If you’re in Sales, this scenario has likely happened to you at least once: 

 

It’s the final week of the quarter, and you’re just one deal away from hitting your quota. You’ve been working on a deal for 3 months now, and you’re just missing the final signature when, out of nowhere the buyer ghosts you. And the worst part? You don’t know why. 

 

 

What you also don’t know is that this is when the power of nearbound can save the day. 

 

Yes, partnerships is a long-term strategy, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t leverage some low-hanging fruit. And no, this doesn’t mean your Partner team will steal your deal.

 

It’s still your deal, you just have a bit of partner influence to close it faster. 

 

Partnerships play a crucial role in accelerating deals. Here’s the proof: 

• Daniel O’Leary, Director of Partnerships at Box, and his team had 27% shorter average deal cycles when involving partners. 

• According to Allbound’s The Year of Partnerships report, deals are 53% more likely to close when a partner is involved.  

• Sendoso calculated that partner-influenced deals close 28 days faster on average than non-partnership deals. 

• Reveal has seen deals involving trusted partners have 41% higher win rates and close 35% faster. 

The relationships and the data are there, you just need to capitalize on partnership opportunities—it’s about who you are connecting with and leveraging to close deals faster.

 

To help with that, we got Reveal’s Sales and Partnership teams to share some stories on how they have won with partners. 

 

Feel free to replicate these wins when you’re stuck in a deal or you’re…

• Not getting the final approval to sign the contract

• Not getting the final signature

• Identifying an upsell opportunity

• Noticing the Sales team doesn’t think partner-first

Let’s dive in!

 

Use case one: Not getting approval from the CRO

The situation: Reveal’s Sales team had already been working with two champions to get internal buy-in in Company A and had already tested and seen the value of the freemium version. But after a couple of months of trying to get the deal signed, they realized that, despite building a relationship with the two champions, Reveal’s Sales team was talking to the wrong deal influencer. 

 

They needed to talk with the CRO because he approved the budget. However, he was skeptical and completely ignored the team. 

Solution: Partner intel 

The play: After trying to get in touch with the CRO, one of Reveal’s partners reached out to one of Reveal’s AE (owner of Company A), and saw that they had that common opportunity. So the partner decided to help the team by sharing intel about their ongoing process with the prospect. 

 

Here’s the intel the partner shared: 

• The CEO totally understood the value of a nearbound strategy

• The CEO leveraged Reveal in his previous role

• The deal influencer was the CEO, not the CRO

Reveal’s AE reached out to Company A’s CEO, explaining the context and who he was already talking to in Company A, as well as how nearbound and Reveal could help his team reach the promised land. 

 

After reaching out to the CEO, the deal ran smoothly, resulting in a closed-won in less than 2 weeks. 

 

The partner helped accelerate the deal closure just by sharing intel that Reveal’s team didn’t have access to. 

 

Use case two: Getting the final signature

The situation: Reveal’s Partnership team was trying to help Sales close a deal that was in the final stages, but the team didn’t have any idea if they were heading in the right direction, because despite having the approval to sign the contract, Company B was ghosting the Sales team. 

Solution: Your network 

The play: Reveal’s Partner team dove into Reveal to find who from their partners had Company B listed as an existing customer, and found out that the POC of the partner company just got a new job. However, thanks to their existing relationship with the POC, they asked for intel regarding its previous role: 

• What’s going on in the organization?

• Are we talking to the right people? 

• What’s your overall take? 

 

Some findings were: 

• The person whom the Sales team was already talking to had no decision-making power

• The 2024 focus of the deal influencer (C-Suite) was all about partnerships

• The organization chart of the team 

• Who is in charge of decision-making and who would sign the deal 

 

This is intel the Sales team couldn’t directly ask Company B or get on their own—not even by deep diving into LinkedIn or Google. Even though the POC no longer worked directly with the prospect, Reveal could leverage the past relationship to get the insight needed to move forward. 

 

After the Sales team was aware of this intel, they reached out to the right deal influencer by requesting an intro through Reveal to the existing contact they were talking to, and involved and engaged the right people during the Sales process. 

 

 

Based on the pain points and the focus of the C-Suite, the Sales team built a personalized pitch and clear next steps, resulting in a close won deal. 

 

Use case three: Identify an upsell opportunity

The situation: After closing a deal last July with Company C, the Reveal team saw an opportunity to make an upsell (with more seats) at their renewal. However, Company C saw Reveal’s value but didn’t know how to leverage the extra seats, so the deal got stuck in a long back-and-forth process. 

Solution: Partner influence

The play: The Sales team used Reveal to discover Company C’s existing partnerships and identified a strong co-selling relationship with Company X (a 2-way data sharing partner), which also happens to be one of Reveal’s key partners. 

 

The Sales and Partnership team worked together with the partner through Reveal’s Slack integration to find out how Company C and their partner (Company X) were building the co-selling motion, and to identify their shared vision. 

 

 

When the partner (Company X) found out about this situation, they helped influence Company C to get the additional seats so their entire team could co-sell properly with them. 

 

After working with Company C’s team, enabling them, building reports for their RevOps team, and Reveal’s partner influencing the upsell, the upsell was finalized in late January 2024.  

 

Use case four: The Sales team is not thinking partner-first

The situation: The Sales team identified an opportunity with Company D, but they were already working with another account mapping tool. Thanks to an existing relationship Reveal’s AE had with the VP of RevOps from Company D, the AE knew that Company D’s focus was being able to surface partner data to their team at scale and to make this data actionable for reporting through dashboards.

 

They were convinced of the value of Reveal but were hesitant to sign the contract since their Sales Reps weren’t open to leveraging partners in the deal cycle.   

Solution: Partner influence

The play: The Sales team researched and found out that one of the Partner Managers—a deal influencer in Company D—was a huge nearbound believer. They asked one of Reveal’s Partnership Managers who had an existing relationship with Company D for an introduction to the deal influencer. Luckily enough, all three ended up attending an event—there’s nothing better than an in-person introduction. 

 

They continued the conversation, but the deal moved slowly. Despite the entire GTM team trying to prove the value of Reveal to their Sales Reps, there was still a bit of hesitation to buy Reveal. 

 

The decisive factor? Having partner influence from one of Reveal’s partners. This partner supported Reveal’s AE throughout the cycle by checking in and mentioning Reveal every time Company D and the partner met in person. But it was their final push that made Company D make the switch of platforms. 

 

This partner-assisted Company D in improving their ability to track partner deals in Reveal,  monitoring which partners were associated with key accounts, and enabling their Sales team to recognize the value of partner data. 

 

The partner influence and the relationship built with the Partner Manager resulted in a closed-won just when the quarter was about to end, allowing the Reveal AE to reach quota. 

 

Running nearbound plays

When you run a nearbound play in tandem with Reveal the results are 2x higher because you not only have the power and lever of trusted relationships, but you have the data and insights to back up your decisions. 

 

Start with our free plan to witness how Reveal can help you close deals faster thanks to partner intel, or book a meeting with the Reveal team to learn more about nearbound strategy.