Every Thursday 10am PT / 1pm PT we have a weekly Q&A in our Slack community. Join us. 🙂


Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 12:59:57 PM
@channel Let’s start our first weekly Q&A.
Today’s topic: How do you manage referral partnerships?

Partner operations

What referral tracking software do you use?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:00:30 PM
What referral tracking software do you use?

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:02:10 PM
No more spreadsheets! Looking for some recommendations, so this is great simple_smile

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:05:48 PM
Tapfiliate, LeadDyno, Ambassador, and Partnerstack are the usual suspects. There are others like Profiliate pro. Impact.com is another one a CSA member recommended, but I don’t know much about it. Then there’s ShareASale.com as well. It seems like the market has a lot of entrants.

Richard Bernstein
June 13, 2019 01:02:45 PM
Quite a few SaaS companies including myself have been looking at Crossbeam. It is that starting point for us. It helps remove the need for google docs to try and figure out which reps overlap. Huge time saver.

Nikita
June 13, 2019 01:03:57 PM
@Richard Bernstein To my knowledge Crossbeam is more of an addition to a typical referral/PRM solution where you can functionally see which accounts both companies are using

Dan Caldwell
June 13, 2019 01:05:37 PM
@Bob Moore Can you give context if Crossbeam can be a useful tool with tracking referrals?

Bob Moore
June 13, 2019 11:11:27 PM
Crossbeam does help a number of companies with referral tracking, but it doesn’t use traditional methods like cookie tracking, URL parameters, or lead registration. We instead allow you to compare your actual customer lists against lists provided by your referral partners (and vice versa). We draw the venn diagram for you, so you can figure out what overlaps without revealing the full underlying list.

This is typically most useful for things higher in the funnel (account mapping, lead sharing, co-selling, data enrichment, etc), but we do have companies using this is a way to verify that all referrals are being captured and counted.

It’s free to sign up: https://www.getcrossbeam.com/

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 02:29:38 PM
What are you guys using at Smile? @Steve Deckert – Smile.io

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 02:30:53 PM
In house but I’m currently looking at other options. We should not have built our own partner portal for agencies/channel. For technology partners building integrations it’s super useful, but not for agencies/channel in its current state.

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 02:31:25 PM
Tell me about it. Engineering against channel is a huge expense that is never maintained.

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 02:32:07 PM
It’s a constant battle for features that’s not worth anyone’s time, including the product team.

I’m aware of some solutions that exist, but I’m mostly interested in what other companies are actually using and if they actually like it.

What are effective landing pages for referral partners?

Jared Fritz
June 13, 2019 01:33:39 PM
I’m looking to build some new landing pages for our referral partners. Would love to see what y’all have built, and what you think is effective?

Jared Fritz
June 13, 2019 01:35:06 PM
Here’s one that we’re currently using for an integration partner – https://grow.pushpay.com/lp-demo-partner-planning-center.html
I want these new pages to feel like warm/personal introductions from the partner to us.

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:39:26 PM

Jared Fritz
June 13, 2019 01:56:49 PM
Oh, I like the reviews part. Nice to have some third party validation

Michael Kovacs
June 13, 2019 02:27:12 PM
Zendesk does a good job of this – they separate each of their marketplace, app directory and partner directory – partners here – https://www.zendesk.com/marketplace/partners/

Michael Kovacs
June 13, 2019 02:27:49 PM

Partner commissions

What commission terms do you offer?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:00:36 PM
What commission terms do you offer?

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 02:09:47 PM
20% revenue share paid lifetime to partners as long as they remain active in our program.

Active = at least one successful referral per year.

In the same vein, what SPIFFs do you offer the referral partner reps?

Richard Bernstein
June 13, 2019 01:02:09 PM
In the same vein, what SPIFFs do you offer the referral partner reps? Cash, quota relief, gift cards?

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 01:05:56 PM
We do 20% revenue share on the subscription paid lifetime provided they’re an active partner.

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 01:07:36 PM
Other than that sometimes we’ll drop swag on a performing partner

Asaf Fradkin
June 13, 2019 01:11:08 PM
Gift for sales person in the company- once a quarter..

