 As a savvy marketer you’re always looking for ways to increase revenue and brand equity. You could go it alone and be the “Apple” in everyone’s eye. But that’s expensive and takes considerable time. What you need is a wingman - or preferably a few wingmen, also known as business partners - to help expand your online marketing reach and revenue.
How can partnering increase your online marketing revenue?
- Offering a compatible solution increases customer trust and loyalty
- Your customers benefit from eliminating the need to shop around, thus saving them time and money, increasing loyalty and repeat purchase
- Satisfied customers result in mutual referrals
Why is brand equity important?
If your partner has a stronger brand than your company, you’ll benefit from this brand bump. Your image appeal has the possibility of being increased simply by being associated with your new partner. Liken this to dating someone better looking than you - others simply assume there’s more there based on the visual representation. It’s not unusual for companies to create purely strategic partnerships, where although the revenue may not be immediately forthcoming, partnering with a strong brand could make you look more attractive - appear more credible - to companies you want to do business with. Of course after this door is open, it’s important to have a strong product and service to move these deals forward.
The 5 Basics for Building a Successful Partnership:
Much like finding a soul mate or seeking a long-term relationship, the criteria for building successful business partnerships are similar: Quality, Expectations, Availability, Communication, and Collaboration.
1. Seek Quality, not Quantity
The 80/20 rule still applies. Most partnerships take the same amount of time to manage yet only a few actually generate substantial revenue. To efficiently and effectively utilize your company resources, be picky about who you choose to partner with. It’s not about the quantity of logos you plaster on your website. It’s about the revenue-generating quality you get from the select few you choose as partners.
2. Align your Business Goals
Identify objectives and candidly discuss expectations. Partnerships have a better chance of succeeding if they have a common shared goal or objective. The “what’s in it for me” should be clearly defined in a contract or Letter of Agreement.
3. Confirm Availability of Company Resources
Create a launch timeline and scope resources required to move the partnership forward. For example, for an integration partnership, engineering and product resources need to be available to help scope and launch the partnerhip. For reseller partnerships, ensure that all the necessary product training tools, lead tracking tools, and agreements are in place.
4. Communication is Imperative
Identifying and engaging with your partner account manager during the contract negotiation stage could affect the success of the relationship. Is your partner contact excited about managing this account, or will you be lost in the shuffle desperately attempting to get your account manager on the phone? Book weekly meetings and monthly/quarterly reviews. Meet often to discuss common goals, strategies, or problems. Build trust and respect. Partnerships have a higher chance of succeeding if the key account stakeholders have a good working relationship. Keep talking.
5. Collaboration is Key
Marketing collaboration is a key benefit in partnering. Be very clear and candid about the availability of marketing development funds, as well as what types of marketing programs you envision to drive revenue. Many programs take substantial lead time to implement, so creating a marketing plan as part of the initial agreement will save a lot of frustration later on.
If you are an online marketing business looking for a partner with an automated online marketing tool such as Lyris HQ, check out our NEW partner program launched this month at http://www.lyris.com/partners/?lnk=ilhq_201009.
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About the Author
Marjan Mohsenin, manager for the new North America Lyris Partner Program, has extensive experience launching and managing collaborative, revenue-generating partner programs. For more information about the Lyris program, feel free to contact Marjan directly at partners [at] lyris [dot] com.
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