Welcome to the Nearbound Daily Newsletter—the #1 partnerships newsletter in the world keeping thousands of partner professionals on top of the latest industry principles, tactics, and trends. nearbound.com is a project of Reveal. Join the movement here. And ask NearBot a question here.
PRINCIPLES
You'll learn more outside of your walls
Someone has already done the thing and learned the hard lessons.
Most people think they need a 1-1 mentor to teach them these things. While that would be nice, it’s not necessary.
Instead, learning these "earned secrets" just takes a little detective work.
Build out a list of companies doing aspects of partnering right.
- Have they built incredible integrations?
- Are they winning inside of a huge ecosystem?
- Are they stellar at onboarding new partners?
Get close and break down their systems.
You miss easy opportunities to learn when your focus is always turned inward.
TACTICS
#1 lesson working with resellers
For over 17+ years, Nelson Wang (Founder, Partner Principles) worked with resellers, driving over $250M in revenue.
He shares,
I used to think that if I simply recruited, trained and led a co-sell motion with resellers, that would certainly lead to big revenue growth...right?
Don't get me wrong.
It helped.
But I learned the most important lesson about building a reseller strategy the hard way.
Now that I've launched a reseller program 5 times and have participated in 7 (including two that did it incredibly well at VMware and Cisco), I can tell you with clarity that the #1 most important thing you can do is this:
You need to be crystal clear on swim lanes.
Are reseller discounts helpful? Yes.
Is co-selling impactful? Yes.
Can compensation neutrality help drive revenue and reduce sales friction? Yes.
But in the end, all of the tactics won't drive long term growth sustainably without clear swim lanes.
Keep reading to learn the 3 GTMs of a reseller.
REMINDER OF THE DAY
Panic leads to short-term thinking
I recently read an article on CMOs and the current state of the market, but the piece applied to everyone in B2B SaaS, including partner pros.
Here's what the article shared.
Too much focus on short-term results leads to short-term thinking and prioritization.
Let this be your reminder today: partnerships is a long game. Don't let yourself get caught up in the panic of the market.
UPCOMING EVENTS
Stuff you don't want to miss!
- July 22nd-25th—Arcadia Leadership Conference—Discover the best of your partner program and the best of yourself through an intentional gathering in Bozeman, Montana. This is not a conference, this is a fully immersive experience - with luxury glamping, actual fireside chats, fresh mountain air and an elite community to help you tactically scale your program. Register here.
- Nearbound Summit 2023 Recordings—The future of GTM is nearbound. Watch the recordings to hear how B2B leaders across departments unite with Nearbound strategies and tactics. Listen here.
You're all caught up.
RECENTLY PUBLISHED ON NEARBOUND.COM
- Howdy Partners #75: Prioritizing Operations or Relationships? Striking the Balance in Partnerships with Coriena Hipple Merejo
- Nearbound Podcast #166: Pete Caputa’s Return: The Partner Led Startup Story
- Breaking Down Silos and Getting a Seat at the Table by Sam Yarborough
- Target the Right Leads at the Right Time: A Recap of the Happy Customers Festival by Andrea Vallejo
- The GTM Partners x Reveal Partnership by Sangram Vajre
- Partnership Value Modeling by Linkon Axon
- How CallRail Increased Integration Adoption by 167% Through Strategic Partnership with HubSpot and Reveal by Shawnie Hamer
- How to Help Your Sales Team with Intros by Andrea Vallejo
- Leveraging Partnership Data To Its Fullest Extent Requires Integration by Shauntle Barley
- Howdy Partners #74: Reactive Partner Marketers Are Salary Wasted with Jessica Fewless
See you tomorrow
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