Our newsletter includes actionable strategies on how to execute partnerships effectively.
To acquire new partners, you will need a directory showing social proof, third party influence, sales, and SEO. Here are the tools we know and love to find/convert and enable your partners:
*Note - since we originally published this, we have been customizing internal and partner-facing PRMs using Airtable + Stacker. If you are on a budget, please read and watch this:
A client came to us asking about PRMs and creating views to share with sales to get them the insights they need. She (Stacy in the video) already used Airtable so we introduced her to a UI builder called Stacker that allows anyone with an Airtable base to create a frontend in various formats (CRMs, directories, content calendars etc...). Here is the result: In under a week, Stacy can now create custom views and a directory for all her internal partner management needs. For under $150/mo. Head to https://partnerprograms.io/resources/ for more strategies.
Crossbeam is account mapping, but unique in that you can publically-display your database map link to site traffic in order to show potential co-selling partners what accounts you are able to offer them.
Here is Crossbeam in action on one of our partners’ partner page:
And here’s Crossbeam in action with our database over Sendoso:
API Deck is a powered integrations directory with automated-landing pages which are indexed automatically. They power our directory of top agency-partner programs which has already created and indexed over 3000 pages automatically IN A FEW WEEKS!
Here is Salesflare’s API Deck:
PartnerPrograms.io (yes, we have to add ourselves) for assisting in the influence of partner conversion. We do this by creating custom courses showing agencies how to build services on top of our partners’ solution, showcasing top agency-ready partner programs on our directory, featuring our partners on our podcast, as well as networking and discussing partnerships in our community.
Partner Page for your agency directory. We appreciate what this team has built because it’s focused on moving prospects through the funnel and matchmaking with agencies:
You will need to track referrals and pay your partners, which means PRM. Depending on your use-case, here are some top PRM’s:
Everflow is great for larger B2C affiliate programs with thousands of mobile-first partners, and any influencer-focused programs.
PartnerPortal.io is a great PRM for saas companies with agency-first partner programs.
Partnerstack is the leader in the B2B PRM space with a great value proposition in their directory which houses all of the clients’ programs and generates organic traffic for full-funnel partner acquisition.
Allbound is a unique take on PRM where you actually get your own CMS for management of your partners’ enablement content. So it’s great for programs where a lot of partner enablement is needed.
From there, as you scale your program, you will need to attribute the content-sharing efforts of your partners when affiliate links or codes are not used to avoid channel conflict. This is where Xamplify comes in.
Here’s an example of how two-tier metrics works from Xamplify:
Partner enablement is the most difficult part for most partnerships teams – how do you get those who join your program to actually refer you new clients AND assist in the sales process to close those referrals?
There’s no short answer to this as every program has it’s own challenges. However, we do have some recommendations:
This is where you can customize a support community for your partners for only $28/mo. Further, if you choose to, you can use it for course work.
Check out our community for agency partners >>
You will want to train and quiz new partners as if you are training a sales team. This means actionable content related to your product’s main use cases so partners know how to build services around it to sell to their clients (ideally, as retainers). This curriculum needs a home so we recommend Thinkific because of it’s UI and marketing features. We tried other platforms but found Thinkific to be the best.
Check out our school for partner team and agency partner training >>>
We’ve learned over hundreds of agency interviews that the best way to gain new partnerships is to show the partners how to build services around your product. This is why we’ve created the program for saas which includes the development of their own custom course based on a prime use case for agencies wanting to sell services off of their solution. This course is then loaded into our school and distributed out for free to agencies we believe would be a great fit.
And that’s agency enablement 101 :)
Why agencies hate working with software companies & what you can do about it.
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How to convert new co-marketing partners to co-selling partners.
View Resource
Defining and finding ideal alliances using Google Search Console data.
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