Service partner

There are multiple teams and an org structure laid out here, so I’ll try to answer it best according to how our team is currently organized at Aircall. For reference, I sit under—and always have—the demand generation org which is essentially our entire marketing team concerning revenue. Customer marketing has been under operations or product marketing for us. 

I work with our North American-based tech partner managers on their individual partner plans. This includes, but isn’t limited to: partner business development (new contacts and strengthening GTM relationship with existing partnerships), integration GTM launches (major integration updates), and generating new business through referrals, partner marketplaces and comarketing campaigns. 

When customers come into play, it’s generally for integration GTM plays or comarketing campaigns. For example, a joint offer for your partner’s customers and their offer for Aircall customers is a great demand gen play for partners reaching new audiences. We promote these via customer marketing through emails or our monthly customer newsletter. If you’re on Crossbeam, even better. You can identify specific populations of your prospects that might be a customer of your partner, shared open opportunities for co-selling etc.

If we’re launching new integration updates from a partner that may meet our customer’s needs, we’ll segment out those customers and promote the update to them via marketing or even our CSMs. 

For comarketing campaigns like webinars, both partners have to be upfront if they’re willing to promote to their customer bases and that the content is relevant. I’ve found with bigger partners, their customer marketing is often controlled by a different team, so it may not be as streamlined to promote to them as one thinks. 

I think partner managers are worthless without great teammates from marketing, sales and product. The marketing team specifically helps you deliver on co-marketing campaigns, create case studies, launch ebooks, events, webinars, tc. In Hygraph, there’s a dedicated partner marketing person who owns any partner-related marketing activity, but we also work with product marketing because integration announcements fall more into their expertise. I think an important, but often overlooked part of “marketing” your tech partnerships is writing good documentation, so your tech writers will help you greatly too. So most of the time, the partner manager brings the idea, the opportunity to do  something with a valued partner, and then the marketing team will help you make that happen.

Most of the time the marketing team will have a backlog with tons of competing priorities, and it’s your job as a partner manager to help them evaluate the opportunity and assign a priority to it. Most probably you’ll also need design resources (sometimes it’s a different department, sometimes it sits with marketing). In that case, the best approach is to ask for some templates, something that you can work from when you need something quickly that’s relatively easy, but when you need some custom for a bigger campaign, you need to let them know well in advance.


I'm still new here at Celigo, but in my previous role I would have a regular cadence scheduled with the Marketing team to highlight new and existing partners in our Partner Newsletter as well as choose a specific Partner to spotlight that week. We also had a "Featured Partner" section on our directory which would be customized quarterly to highlight key partners that stood out. 

Case studies are an obvious go-to for promoting a partner to your customer base. Whilst there’s no denying that case studies offer great promotional value, they’re not always quick wins. They can take time, patience, and you need buy-in from numerous stakeholders. Furthermore, they’re not a scalable co-marketing activity. Partner marketers aren’t able to create case studies with every partner in their ecosystem - it just wouldn’t be possible and you also need to prioritize the right stories. 

It doesn’t always have to be a huge campaign to drive value to partners. At LoyaltyLion, we identify or create low-lift opportunities to showcase how a partner has driven great results for a mutual customer (e.g. social media spotlights, newsletter spotlights, featuring short partner testimonials/quotes in blogs or ebooks).

We have recently created a partner spotlight social tile that is a trial of “self-serve” content. Our Partnerships Managers can make a copy of the tile, add the logo of the partner they want to celebrate for achieving a particular milestone, and share it across their network. I’m really excited to see how our audience engages with it! 

The partner team works with marketing to decide which partners to have create a closer 1:1 marketing GTM together. Within that plan your marketing person works to help promote the collective value prop - this could be in many ways - social and exposure on social, customer newsletters, case studies, and incentives of our partners solutions or incentive to our IT partners to sell our solution (solely or with another integration partner). You can also invest in a partner “directory” connected to your website so prospects can see who your top partners are and what they specialize in as it relates to your product. 

Signifyd has an incredible marketing team that works in tandem with our partnerships org. We actually nest partnerships into a greater “marketing & alliances” department so that we’re always working together when it comes to marketing initiatives. 

This allows us to seamlessly integrate partners into the planning and design of many of our marketing campaigns. For example, our monthly customer newsletter has a ‘partner’ section where we feature the cool and interesting projects led by our partners. We also tend to have a partner component, whether it’s a sponsor for one of our ‘Crimes & Cocktails’ webinars, a partner that’s selected as part of Signifyd’s 30 Most Influential in Ecommerce, or a speaker at Signifyd’s annual FLOW Summit, partners are part of our go-to-market strategy when it comes to marketing initiatives.

Finding lower-lift content is one of the easiest ways to get the marketing team onboard to promote your partners. Social media spotlights, newsletter spotlights, or having a partner provide a thought leadership quote in a blog that the marketing team is already writing, is a simple but effective way to drive awareness for your partners with your customers. Not everything has to be a huge campaign.