Ryan Vanderkolk
June 13, 2019 01:36:33 PM
@Richard Bernstein I had the same question. We generally offer our partners a 20% residual rev share, but often the partner sales rep receives little to none of this revenue. It’s been particularly difficult to incentivize reps directly because many partners won’t allow us to provide their reps with cash spiffs. If anyone has any creative ideas, that have been successful in incentivizing partner reps, I’d love to know!

Richard Bernstein
June 13, 2019 01:51:19 PM
@Ryan Vanderkolk to make it more complicated, per the above spiff ideas, those are requests from different partners. Do we try and reciprocate every time, or do we have our own method for spiffing our reps and let them take the commission and split if how they feel is best. And if ours is more generous, does that upset the rep on the other side? hmmmm

Ryan Vanderkolk
June 13, 2019 02:04:49 PM
All good points, @Richard Bernstein. This is a nut I haven’t been able to crack. Working in sales in the past lets me know that reps ultimately want to make money. Additionally, I know that the partner rep’s job of selling their own product/hitting their quota is hard enough. That being said, the only way I figure you can incentivize someone is by fatting their wallet and/or providing a solution that allows them to sell their core product easier/faster. The question then becomes 1. Are you allowed to pay the reps a cash spiff, 2. do you have the margin to pay said spiff, and 3. does your product/service make the partner rep’s job easier or complicate the sale pitch?

Do you have different programs for affiliates and agencies/consultant referrals?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:06:32 PM
Do you have different programs for affiliates and agencies/consultant referrals?

Olga Pukhalskaya
June 13, 2019 01:47:11 PM
Right now we have one program, but it seems it is better to have different programs.

Robert Rand
June 13, 2019 01:48:00 PM
At JetRails, we have referral partner commission, and agency commissions. The two can be mixed and matched. It’s a form of commission split, allowing us to pay out the referral source, like one of our technology partners, as well as the agency/developers/solution providers that will be working with us to support the client. In many cases, the agency will get both fees, but it’s nice to have a pre-determined split.

Partner recruitment

How do you recruit referral partners to join your program?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:00:44 PM
How do you recruit referral partners to join your program?

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:01:47 PM
So far, most of our referral partners have come to us. This has been a good way to test the business case on how/where to invest in partners.

Asaf Fradkin
June 13, 2019 01:06:19 PM
Same as @Kasey Bayne .. and that provided us with 5 leads / day.. now we also trying to email our users and that have been working well(ish)

Robert Rand
June 13, 2019 01:07:00 PM
@Kasey Bayne I’ve had similar experiences, although I do tend to pick up some great referral partners at industry trade shows as well. At JetRails, we cater to the eCommerce sector, which can be a pretty tight-knit community.

Nikita
June 13, 2019 01:09:37 PM
Something that we typically recommend is understanding which companies your product sells alongside? So do your customers currently purchase Hubspot/Salesforce alongside your product? This will give you a sense of the ecosystem, and those large ecosystems will have partners that are looking to sell complementary products alongside those solutions.

This usually serves as a good place to start in building a really strong outbound strategy and understanding which types of partners might work well for a business

Michael Kovacs
June 13, 2019 02:03:55 PM
Agree, we’ve found what @Nikita said to be best, and try to go one step further when we can by having a joint customer as an example – The possible partner will find it that much more compelling.

Tyrone Lingley
June 13, 2019 04:45:07 PM
I think it’s also important to segment your partner types which allows you to get more focused and personalized. At Unbounce our two major partner segments are SMB-focused PPC Agencies and Affiliates (educators or content publishers). We recruited first through our entire database and have an ongoing recruitment flywheel in our app, in email campaigns, through CS teams.

Outbound we take @Nikita‘s suggestion, but I also use SimilarWeb to find look alike partners. Then through PartnerStack, we equip our partners to succeed by providing the content, assets, and tips our top performers are utilizing. The platform also allow us to have segmented onboarding flows, challenges, and communications to each segment which increases activation rates and output.

