Sure, the first-ever Ecosystem-Led Growth conference last week in Austin had great food, swag, and high-speed go-kart racing — but the gathering’s real value was in the content shared by successful ELG experts and the conversations that were built around it. 

Here are a few top lessons and takeaways that attendees said will motivate and strengthen their teams going forward. Photos by the talented Lauren Slusher.

“The key takeaway for me is that without field sales and the frontline reps on board, none of this works. So implementing ELG means really getting into what's in it for them. That mindset is key. —Jennifer Thibault, Senior Manager of Business Development at ServiceTitan

“I would say one of my biggest findings was from the afternoon breakout sessions, when we talked about ways that people in marketing can better help partnerships teams, and where marketing should roll into within the organization. Also that we should identify the differences between the ‘ideal customer profile’ and the ‘ideal partner profile’, to inform better ways for marketers to bring new partners into our programs.” —Olivia Folick, Senior Manager, Partner Marketing, PartnerStack 

“In Kathleen [Booth]’s breakout workshop [about using ELG across revenue teams], I made a point of getting out of my comfort zone and doing the exercise as if I were in customer success. I got perspective that I had not thought about in terms of how to bring customer success into the ELG motion.

It highlighted not only that the strategy has to be holistic, but compensation incentives have to be aligned. Because when the whole team doesn't row one way, you're never going to get them to row together. CROs love to believe that teams will do the right thing that’s most effective, but really people will do what's best for their pockets, so everyone has to be incentivized to do that right thing. It was great to hear that validation of that idea from other people who are coming from different worlds.” —Antonio Caridad, Head of Global Partner Operations, Tricentis

“My takeaway is the importance and power of aligning KPIs between teams. As a marketer, I always find partnerships to be undervalued by marketing in terms of the ways our teams can work together. So if you have alignment, you have success.” —Jason Howie, Marketer-In-Residence, MarketerHire

“My biggest aha moment is that Partnerships has really made it. When you look at the tech stack infrastructure, that is a real strong litmus test of the maturity of the function. If you didn't hit that maturity, you wouldn't need all the automation. And that's a reflection of the scale and sophistication that partnership as a function is at right now.”  —Christine Li, VP Global Partnerships, G2

“What I took away was if you're not ever-evolving, you're slowly dying. That means a lot to me, especially in the partnership world. In partnerships, most things are constantly changing year after year. You have to change your partnerships, how you're reacting to them, how you're working with partners, and how you're evolving with those partners to meet the needs of your customers and to meet the needs of the ecosystem.” —Christian Beck, Partner Operations Manager, Seismic

It highlighted that we're all going through the same challenges. Seeing other companies successfully implement ELG programs reinforces that we're not crazy after all, and reinforces our mission at our organization.” —Micheal Dabrowski, Manager - Partnerships at Aspire

The format of this year [‘s ELG Con] was a lot more intimate than it was last year [at Crossbeam’s Supernode Conference]. I think people were a lot easier to connect with and able to talk about ideas. With the growth of [ELG Con co-host] the ELG Alliance, we were really able to connect with other companies with the same mindset. But at the conference it was really good to get into a space with people that you're not talking to very often, because they're not technically your partner, right. I think there's going to be a lot of innovation that happens as a result of the ELG Alliance and bringing these leaders together. —Alexis Bonavota, Senior Manager, Partner Success, G2

If you couldn't attend this year, we already can't wait to do it again, and Crossbeam Insider subscribers will be the first to get the details!