As a partner marketer who lives under the partnerships team, it's my role to be the bridge between the marketing and partnerships teams. I work with my partner managers to understand their goals with each of their partners and find the right low-lift opportunities with the marketing team so that everyone accomplishes their goals.

How we promote our partners to customers depends on the type and tier that the partner falls into within our partner program. Here is an overview of the different activities that we focus on; 
1.  Co-marketing - Events, whitepapers, sponsorship, joint case studies 

2. Identify signals for each partner to help identify when their solution is relevant to our customers - Marketing creates content for CSMs and Sales, such as 1-pagers or short videos, for CSMs and Sales team to include in their QBRs or throughout the sales cycle 

3. Enable the sales & CS team so they are familiar with and trust our partners and are happy to make introductions - Marketing helps with the enablement content 

4. Partner Spotlight -every month we feature a partner and push content to our customer base, through social, email and events 

5. Partner updates and promotions in our monthly newsletter 
Promotion of our integration partners within our platform to create more awareness

6. Optimisation of our partner directory (through partnerpage.io) 

7. ABM strategy for Enterprise 

8.Spiffs


When working with partner marketing, it's important to prioritize which partners you want to promote to customers. You'll need to consider what partnerships will be most beneficial to your company and then create a plan of action for how you'll promote them.

Often, co-marketing can be a very effective way to promote partners. This involves working together with your partner marketing team to create joint marketing campaigns that will reach your customers.

It's also important to keep in mind that partner marketing is a two-way street. Your partner team will likely want access to your customer data in order to better understand how to market to them. Be sure to establish clear lines of communication so that both teams can work effectively together.

For example, Pendo created a joint customer case study with Calendly on a mutual customer, Credly, and detailed how they used both products for quicker, deeper user research. 

By using a joint mutual customer, and showcasing how that mutual customer used both products effectively to grow their business, we were able to continue to grow trust in all 3 companies, show examples to current and prospective customers what our product can be used for, and strengthen our relationship with a key partner. I hope this helps! https://www.pendo.io/customers/how-credly-combined-pendo-and-calendly-for-quicker-deeper-user-research/

At Caspio, we're fortunate to have a Marketing team that believes strongly in supporting Partners, and we do that through running joint webinars (one a month), press releases, social media posts, blog posts, and an actively maintained partner directory - besides call outs in our newsletters. We also actively support partners who want to run co-branded campaigns with marketing collateral and assets. Our guidance to partners is bring us any idea you have and we will be open to listening and implementing it as long as it can add value to our customers.

The key underpin to successful partnerships/marketing collaboration is buy-in and support from Marketing so that the work you pitch and request gets done and that they see value in it. This is a whole other conversation I'm happy to dive into to build. Once you have that...

Before I brought on a Partner Marketing Manager: We have a shared slack channel where we'd put all requests/ideas for co-marketing initiatives. We'd put project plans in place for each project, loop the partner in accordingly, and execute on that project with weekly check-ins to monitor progress. You have to be highly involved to make sure things are being handled properly and on-plan/meet expectations. This is a lot of work for a partner manager but important to the success of your partnership/

Now with a Partner Marketing Manager I am less involved in the day-to-day and our PMs give him our ideas/requests and he owns and manages the full execution with our guidance. He leans on Marketing for resources around copy/design/ads but we trust him with leading and owning the vision and overall execution and checks in with us to make sure it's going in the right direction and will help us accomplish our goals.

Great Question. Two (out of 5) core pillars to Snowflake Marketing are relevant to this question: Scale with Partners and Strong Alignment with Sales. These pillars had buy-in from the entire marketing leadership, including the CMO. 

This question is about customer accounts and not prospect accounts. Sales are extra careful about introducing the right partner to the customer accounts, and rightfully so, because Sales has put in a lot of work cultivating these accounts for customers. Thus, alignment with Sales is key. The Marketing team collaborates with Sales and Partner team to identify the relevant partners in customer accounts, especially during growth and planning sessions. Each account planning session requires identifying which partners are appropriate and aligned in an account. 

Then, the marketing team will activate various channels based on the partner's strengths. Some partners are great at Field Marketing, and some are great at Online Demand Generation tactics. It is important to understand the partner's strengths and play on those rather than trying to introduce them through channels where they can fail. For example, asking a partner to do a field event in an account where they must have a field presence for the first time (sales or marketing) will generally lead to a subpar experience.

Interesting side fact: listening to Blackhole Sun by Soundgarden while typing this answer. 

Our marketing approach to partner promotion is highly strategic and varies by partner type. Here's how we structure it:
For product and integration partners, which are our primary customer-facing partnerships, our product marketing team leads promotion through multiple channels:

PR campaigns for major product releases
Website integration and positioning
Sales enablement materials
Social media announcements

For our other partnership types, we take a more targeted approach since not all partnerships are designed for direct customer promotion or have incentive structures aligned with broad marketing campaigns.
The partner team serves as the critical liaison between Remote and our partners, ensuring our marketing team has the right information and assets to execute effective promotional strategies. This close collaboration ensures our messaging is aligned with both partner objectives and Remote's goals.