Do you qualify your referral partners first? Or do you let anyone sign up?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:06:37 PM
Do you qualify your referral partners first? Or do you let anyone sign up?

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:08:35 PM
Qualify for sure. This product is high-touch for set-up, so we need to make sure they’re representing us and the product well.

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:10:16 PM
How about for low touch products… Did you qualify accounting partners at FreshBooks too or just have them sign up? When I had control of that program, I waived anyone through and dealt with yutzes on the other side. But I had not enough time to focus on each partner as the only partner person.

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:12:20 PM
For the set-up I had, I ran a CPE (CPA education credit) session, so once the accountant completed that, they were in.

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:12:49 PM
Clever.

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:12:53 PM
There were some people that turned out not to be great that I had to deal with afterwards, but if they passed the CPE test (a 40 min webinar with 10 “quiz” questions), they were in

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:13:09 PM
And a nice value add for the accountant at very low cost to us wink

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:13:35 PM
What a great idea using professional accreditation to “pay” for their time to talk to you.

Asaf Fradkin
June 13, 2019 01:13:42 PM
We let anyone signup.. if we see a potential we’ll train them..

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 02:13:26 PM
That is a really interesting strategy @Kasey Bayne!

Michael Kovacs
June 13, 2019 02:15:46 PM
@Kasey Bayne that is such a smart idea to filter partners, nice!

Do you remove underperforming referral partners?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:06:41 PM
Do you remove underperforming referral partners?

Asaf Fradkin
June 13, 2019 01:09:35 PM
We do not

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:13:55 PM
Not here either (nor have I in the past), unless they were “not good” or poorly representing us. If it’s just a matter of not sending us enough business, we’d let them stay.

Robert Rand
June 13, 2019 01:44:15 PM
Only if there’s a cause or catalyst. We don’t remove them simply for being lite on referrals, although we do have stipulations about minimum #’s of referrals per year to keep certain preferred commission payout terms. It’s not a high bar, but it allows us to reward our more active referral partners.

Olga Pukhalskaya
June 13, 2019 01:47:32 PM
No

Do you refer your partners business?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:25:42 PM
Do you in return refer your partners business? (e.g. a partner directory; or behind the scenes sending them customers who need more hands on help)

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:28:32 PM
Yes for sure! We did this a TON with the accountant’s channel at FreshBooks

Robert Rand
June 13, 2019 01:37:43 PM
We do a lot of this at JetRails. If we know that an eCommerce website owner needs assistance, we go out of our way to pair them up with great solution and technology partners of ours.

Steve Deckert – Smile.io
June 13, 2019 02:16:29 PM
Yes this is super important when partnering with product companies. Generally speaking product companies don’t care about your revenue share, they want to sell their product. They want leads and sales. Setting up a reciprocal referral model will be more motivating than a one way channel model that pays them revenue share IMHO.

How much time to spend on partner marketing vs direct b2b marketing?

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:02:52 PM
In a small company, how do you know how much time to spend on partner marketing vs direct b2b marketing?

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:18:14 PM
Lessons from my client work… I find you can’t know. Too early, you don’t have enough data. So you have to make educated bets on your investments.

Are partners knocking at your door? Then they are hot relationships and you should take them, but only if you can serve them programmatically instead of one-off. One-off is chaos.

If direct is working, then it’s more important at the beginning because you need to create channel demand in order to acquire partners. Partners like what their customers like.

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:18:39 PM
But that’s half made up. It’s hard to know as there is little information to work with.

Kasey Bayne
June 13, 2019 01:28:13 PM
It’s tough! Right now, I’m handing requests as they come in and trying to systematize and create brandable assets. Next step is to put together a business case/ROI on if we should bring in a full time channel manager to build this out.

Sunir Shah
June 13, 2019 01:48:09 PM
I did a lot of consulting in this area. The only thing I cound find that worked is the 2-step dance:

Step 1. CEO wants to take a “bet” on partnerships and hires 1 partner person to explore the opportunities and bring it to order.

Step 2. Can that partner person systematize and programmatize partnerships enough to hire someone more operationally focused to run a program? That’s a lot to ask an individual and it can come down to an individual effort.