November 6, 2024

Issue #690

You may have a lot of things competing for your attention this week, especially if you live in the U.S. Whatever you're juggling, it's never a bad time to take a step back and look at the bigger picture of your day-to-day.

If a big part of your GTM role is driving growth by creating customer value, today’s Daily has a resource to help you take a new look at your approach.

PRINCIPLES

Ecosystems need intention

Recent research from Gartner found some fundamental truths about partner ecosystems that closely align with the stories we hear from GTM leaders and Crossbeam customers every day:

“Partner ecosystems play an increasingly crucial role in driving client outcomes and revenue growth. However, not all partner ecosystems lead to increased sales. The ones that do offer access to new channels, intellectual property, scalability and cross-selling/upselling opportunities.

Although many providers develop partner ecosystems, not all prioritize serving end clients. Instead, they focus on meeting sales quotas. According to a Gartner survey, providers fail to maximize ecosystem effectiveness due to a lack of shared vision for client outcomes, resulting in a lack of trust.” — Drive Growth via an Effective Ecosystem Strategy, Gartner Research

Simply building ecosystems without focusing on how those partnerships serve customers won’t earn customer trust and deliver new revenue. But when the agreed intention between partners is to better serve customer needs, the partnership’s shared intel and efforts are a powerful driver of growth.

TACTICS

Turning intention into action

Gartner’s report on effective ecosystem strategy offers a framework for orienting your partnerships around customer outcomes and trust. The framework’s four pillars are one resource to help you set plans and goals around the ecosystem data you share with partners and the intelligence you gather through mapping accounts.

1. Mindset: General managers must establish and operate according to key mindset principles:

• Create a Joint Partnering Mindset: This is critical because it shapes thoughts, behaviors and actions. Instead of wanting to simply innovate faster and fill a sales pipeline, general managers must look to lock-in on business outcomes.
  
  

• Build Trust: Trust is another crucial mindset and is achieved through an equitable relationship. General managers must not leverage size, scale or relationships they own to exert unwanted influence over others. Anyone who feels dominated most likely will lose interest in and exit an ecosystem relationship.

2. Value Co-Creation: Key steps to developing new value for clients include:

• Start From Client Challenges: Understand client challenges and anchor on a co-created value chain to deliver customer outcomes. Achieve this by aligning on the client’s challenges (e.g., problems and requirements) and then working backward to identify steps to design and/or build solutions to address them.
  
  

• Align on Individual Strengths: Co-design the solution, mapping a (high-level) workflow. Along the chain, identify which partner owns what scope and brings value-adding strengths, and seek opportunities to accelerate outcomes.

3. Operating Model

• Develop the Ecosystem Operating Model: This is a structure for partner performance —- federated, centralized and center-led. Decide whether a dedicated function is required or if individuals filling roles is sufficient, especially at the outset of ecosystem formation.
  
  

• There is no one-size-applies-everywhere structure. General managers must adopt the model that fits best with respective corporate culture and governance approaches.
  

4. Mechanisms

• Design and institute repeatable processes to ensure partner performance, to identify and mitigate risks, and to create environments that allow you to engage partners seamlessly.
  

Download the full report for more details and insights to help execute your Ecosystem-Led Growth strategy with a customer-first, value-creating intention.

STUFF YOU CAN’T MISS

• November 11 - 14 — Web Summit 2024
  

70,000 people will gather in Lisbon, Portugal for one of the biggest tech conferences in the world, featuring speakers from leading companies across nearly every technology vertical. Book your ticket to join them here.

• November 12 - 14 — B2B Forum

B2B Forum, the B2B marketing conference from MarketingProfs, is coming to Boston, MA. Learn how to drive growth, elevate brand reputation, prove ROI, and stay ahead of the ever-changing marketing curve. Register here.

• November 20 — GTM Partners Better Together Roadshow: San Francisco

If you’re a GTM leader, join the first B2B go-to-market conference focused on unifying teams and tech. The Crossbeam team will be at the next event in San Francisco, learn more here.

You're all caught up

See you tomorrow

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