Partner marketing is important to any strategy and it’s often overlooked with partnerships. Having a clear partner marketing strategy allows you to have different outlets to promote your partnership and engage with your joint prospects and customers for lead flow.

Our marketing team has a quarterly kick-off with our partners to discuss marketing activity and our calendars. Defining clear goals and promotion tactics allows each party to carry the weight agreed upon. Expectations up-front is so important for what can be achieved. 

We build webinars, events and content based off topics / themes that we’re both focusing on that quarter and promote it on multiple channels: newsletters, social and sharing budget on content syndication / ads. 

There’s an active Slack channel to update each other on registrants and work on a post-follow up plan with our sales teams.

Internal communication is so important. Our team acts as an internal advocate for our partners, making sure to keep a healthy balance between the company needs and the partners needs. This is an ongoing challenge and depending on the project, is sometimes easier than others. We make sure to involve all the relevant POCs per project and maintain full transparency and healthy lines of communications all around. When needed, we allow direct communication too.  

How does your marketing team usually work with your partner team to promote partners to customers?

We scaled our partner program from 27 members to 1000 members in the course of a year and a half. How we did it was a few different ways:

1. Paid social media advertising
2. Cold outreach to ideal partners
3. Creating an SEO optimized page that attracts our ideal partner

On the paid social media front, we generally made ads that targeted our ideal partner with the message of "do you want a better solution to help document your clients' processes?". From there, we got tons of great leads who were intrigued about the platform, and applied to our program. This was great because we could get tons of partners at scale.

On the cold outreach side, we got really specific on what our ideal partner archetype was. That meant their title, demographic, client size, service offerings, etc. And when we got clear on that, I would reach out to those people via email or LinkedIn to ask if they were looking for a software that could help improve their Process Documentation services for their clients. The catch here is twofold though: you HAVE to make it clear that you are not trying to "sell" them anything. And two, you will HAVE to educate these partner leads much more about your product. So, it takes a bit of an effort to get them up to speed. But when you do, they'll be PRIME partners for you.

Lastly, there are probably partners who are familiar with your product and have an interest in partnering with you. So, they will likely search "[Insert Your Company Here] partnership" into Google or a search engine. If you don't have a partner page that clearly lays out your program details and gives them an easy way to get started, then they might go to another partner who does. So, we created our own partnership landing page that comes up when "Trainual Certified Consultant" is searched, and we get a consistent flow of leads from there consistently.

Since tech partnerships require a lot of cross-functional teamwork, and often quite a bit of engineering time, brand alignment opportunities with non-partners are a great way to reach new audiences (and prospective new partners) with a lighter lift. 

Being a service rooted in forms and surveys, Jotform offers an easy, no-code option for data collection, which comes in handy for a variety of marketing needs. For example, we're working with two non-partner companies on a webinar where Jotform will capture all registrant details for the presentation, and will participate in its joint promotions, therefore leveraging these non-partners' audiences through their social and email marketing. 

Highlighting an aligned, non-partner's achievements on social media is a great way to start building a relationship with a prospective partner (who doesn't love free praise?), and joining forces with a non-partner company on a bundled deal for your services can also provide a strong introduction into a new partner vertical.

Recruiting more partners is like finding a good place to catch fish - go fish where the fish are, and recruit partners where they are. 

One of the simplest ways to meet new partners and recruit new partners is to go where they are in person and online. Personally, I think having a good brand as a company and partner leader on social media is key to help to attract the right partners, and you should physically go in person to events where you can meet with partners and potential partners in person. In my world of enterprise sofware as a service, this is events like Dreamforce or Gartner. 

One other key thing to point out is that many times, the best partners are already listed in other ecosystems and just need to go find them. One example I love is Zapier, https://zapier.com/experts , powered by PartnerPage. This makes it so easy for you to find new partners in adjacent ecosystems. 

Marketing to partners is a very under-developed motion so a great place to stand out in the market and take the burden of partner managers doing outbound acquisition. 

This motion is similar to customer marketing but instead of developing around the product, you're developing marketing motions and content around the value of being a partner. 

I would recommend events, a prospective partner page, and high quality content that goes beyond your program and benefits your ideal partner. Being present in communities and channels where your partners are is also important.

For example, one could sponsor a partnerships conference or the conference of a system of record in your space. The latter events are great for attracting customers, but they are also great for attracting new partners by sharing the value of your program.  

From my experience, your best marketing is to close lighthouse partners. 

During the onset of our partner programs, we only focused on a handful of very high profile partners. Once we converted the market leader into a partner, all of their competitors came knocking on our door. 

