Five Ways to Get Your Strategic Partners to Fill Your Funnel

You’ve finally found that strategic partner who is going to be perfect.

The clients they work with are almost exactly the ones you can help best.

You get on with each other, and what’s more it almost feels like you’re building totally congruent businesses, only in different disciplines.

Each meeting has only moved you closer, even further aligned. You’ve visited their offices, theirs yours. You’ve unpacked case studies and shared a bit of how you operate.

It’s all set, but then….

Nothing. A referral or two, but it seems like there is something missing.

Another strategic partnerships conversation ending in a dribble of leads, instead of a flow.

Back to the drawing board.

You were on the right track. Only you’ve made a wrong detour.

Related: 2 Questions You Need to Answer Before Marketing

You've Played the Sit and Wait Game

The sit and wait blunder is about expecting your partners to market for you.

Sure, they may remember to say, “Hey, let me introduce you to…” when they remember to, or perhaps when a client actively asks for a referral, but here’s the reality.

Most partners are too busy focusing on their own work, and most clients will never ask for a referral.

Which means that unless you have another plan (or lots and lots of these relationships, which makes it time consuming to manage), you’ve got a passive marketing strategy that gives you little control.

The reality is if you want to make this work and work on purpose, you have to take control.

Sit and wait won’t work. Build and provide the marketing to your partner, ready to share.

Practically, this could mean:

Book the training session with their staff to walk them through your strategies, how to explain them to clients (in general terms) and unpack the case studies live in the classroom. Video it all and provide it to your partner for further training purposes.

Give them the custom brochure, co-branded and ready to put in their waiting room.

Write the case study article for their newsletter, co-brand it and provide it to them in exactly the format needed to upload into Mailchimp (or whatever they use). If they don’t use Newsletters (and you believe in the opportunity), help them set one up and teach their staff how to do it.

Book the co-hosted event. Suggest the venue, prepare the invites, book the entertainment, pay for the costs and invoice them for that bit. Even go as far as managing the RSVP process. Make it happen.

Build the webinar or seminar together, and show them how to market it to their clients, online and any other marketing avenues that work. Then fill it and make them look good.

Are you getting the idea?

The reality is if you’re reading this, you are probably taking more of an interest in leveraged ways of attracting new prospective clients into your firm than most.

Strategic Partnerships are no different. Generating a consistent and deliberate stream of leads, on purpose, into your firm from partnership requires different thinking.

So, what are you waiting for?