What have you experienced to be successful partner marketing tactics to generate leads for partners?

It really depends on the partner type (service provider, ISV, referral partner, etc.) and their offering, but generally speaking, the more you can leverage your organization's distribution to showcase a partner's value proposition to the right audience, the better off you'll be in generating leads on their behalf. More specifically, I've seen a few tactics work really well: Joint Webinars with the Partner: These provide an opportunity to combine both brands’ expertise and thought leadership, giving potential customers insights into how the partner’s solution integrates with or enhances your product. Webinars can generate high-quality leads because they attract attendees who are actively interested in the topics being discussed. Ensure that you align the content with mutual goals and follow up with attendees promptly to convert interest into action. Campaign Kits: Providing partners with ready-to-use marketing kits that include email templates, social posts, landing pages, and educational content (like eBooks or white papers) allows them to run co-branded campaigns efficiently. The easier you make it for partners to execute marketing campaigns, the more likely they are to engage and drive leads. These kits help partners maintain consistent messaging while saving them time on campaign creation. Content Syndication: Sharing co-branded content across digital channels is another powerful way to generate leads. This could include blog posts, case studies, or joint research reports that highlight the value of both companies working together. The key here is to ensure that the content is positioned to solve specific pain points for the target audience, making it a compelling reason for prospects to engage. Partner Listings in Directories/Marketplaces: If your organization has an app marketplace or partner directory, featuring your partner prominently within these platforms can significantly increase their visibility and generate inbound leads. Customers who are already in your ecosystem are more likely to explore partner solutions that are trusted and integrated with your platform. Joint Sales Plays: Aligning your sales teams with the partner’s sales teams can also drive lead generation. By collaborating on specific accounts, running account-based marketing (ABM) plays, and sharing target lists, both companies can maximize outreach and tailor messaging. This cross-pollination between sales teams can dramatically increase the chances of landing new business. Exclusive Offers or Trials: Offering exclusive discounts, product trials, or bundled solutions when both products are purchased together can create urgency and appeal. This approach can be particularly effective for ISVs or service providers that rely on differentiated value propositions. The key is to ensure that both parties actively promote the offer through their respective channels. Co-Branded Events: If budget allows, hosting in-person or virtual events with partners—such as industry conferences, workshops, or user groups—can be a great way to generate leads. These events provide a platform to showcase both solutions and their combined value to a broader audience, offering direct engagement with potential customers. Overall, the success of any partner marketing tactic hinges on close alignment between the marketing, sales, and partner teams. Regular communication, goal-setting, and performance tracking are essential to ensuring that both parties are investing equally and benefiting from the campaigns.

You have to define success first and what results you're looking for. This question is asking about specifically generating leads. So, for higher-funnel lead generation, I would recommend: - Virtual Industry panels or AMAs: Bring in an expert from your industry (or a few), or even an influencer if there are any in your field. You can have someone from your company and your partner company either moderate and/or be a part of the panel. This gets a lot of attention and leads if the topic is timely and relevant to your audience. Split the coordination and set-up of the webinar (landing page, emails, graphics etc) 50/50. - Comprehensive "State of" or Benchmark Reports: If you're able to partner with a company or two you can use your own customer data, conduct research or hire a 3rd party to compile data and create an overarching authoritative type of report. These are great for your industry or field for lead gen, will often be able to collect leads throughout the year and then be repeated again on a regular basis (quarterly, monthly, yearly etc). - Templates: Another content download. Partner with a company and create a template that can be used by your target audience and provide value to their everyday. Whether it's a sales plan, a sales cadence outreach, or an end-of-the-year checklist, it can live as an evergreen lead generation asset honested on one, or both of the partners' websites.

I think that ultimately, the partner wants to know if they can trust you with the prospects and/or customers that they are sending your way. If they feel that you are handling the lead hand-off with care, they will feel more comfortable sending more and more leads your way. The other part of that is making sure that you are able to take it further than just another sale - can you generate content from this new relationship such as creating data sheets and/or case studies, customer references etc. involving (and highlighting) the referring partners technology in that content.

Customer success stories for joint customers and webinars targeting the partner's customers

Great comments from everyone else here. I'd add asking partners to give your customers an offer—this could be a discount, a walk through of their integration, a consultation with one of their experts. It'll help your team promote their company to have something exclusive to your customers to share in content, emails, etc.

Plan promotion effectively - as mentioned above, it’s key that you work out how and when you will promote the co-marketing initiatives that you commit to to maximize the number of sign-ups you drive. Make sure the content is relevant to your audience - it seems obvious, but ensure the partner marketing opportunities you take part in offer value to your customers and prospects - they’ll be much more likely to engage with the content if it resonates. Don’t get lazy with promotion material - some partners very kindly create sample copy to help you promote webinars and ebooks. Make sure to tweak this copy to avoid overlapping contacts getting exactly the same messaging from numerous partners. To my point above, I always try and position how the co-marketing initiative I am inviting merchants to will help them enhance their retention strategy. Highlight brands’ involvement with co-marketing - If a partner marketing event/webinar has a brand on the lineup make sure to highlight it! Brands love hearing about what other brands are up to, or how they have achieved great results. We always see an increase in CTR and sign-ups when we do this.

I have leveraged a BDR team to call out to partner lists or internally generated lists. You could give them a chance to go after deals that were “no shows" meetings or fizzled out for some reason. Sharing specific customers for them to upsell post-sales services they provide in return for new front end opportunities. Joint events that you sponsor or co-sponsor on a local level have been good ways to economically generate leads. In any arrangement, be sure that you both get something out of it.

When we co-market with a tech partner, we know they have a sizable marketing database and can usually help drive leads together. We'll put a minimum lead threshold and if they make that, then we share the full lead list with them. This is pretty standard practice for co-marketing amongst tech partners. But for agency partners, it's often about giving and not just getting. They don't always have the same large database sizes as a tech partner, so we know co-marketing with them won't always drive us leads if we include them in a webinar, e-book, or even an in-person event. But including top partners in these campaigns gives us an opportunity to share the lead list with them, which is a value for top partners that have already driven a lot of value to our company with their referrals.

Generating leads for partners can be a challenge, but it's not impossible. Here are a few tactics that have worked well for me: 1. Develop a co-marketing campaign. Partner marketing can be extremely effective when done in conjunction with a co-marketing campaign. This involves developing content or offers that are mutually beneficial to both parties, and then promoting them together. 2. Host webinars or other online events. Online events are a great way to generate leads for partners, as they allow potential customers to learn more about your product or service without having to leave their homes or offices. 3. Use lead magnets. A lead magnet is an offer of something free in exchange for contact information. This can be a great way to entice potential customers to provide their contact info, which you can then use to generate leads for your partner.