We also deployed this approach when we built out the different verticals of our app store: 

1. Identify a target vertical based on customer requests (e.g. donations during events)
2. Integrate with the market leader (e.g. Hopin + GoFundMe)
3. Competitors track GoFundMe, see the announcement, and then become inbound leads for our partner program. 

Success breeds success! 

And outreach to different partners depends on the type of partners (obviously solution partners are very different from CSPs, and technology partners). 

Solution partners love to learn about complex technologies and how to build on them. They also are closest to your customer / prospect, so they love learning about peer success. They also want to solve complex industry problems rather than just being technology experts. They want to know how they can build a services practice on your product. Technology providers want to generally create tighter integrations and be differentiated compared their own competition.

In each case, articulating how partners can be successful in building businesses around your platform with examples is important. Ideally you are activating all channels: Online with regular webinars to promote to new partners, regular in person partner meetups in territory, celebrating successful partners with awards and recognition at conferences, SKOs etc. These efforts should also train partners about your product / solution and highlight how easy it is to work with your organization.

I do want to ask whoever submitted this question, why do you want to get more partners? I have seen programs try to recruit partners for different reasons. However recruiting partners just for the sake of numbers is not a great way to grow your business. You need to grow it with purpose. So feel free to ping me on LinkedIn and I would love to dive in more into your problem. 


At OutSystems our primary focus isn’t on acquiring new partners but rather on nurturing and enabling our existing partner ecosystem. We’ve built a robust network over the years, so our focus is ensuring continuous enablement and engagement with top-tier partners as well as activating less engaged partner sellers and marketers through tailored initiatives.

When it comes to attracting new partners, we have running paid media campaigns for less engaged partners with assets that also target prospective partners. I'm talking about foundational messaging, such as "Why partner with..." to communicate the value of joining our ecosystem. While new partner acquisition isn’t our primary focus, we want to ensure that the right opportunities are reaching the right prospects.

Our partner recruitment efforts are focused more on evergreen resources than targeted campaigns. Create the messaging and positioning for the partnerships program space on your website so that the program benefits and FAQs are clearly outlined. Gather testimonials from successful partners that you can use across assets like the website and partner enablement materials. If your company does a lot of in-person events, have a good 1-pager that outlines partnership opportunities and a way to get in touch with your partner team. 

We do this organically, via Linkedin mostly and other social media channels where relevant. When we have trouble getting responses, we try to get introductions via mutual contacts that we already have a positive relationship with. We find that to be really effective. 

What marketing do you do in order to reach partners that are not in your program, so that you can get more partners?

This is completely dependent on the project, the partners, and the goals they agreed upon before launch. Be it webinar registration numbers, blog click-throughs, social engagements, integration adoption, or lead generation following an email campaign, the most critical success indicator comes down to what was agreed upon as the "north star" metric at the start of the project, and how the results stacked up to that particular metric.

Did it generate the results that were initially discussed and agreed upon between the partners involved? If it didn't, is everyone satisfied with the results that are transpiring? Is there progress toward bigger rocks or milestones in the partnership? 

You need to have these key metrics outlined and partner growth plans established before you can say a campaign, program or strategy is successful or not. It may also be successful for one side of the partnership, but not for the other. It's important to conduct post-mortem sessions and have open, honest and transparent feedback with your partners in order to mutually achieve goals. 

There is no one-size-fits-all answer to this question, as the success of a partner marketing strategy depends on a number of factors. However, there are some key indicators that can give you an idea of whether or not your strategy is on track:

1. One important metric to look at is engagement rates. This includes measures such as click-through rate (CTR) and conversion rate. If your partner marketing campaigns are generating high levels of engagement, it's a good sign that your strategy is successful. 

2. Another key indicator is reach. This refers to the number of people who are seeing your partner marketing campaigns. If you're reaching a large number of people, it's likely that your strategy is having a positive impact. 

3. Finally, another good indicator of success is partner satisfaction. If your partners are happy with the results of your campaigns, it's a good sign that your strategy is working well. 

Ultimately, the success of a partner marketing strategy depends on a number of factors. However, if you're seeing positive indicators in terms of engagement, reach, and partner satisfaction, it's likely that your strategy is on track. 

There should be a direct ROI on your partner marketing spend. I'm in the very luxurious position, in my current role, of having an outbound team who are fantastic at opening opportunities in real life if they're somewhere with prospects who fit within our ICP.

It's easy for us to show an ROI on our Partner Event marketing spend, so I haven't to dig too deep in to UTMs from partner content - we can just take a holistic view and do the things that we intuitively know are right to do (like collaborating on partner content), without being concerned about the attribution.

This is the dream scenario to be in but, in general, measurable impact on revenue is ALWAYS the right answer to working out whether your partnerships efforts are successful or not...

The success of a partner co-marketing strategy varies depending on your business goals, but generally speaking, the impact can be measured by tracking a few different sets of metrics. 

