Planning Your Partner Program Strategy: The Handbook for Success

If you brand is taking on aggressive growth strategies, expanding into new markets, while still trying to remain lean, planning your partner program strategy is a top priority. In fact, a study¹ revealed that 1 out of 3 high-growth companies rated partnership marketing as the most impactful marketing technique. ROI on partner marketing initiatives outperformed marketing channels like paid advertising, email marketing, and trade-shows, to name a few. 

The trend is undeniable - especially for business-to-business (B2B) organizations. Instead of purchasing large booths (which come with large price tags), B2B marketers are putting more resources than before into digital marketing initiatives. According to Demand Gen, 8 out of 10 of the most effective demand generation channels for B2B marketers are digital, with the top 3 stated as email, search, and website.

The Value of B2B Partner Marketing

Now more than ever, it’s important to be where your audience is and for the majority of B2B brands - that’s online. In fact, 9 out of 10 buyers say online content has a moderate to major effect on purchasing decisions.

And that’s not all.

With 67% of the buyer’s journey now done digitally - think content, social, influencer, and partner marketing - understanding the value of online marketing is a must. More so, only 2% of cold calls result in an appointment.² So instead of focusing on outbound efforts, marketers are looking at how to build relationships, while leveraging inbound marketing tools.

What does this mean for organizations looking at the future of customer relationships? 

Forrester predicts that B2B marketers will:

- Put the customer at the core of their purpose
- Redefine its charter to better engage the new business consumer
- Optimize engagement with artificial intelligence (AI)
- Prioritize operational excellence

In the B2B marketing world, partner marketing plays a crucial role in acquiring new business. Engaging and building positive brand relationships with prospects via channel partners, value-added resellers, and agencies produces immediate results similar to customer referrals.

And since 91% of customers say they’d give referrals, but only 11% of salespeople ask for them, partner marketing can position your business for the same effects, but without the giant chasm that exists between providing referrals and asking for them. Which is why having a channel partner program in place is becoming an important piece of the overall customer acquisition plan.

How to Start Planning Your Partner Program Strategy

Leveraging technology is critical when it comes to developing your business partner program. It’s crucial to adopt best practices and update outdated business processes by leveraging automated partner programs. Here’s how to get started:

Step 1: Focus on the Audience

Prioritize increasing the quality rather than the quantity of your partners in your program.

Utilize the Portal Registration Page: The portal registration page allows you to collect additional information from your partners such as their company website and other useful details. Once they enroll via the registration form, partners will automatically be logged into the portal for easy sharing.

Auto-Enroll Partners: For relationships you’ve established with existing partners, auto-enroll them into your program to make participation turnkey.

Kickoff the Program: Don’t just hope that partners will find your program. Announce your program launch through dedicated emails to start seeing results quickly.

Build a Program Overview Landing Page: Provide partners with a comprehensive overview of the program by having a dedicated page to point them to.

Step 2: It’s All About Engagement

Keep your program top-of-mind with partners, influencers, resellers, and more by proactively engaging with them often, and will valuable assets.

Implement a Direct Entry Form: Partners tend to have a more personal relationships with your brand and are likely to have contacts they want to recommend for individualized follow-up. A Direct Entry Form allows partners to enter contact information of a referee into a form that lives in your portal.

Encourage Employee Promotion: Provide employees that have high touch points with your partners with copy or a graphic that they can use in their email signature to promote the program.

Create an Educational Guide or Video: Send a toolkit with all of the details to new partners in a welcome email and include a link on your program overview landing page. Include information on what and where to share, how to utilize the portal, recommendations for seeing success and more.

Send Dedicated Emails: Encourage engagement by providing useful program information in dedicated emails. These emails can offer suggestions for seeing success or even highlight top performers.

Build a Community: Create a place where your partners can share best practices, advice, and feedback with one another. A private Facebook group is a great place for partners and affiliates to share with each other and your brand can tap into the conversation. This commentary can help you deliver a better partner affiliate program experience.

Step 3: The Incentive Matters

Ensure you’re offering the right incentive at the right time by understanding what matters to your partners.

Utilize a Revenue Share: Most partner programs offer a commission that is a percentage of the total purchase. Monetary commissions, such as PayPal, are most successful.

Offer a Dual Incentive: Rewarding both the partner and the referee can provide a substantial lift.

Implement Limited-Time Rewards: Boost participation by offering partners exclusive rewards in addition to their base commission. For example, you could award conference tickets based on top performance during a specific month.

Will a Partner Marketing Strategy Benefit My Brand?

Across industries, establishing a trust-based relationship from first interaction is extremely important. Online or in-person, today’s buyer is more likely to turn to partners, peer-to-peer referrals, brand connoisseurs, and industry leaders when considering various product offerings. 

In fact, B2B buyers are typically 57% of the way to a buying decision before actively engaging with sales. This underscores the importance for marketing to pave the path at every step of the journey for consumers to learn about and engage with your brand. 

When carried out at a strategic level, partnership marketing can be expansive and deliver its full potential. More so, when companies focus on delivering a world-class experience they reap the benefits of building long-term relationships, such as better engagement amongst partners, total transparency and visibility, as well as increased engagement.

And by automating the tedious tasks that go along with creating long-lasting relationships - like form submissions, lead tracking, and payments - your marketing team can start scaling a channel that really drives long-term growth.

How Can a Partner Marketing Solution Help My Brand?

When carried out at a strategic level, partnership marketing can be expansive and deliver its full potential. More so, when companies focus on delivering a world-class experience they reap the benefits of building long-term relationships, such as:

Better engagement amongst partners

Total transparency and visibility

Increased engagement

And by automating the tedious tasks that go along with creating long-lasting relationships - like form submissions, lead tracking, and payments - your marketing team can start scaling a channel that really drives long-term growth.

A partner marketing platform - like Ambassador - is undoubtedly the fastest way to provide robust programs, fully-automated tools tailored specifically to partner needs while fostering a rewarding partner experience.

With Ambassador, your brand can engage and build positive relationships with your potential customers via channel partners, value-added resellers, and agencies. Our powerful partner marketing software delivers a customized experience, automated cash payouts, and metrics to keep your program growing.

To learn more about creating and managing a successful partner marketing program, check out our eBook below.

[1] Hinge's High Growth Study
[2] B2B Marketing & Sales Statistics