you can add a slide that will show the steps both parties will follow if they continue with the collaboration. You can include things like:

When is the agreement signed
When/who will be trained
When will they be included on your website? When will you be included on theirs?
How often will you meet and what will you discuss?
When (and how much) do they need to pay to become partners (if this is the case)

Next steps

Assuming you found a way to the partner’s heart, you should be signing the agreement. Make sure you give them your maximum attention during the first months. Follow up, call them, make sure they become active partners. Aim to deliver what you promised and make a great first impression.

If for some reason they did not end up signing the agreement, make sure to ask them about the reasons. Was it the price? Was it the value you are offering? Incompatibility? Focus on other areas? This data can help you improve the process for the next partner. Implement small tweaks and measure the results.

Go get them!