Product Usage: One would be integration installs and usage over time. For instance, at Intercom, once customers use four or more integrations, key metrics such as retention, churn, lifetime value (LTV), average contract value (ACV), and customer health scores improve significantly. The number of integrations it takes to see a substantial verifiable impact varies company to company, but generally speaking, deeper integration engagement drives overall customer success and satisfaction, a stickier product, and better retention over the long term. 

Pipeline: This will vary depending on your GTM motion(s), but the most common partner-specific I see are sales referrals, sourced partner deals, and acquired leads from partner activations. At Intercom I also pushed for “reengaged leads” which are leads that were dormant but became active through partner efforts.

Then you should also use your existing marketing attribution model to measure partner marketing campaigns the same way you measure all your other non-partner campaigns. This ensures consistency across all your campaigns and reporting. We use a W-shaped attribution model and have a specific system for naming and then reporting on campaigns. We “plugged” partner marketing into these systems so we can track those campaigns the same way.

For New Business I report on  Leads (Total Influenced Conv.); MQLs (Total Influenced Conv.); S2s (Total Influenced Conv.); S2 (Influenced Oppty ARR); S2 (Attributed ARR); Closed-Won (Total Influenced Conv.); Closed-Won (Influenced Oppty ARR); Closed-Won (Attributed ARR).

It's the same for Expansion Business but without the Leads and MQL metrics. 
If you're earlier in your journey, focus on campaign-level metrics—high registration rates and engagement in joint webinars, for example, are strong indicators of an effective strategy and that your campaigns are resonating with your audience. 


We do this by defining clear KPIs before each collaboration or campaign. For example, if our goals are brand awareness, we look at KPIs like impressions and engagement. If our goals are user acquisition, we track that too. We make sure to be clear and transparent with our partners as to what our goals and KPIs are and how we plan to measure this. 

How do you know if your partner co-marketing strategy is successful?

One of HubSpot's top downloaded assets was a project I launched with them while at Aircall! It's a sales planning template. During our campaign period, we generated over 12k leads, globally. They host the asset on their site and see hundreds of organic downloads monthly. Check it out here: https://offers.hubspot.com/sales-plan-template

I actually would love to see some innovation and freshness when it comes to comarketing! I've done all of the typical stuff (webinars, ebooks, content, discounts, bundles etc) and would love to see more B2B brands come together in more B2C style collaborations. Think about how Nike or Spotify collaborates with other partners and brands. 

We have an Expert Tip series that's been great! 

I provide my partner managers a Google form with 1-2 questions on a designated content topic (check out our current BFCM Expert Tips blog on Okendo.io :) ) for them to send out to their selection of partners.

Once we write the piece based on the partner's answers, we created a social asset that includes the author's agency logo, name, headshot, and quote in the piece. We ask them to promote the blog with us, and since we've provided everything they need and added a personal touch with their individual information on it, it's hard for them to say no! We find we have a "social takeover" whenever we release one of these pieces, which is really exciting to see.

Partner marketing can be an incredibly effective way to reach new customers and grow your business. By collaborating with another company to market your products or services together, you can create a joint marketing campaign that will expose your brand to a whole new audience.

There are many different ways to execute partner marketing, and the most effective campaigns are those that partner with a company that has a similar customer base. For example, Pendo.io is a product analytics company for product teams & product managers, that has a strong partnership with Google, which provides Google Analytics for marketers. We use our joint reach and target audiences to cross-collaborate and cross-promote.

Another important factor to consider when partner marketing is the resources that each company is willing to contribute. If one partner is putting in more effort than the other, it can lead to tension and resentment. It's important to be fair and equally invest in the partnership if you want it to be successful.

There are many effective co-marketing examples that vary based on company, industry, and target audience, but here are a few that have worked for me across companies and industries:

1. Joint press release
2. Joint social media campaign and interactions
3. Joint email drip nurture campaign
4. Joint webinar (especially with a mutual customer)
5. Joint YouTube video, demo, etc.
6. Joint e-book, whitepaper, infographic, or free asset of some type

Co-marketing can be an incredibly effective way to reach new customers and grow your business. By collaborating with another company to market your products or services together, you can create a joint marketing campaign that will expose your brand to a whole new audience.

The funniest, most attention-grabbing co-marketing campaign I’ve seen this year has to be Vidyard doing a Janet Jackson Rhythm Nation video knockoff to celebrate them joining the Salesloft ecosystem a couple of months back. I hope it got a ton of impressions on LinkedIn for them, it was hilarious and informative at the same time, and it's stuck with me since! 

Closer to home, I love the annual Customer Service Trends report our marketing team produces at Intercom. We’re into our third or fourth year of producing it now, and we partner with a couple of key tech partners, as well as a community partner, to produce an incredibly well rounded range of insights and benchmarks. It’s a full integrated campaign for us, with the report at the centre of it, plus email and webinar activities as well. Webinars have consistently performed well for us since we started to run a partner webinar program in 2020.

