B2B companies are growing increasingly dependent on partners to improve customer success and drive growth. As products have gotten more complex and required more configuration, customers have needed more extensive consultation throughout the sales process. Partners fill an important gap by providing deep, specialized expertise and consultation to help customers select the best options.
But how do you support your partners? What types of resources do they need in order to stay immersed in your offerings and provide the guidance your customers need? Here are a few essential resources to maximize the impact of your partners.
How to maximize the impact of partners
Give them outreach materials that co-brand your value
Partners aren’t just selling your products – they’re also selling their expertise, which improves the value proposition. It’s important to make your shared value simple and cohesive for customers so they see the improved value accomplished through your partnership. And since partners will communicate this message directly to customers, it’s important to align on the key points to ensure everyone is communicating what customers need to hear in a consistent way.
Essential partner content:
- Shared messaging framework with prioritized proof points and talk tracks
- Video and long-form case studies that prove the success of the partnership
- Co-led podcast or speaking engagement to underline shared vision and leadership
- Co-written byline article to spread awareness of strategic partnerships
Empower them with facilitated content to guide conversations
Time with prospects is critical. When they do secure meetings, they need powerful resources to structure the conversation, highlight important points, and demonstrate value. One thing to prioritize with this content is customizability – since many of these resources will need to be tailored to specific opportunities, it’s important to give the partner something they can easily update in order to show more personalized value to the prospect.
Essential partner content:
- Master template pitch presentation
- Product/service overview presentation
- Self-assessment to identify needs/gaps and potential solutions
Leverage them with training content during onboarding to improve customer success
Customer success isn’t secured when money changes hands – it’s a lengthy process that requires active consultation throughout the onboarding phase. There are often many stakeholders and use cases that must be addressed in order for onboarding to be a success. Partners play a vital role in this process by solving problems, answering questions, and providing access to helpful training materials and documentation. Beyond just making your documentation easy to find and navigate, it’s important that you involve partners in the distribution to ensure customers get access to the latest information.
Additionally, you must keep partners updated about updates to your product roadmap to ensure they are able to maintain their expertise and develop their own additional support materials. Regular briefings have the added benefit of improving the partner experience as well by showing ongoing commitment to their success.
Essential partner content:
- Use case-driven tutorial packages
- Product roadmap briefings
- Partner discussion forums (virtual or alongside industry events)
- SME briefings
Give them co-branded real estate to merchandise their value
And since we’re talking about prioritizing the partner experience as well, this last point is an effective way of allowing partners to play off your brand equity and generate increased demand. It also provides you with opportunities to highlight strategic partners by proactively suggesting relevant partners to customers during their evaluation, onboarding, and beyond.
Essential partner content:
- Partner portal with dedicated landing pages
- Partner spotlights on your website and in email nurture
- Co-branded campaigns for strategic partners
Looking for help with your partner strategy? Sign up for our SQUAD offering, a two-hour design thinking session where we lay out best practices, generate ideas, and build a project plan.