Sales and partnerships teams can cut deal cycles by 27% and close 53% more deals by collaborating. Discover a 3-step strategy to win together.
No matter how much time you spend creating one-pagers, recording videos, or hosting hour-long enablement sessions, if your sales reps don’t see the value of integrating partners into their sales motion, they won’t adopt an Ecosystem-Led Growth (ELG) strategy.
(Share this article across your teams to help smooth things over.)
[For Sales] The numbers don’t lie. When you collaborate with your partnerships team, you drive more revenue.
- 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.
- Even Maya Connet, VP, Inside Sales at Clari, once told us that partners impacted 41% of their new logo business in the last 24 months. “Opportunities that involved a partner converted at four times the rate of non-partner opportunities. Deals that had partners involved were 2.7 times larger than going at it solo.”
So, can you give partnerships another chance to help you generate more deals?
Now, Sales and Partnerships teams, buckle up, because we have a three-step strategy to help you collaborate more effectively (and even more stats to prove the value of your collaboration).
3 step strategy to build a culture crew of collaboration with your ecosystem
Creating a culture of collaboration between your GTM teams isn’t just about working harder — it’s about working smarter.
The right partnerships can make or break a deal, so it’s crucial to align your team’s efforts with your ecosystem. This three-step strategy will guide you in building a "culture crew" that leverages ecosystem data to drive bigger wins and faster sales.
"Choose one sales pain point and focus on it — speak the sales team's language. Don’t try to educate them on the general power of partners; instead, showcase how partner workflows can address that specific pain point."
Step 1: Identify the pain of your VP Sales, and show how ELG sales can help
[For Partnerships] Does your sales team need help with any of the following?
- Pipeline creation
- Deal acceleration
- Deal size
- Conversion rates
- Win rate
Choose one and focus on it — speak their language. Don’t try to educate them on the general power of partners; instead, showcase how partner workflows can address that specific pain point.
Create a narrative, develop case studies for each product use case, and provide stats and partners who can help them customize their demo to address important needs.
[For Sales] Partner Managers aren’t mind readers. When you share your goals and pain points with them, be sure to include what you’ve already tried and how you structure your demos. This transparency doesn’t mean your Partner Manager will steal your deal — in fact, it’s quite the opposite. Partners are here to help you close deals more effectively.
For example, instead of starting a demo with “We integrate with all of these Partner Relationship Management tools (PRMs),” start by showing the customer the PRM they use. Demonstrate how to maximize its potential with your tool, making your demo more relevant and impactful.
Step 2: Equip your team with the right tools
[For Partnerships] Provide your team with an account mapping platform like Crossbeam, where they can access ecosystem data such as account overlap, revenue potential, and insights into your prospect’s tech stack.
Train them on how to use it so they can understand the partner's potential and address their prospects' pain points.
This doesn’t mean they have to spend the same amount of time and effort with every partner. Instead, teach them how to balance influence and time spent with partners — start by sharing stats. Salespeople like numbers, so show them where to find those key metrics.
If your sales team isn’t using your account mapping platform, at least share key ecosystem data with them in the tools they are already using (Gong, Outreach, Salesforce, etc.) and explain how that data helps with specific sales plays.
[For Sales] You love stats and information, so actively use all the data you have about your prospects. Partner tech is designed for you to leverage ecosystem data without your Partner Manager becoming a bottleneck. You don’t need them to figure out who the partner’s rep owner is in your prospect’s account or to know which tech your prospect is already using.
Think of partner tech this way: Would you rather look at your account mapping tool and identify a key partner and intel that can help you close a deal faster (and get you a foot in the door), or make 500 calls and send 500 emails, hoping for someone to show interest?
Ecosystem data will allow you to have meaningful conversations with your prospects, and it can only be found in two places: your account mapping platform and your partner’s knowledge and experience.
“Don’t turn up and pitch; turn up and talk about everything you know so far.”
Step 3: Set up the flywheel
[For Partnerships] Create a partner process that allows you to quickly and effectively connect partners with sales — and teach them this process.
As a Partnership Manager, proactively connect your sales team with partners. Jump into calls to add credibility and support your sales team with stats and intel. Ensure intel is shared both ways:
- What other tech is their prospect using?
- How long have they had those relationships?
- Which tech might they buy next?
- Who are the key decision-makers?
- How can your tool fit into your prospect’s tech stack?
Sales people have to think transactionally to be successful; so for every action they take, they’ll often expect something in return. So, give them constant visibility into the partners that add value to their deals and help them build those relationships. If they see that their partner isn’t sharing any intel, they will give up on them.
[For Sales] Partners aren’t just about giving you intel, influence, or intros — they add value to your customers too. Thanks to your partners, you can speak to your buyer in the way and language they prefer.
Yes, you need to sell your product, but you also need to ensure you’re connecting your customer with as many partners as possible to ease their journey and help with renewals. In this way, your customers are paving the way through innovation, you’re exceeding their needs, and fostering brand loyalty.
As Stanislaw Wasowicz, Co-Founder and VP of Growth and Partnerships at Scotty Technologies, once said, “We’re selling joint value propositions and services, the synergies between all these tools together. Your partner will tell you things that not even your prospect will tell you because they already have that relationship.”
One of the best pieces of advice we’ve heard is from Rich Lewis-Jones, Vice President of SmartRecruiters: “Don’t turn up and pitch; turn up and talk about everything you know so far.”
Imagine the power of showing up at your prospect’s meeting and spending half the time talking about everything besides your tool (ecosystem data), then finding that connecting point that leads to your solution — showing your prospect that you have a deep understanding of their business and goals.
The results you can expect
[For Sales] When you collaborate, you gain access not only to intel but also to referrals, a higher win rate, and customers who praise both your solution and your partner’s.
When you collaborate, you stop selling alone. Now, you have your partner’s reps supporting your deals, advocating for you, and giving you warm intros.
Relying on partners not only creates a better product for both of you to sell but also increases customer satisfaction and drives revenue together.
As Rich Lewis-Jones once said, “Find your key partners, spend time with them, show them the value of what you’re doing, and they will start to sell for you.”
We know you need more stats, so here you go:
- SmartRecruiters had around 50% of their deals won thanks to the relationship with their partners.
- Mindmatrix had between 25% and 40% incremental revenue thanks to their partner program.
- Everflow shortened their enterprise sales cycle by 44% thanks to ecosystem data.
- Intercom achieved a 30% YoY growth in partner-sourced revenue and a 157% YoY growth in partner-influenced revenue thanks to ecosystem data.
Learn more about how sales and partnerships can be better together here.