I mentioned Mark earlier in this AMA and this feels like a good time to mention his killer guide at https://partnermarketingguide.com - which has a ton more insights on how we've scaled co-marketing at Intercom.


We recently did a co-marketing campaign with an accounting influencer Jason Staats that drove a substantial amount of engagement and lead generation for new Ramp accounting partners: https://x.com/JStaatsCPA/status/1818696683959558308. I think this was successful because Jason deeply understands the accounting profession, he's built up a substantial following of accountants (that are our target market) and his style aligns well with the Ramp brand. This led to a message that resonated well and resulted in impact for our efforts.

I am watching an episode of Brooklyn 99 at this time. Any 99 fans out there? The episode I am watching is about Raymond Holt asking Jake Parelta to wear a tie to work. His point was that the tie represents a certain way of being a detective. I love this show!  

Like I stated before, I prefer campaigns that put joint customer success front and center.  So any campaigns that showcase customer success, and how the customer / user got there, are great. 

At Snowflake, we were so focused about leading with the customer, even our billboards today highlight customers. Any channel you activate should highlight customer success, and same thing goes for Partner campaigns.

By the way, I have never seen negative campaigns or competitive campaigns highlighting a competitor ever be successful long term. Why would you give any oxygen to a competitor? Focus on what is right for your customer. Highlight your strengths. 

The best co-marketing we have done has been across social media, leveraging joint influencers/creators, with a strong focus on short-form content. 

What are the most effective examples of co-marketing you've done or have seen recently? (What channels, resource types, etc.?)

There are many differences. Partner Marketing is a collaboration between two companies, two businesses or brands. Influencer Marketing is between the brand and an individual. Partner Marketing can sometimes be based on an exchange of resources or deliverables, not necessarily money. Influencer Marketing is transactional by nature. The brand pays the Influencer to create content and distribute it to their audience. Having said that, Influencer Marketing is very similar in the sense that the relationship and trust is the foundation of the partnership. 

What is the biggest difference between "traditional" partner marketing and influencer marketing? Are there any lessons from influencer marketing you can apply to agency/services partners?



At Intercom, Partner Marketing is integrated deeply within the demand generation team (specifically Integrated Marketing), rather than being a standalone function. This setup fosters better collaboration, as the partner marketing lead is in tune with both the overall marketing strategies and the needs of the partnership team. This collaboration enables smoother planning and more efficient execution, allowing us to align partner activities with broader marketing goals, such as product launches or thematic campaigns.

Collaboration is key: by working closely with content, product marketing, sales, customer success, and other teams, we can seamlessly integrate partners into existing marketing motions. This leads to more impactful campaigns and stronger alignment on goals.

The key metrics we track include both sales and marketing indicators. On the sales side, metrics like referrals, source deals, and influenced ARR are essential. On the marketing side, we focus on acquired leads, reengaged leads, and the progression of these leads through the funnel (e.g., MQLs, S2s, closed deals). Integration installs and app usage are also critical, as they reflect direct engagement with the partner ecosystem. Over time, we track how deeper integration usage correlates with improvements in LTV, ACV, retention, and churn, helping us understand the long-term value of these partnerships. For teams just starting out, simpler metrics like event registrations and webinar attendance can provide early indicators of campaign success.


Partner Marketing at Snowflake was about scaling Marketing for Snowflake with Partners. So we focused on scaling various functions Marketing and measured accordingly.

Typically Partner Marketing will have yearly targets around partner involvement in Marketing activity like joint pipeline, joint customer success examples, and investments in activities. And then it is important to focus on quarterly targets which focus on large initiatives. 

Collaboration with different teams is dependent on how bought in is the leadership on commitment to partners. At Snowflake we were lucky that the leadership was very committed to partners. Thus from the beginning all teams collaborated and thought about bringing in partners. It is important to have strong collaboration with the Partner team, demand generation teams (online and field marketing), and product launch teams (PR, Product Marketing etc). 

At Snowflake we would make sure to share our priorities, yearly targets and quarterly goals with all teams regularly. And at times the Partner marketing team set the goals 2 - 3 quarters ahead of every one else, thus making sure we were ahead of all campaign planning processes. We even shared our priorities with our partners before the beginning of a fiscal year, thus making sure any joint planning / execution can focus on these. 

My role in Partner Marketing focuses on nurturing and engaging partners with to-partner focused programs. 
A big part of my work involves keeping partners engaged with the company's marketing content and sales activity, so one of my goals is building mindshare so that our company is top-of-mind next to 12 other vendors our partners are working with, some also in the low-code space. To achieve this, I run regular newsletters, partner-exclusive virtual and in-person events where partners can get together with other partners, but also our company's executives and sales teams, and ready-to-use digital campaign kits designed for minimal customization.

On a day-to-day basis, I'm looking at campaign responses from partners to track engagement. Broadening the scope for the sum of the tactics, I'm looking at net new partner seller contacts and engagement, and marketing influence opportunities. Other usual metrics in Partner Marketing include the number of sales-qualified opportunities, marketing-qualified leads, deal registrations, new ARR, etc.

Internally, collaboration is key. On top of the great Partner Marketing Team I'm part of, I'm working closely with our channel and sales teams to ensure that our to-partner motions address priority topics and provide tangible value. Regular touchpoints with the partner sales and technical enablement teams ensure that we align on the tools, strategies, and agendas needed to help partners succeed. 

My guiding principle is simple: partners are an extension of our team. When they succeed, we succeed, so our job is to empower them with the resources they need to thrive.

Partner Marketing serves as the strategic engine that drives mutual growth through partner relationships. Here's how it operates:
Core Responsibilities:
Strategic Channel Management

1) Oversee company positioning across partner-owned channels
2) Develop and maintain partner program marketing materials and web presence
3) Create enablement resources that drive partner engagement and success

Integrated Campaign Execution

1) Incorporate partners into company marketing initiatives where strategically valuable
2) Co-create targeted campaigns that generate mutual business opportunities
3) Coordinate joint marketing activities that leverage both brands' strengths

Program Operations

1) Manage marketing operations for the partner program
2) Develop and maintain partner-facing content and resources
3) Drive program awareness in target markets

Key Performance Metrics:
Partner Engagement

1) Percentage of active partners in the ecosystem
2) Level of partner participation in marketing initiatives
3) Partner satisfaction and program adoption rates

Business Impact:
1) Lead generation through partner channels
2) Revenue attributed to partner marketing activities
3) ROI of co-marketing investments

Our primary stakeholders are the Partnership team and the marketing team (sorry that's an obvious answer!) We make sure we're aligned with the partnership team by focusing marketing efforts on their most strategic partners and supporting their business goals through marketing activities. Specifically we join the weekly partner team meetings and also meet 1-1 with the partner leader of each program. In my personal experience, Partner marketing sits within the marketing organization, so we're always in tune with the marketing team's priorities and are brought in to different teams' initiatives to drive additional value through partners. 

When it comes to Partner Marketing, we focus on brand partnerships as per our brand goals and KPIs. Choosing the right partner is critical and depends very much on the brief. As for team collaboration, it usually involves different functions within our marketing team. 

How does the Partner Marketing function work? Which metrics do you focus on and how do you collaborate with different teams internally?

Relationship building skills
This is a relations-focused role! Being a natural "people person" who is comfortable walking into a room full of strangers is not a dream scenario for most, but that's how the "good" partner marketers make their marks and grow their networks. They are unafraid to start a conversation, to proactively propose a partnership venture, or to simply initiate a connection between other marketers.

Strong negotiation tactics
It can take some clever compromising and bargaining to bring your partner project to life; understanding each sides' priorities and what they would consider a 'win' can help illustrate the best path forward, but the skill comes from knowing how to tactfully ask these questions and move forward with the best plan to meet your collective goals.

Time and project management skills
At any given time, there are a lot of competing projects going on (both within your own team, and cross-functionally.) Planning ahead, staying organized, maintaining communication, and anticipating needs are all tools exemplified by "good" partner marketers.

Good partner marketers have to be people persons. If you're interacting directly with partner companies and their staff, you need to be friendly and enjoyable to work with. "Easy to work with" is a qualitative point of data I grade partners on. You have to be social, be a natural at making connections and connecting people, and be able to create relationships that are beyond transactional. 

Partner marketers who are flexible and can see the bigger picture will also go far. If you are very rigid or "by the books" you will miss out on a lot of opportunities. It does take critical thinking to determine which opportunities could be worth taking a shot on versus passing up, but the important lesson here is to have an open mind. There are a million and one things that can go wrong in a partnership or partner marketing campaign, especially when you're dealing with two or more companies with different goals, resources, budgets, timelines etc. but the person who is able to "plan" for inevitable change, thrive in some ambiguity will thrive in partnerships. 

Good project managers also make great partner marketers. With many people, someone needs to keep track of the team, the goal and the project. Someone who is organized and able to keep track of, and drive, many moving pieces will excel. 

1) Relationship management 

Building and retaining great relationships with partners is crucial in partner marketing. Not only is important to nurture your relationships with your internal Partnerships Managers but make sure to spend time building relationships with your peers across the partner network. There’s a small but mighty network of partner marketers out there wanting to share best practices and their top tips with you :) 

2) Communication

Clear communication and visibility are everything in a role like this. Partner marketers have many stakeholders - both internal and external - and you need to keep everyone informed and in the loop with a lot of your decisions and thinking.

3) Organization

At times, partner marketing can feel like juggling lots of mini-marketing campaigns. There are always lots of deadlines and requests to meet that span multiple co-marketing initiatives with different partners.

“Good” partner marketers are incredibly organized so they are able to meet these simultaneous deadlines/requests and be selected as the go-to partner for future campaigns.

“Great” partner marketers are able to take this one step further by planning their partner marketing activity three months in advance. 

4) Creativity 

The ecommerce partner ecosystem is a friendly space, but it can also feel overcrowded at times. With many partners delivering similar co-marketing initiatives, don’t be afraid to be creative - your prospects and your partners might just thank you for it! 


1) The ability to collaborate across teams. This requires having a thorough understanding of both your partner and marketing teams, in terms of their goals, what their day-to-day looks like, and what they find valuable, so you can act as the bridge between the two of them.

2) Proactive. Sometimes you're going to have to create marketing opportunities for your partners before you can expect to receive marketing opportunities back, so being ahead of that will only help drive your success.

3) Story-telling. You're going to have to understand the ins and outs of your company's platform more thoroughly than the average marketer if you want to successfully create a "better together" story with your partners. 

4) Relationship Building- partnerships are all about relationships. It's important to not only build strong relationships with your partner managers, but also your partner marketing counterparts and even partner managers at other organizations. Partnerships are a small world so don't be afraid to fully immerse yourself in your partner ecosystem.

There is no one-size-fits-all answer to this question, as the skills and characteristics that make a good partner marketer vary depending on the specific industry and company. 

However, there are some key skills and characteristics that are essential for all partner marketers.

Some of the most important skills for partner marketing include:

1. Strong communication skills: Partner marketing requires constant communication with both internal and external stakeholders. A partner marketer needs to be able to clearly articulate their vision and goals, and ensure that everyone is on the same page.

2. Organizational skills: Partner marketing can be a complex process, involving many different moving parts. A partner marketer needs to be highly organized in order to keep track of all the details and ensure that everything runs smoothly.

3. Negotiation skills: Partner marketing often requires negotiation in order to secure the best terms for both parties involved. A partner marketer needs to be able to effectively negotiate on behalf of their company in order to get the best results.

Some of the most important characteristics for partner marketing include:

1. Passion: A good partner marketer is passionate about their work and truly believes in the product or service they are promoting. This passion helps to drive results and ensures that partners are engaged with the program.

2. Creativity: A good partner marketer is creative in their approach, always thinking of new and innovative ways to promote their products or services.

3. Persistence: A good partner marketer is persistent in their efforts, always following up with partners and working to keep the program running smoothly.

The skills and characteristics that make a good partner marketer vary depending on the specific industry and company. However, there are some key skills and characteristics that are essential for all partner marketers. Strong communication skills, organizational skills, negotiation skills, passion, creativity, and persistence are all important for partner marketing success. Thank you for this Q!

A strong partner marketer leads with empathy and collaboration. 
To me, the best way to approach this role is by truly putting yourself in the partner’s shoes, seeing partners not just as external collaborators, but as an extension of your own team. That mindset lays the foundation for building genuine, long-term relationships.

Building strong relationships with both partners and Partner Account Managers is crucial. Open, transparent communication helps you understand their challenges, priorities, and how best to support them. In many ways, you’re the bridge between the partner and your company — their inside eyes. To do this well, you have to be an internal champion, advocating for partners across different teams to ensure they have the visibility, resources, and support they need to succeed.

Beyond relationship-building, great partner marketers are adaptable, proactive, data-driven and strategic. They don’t just react to challenges, they anticipate partner needs and identify gaps and improvements to help keep enabling partners for success. At the end of the day, your job is to make sure partners feel supported, empowered, and truly invested in the success of the partnership.

Innovation and Orchestration: 

-Excel at identifying and connecting non-obvious opportunities across the business.
-Create harmony between different business units and partners.
-Maintain a broad understanding of both partner and company objectives.

Disciplined Execution:

-Develop good tracking approaches to track all of your "spinning plates" 
-Deliver assets and requirements on time, making collaboration effortless. No one wants to be put in the position of having to ask their team for an unrealistic turnaround because you didn't lay out your needs upfront!
-Present clear, actionable requests rather than vague concepts. Make it easy for your partner to say yes or no to a marketing collaboration request. 

Strategic Prioritization:

-Make data-driven decisions about which initiatives to pursue.
-Confidently decline opportunities that don't demonstrate clear ROI.
-Balance testing new approaches with focusing on proven tactics.

Proactive Partnership:

-Actively champion partners across the organization.
-Identify opportunities to showcase partner expertise in thought leadership to enhance your own marketing team's efforts.
-Connect partners with relevant sales opportunities and business initiatives.

Operational Excellence:

-Create efficient systems to track multiple concurrent projects
-Set clear expectations and timelines upfront
-Ensure smooth handoffs between teams and partners
 

A good partner marketer is one that is able to understand the partner, can easily step into their shoes, understand their needs and wants. Once they can do that, they can find the right balance between the brand's needs and the partners needs. Such a marketer is also a people person, someone who is good at creating and nurturing relationships and a good communicator. 