Are you finding it difficult to grow your business and increase its visibility to attract more customers? You might be overlooking a crucial element that could revolutionize your strategy: partner marketing.
Strategic partnerships can significantly boost brand awareness, unlock new markets, and generate fresh revenue streams. However, forging successful partnerships requires a thoughtful approach. Let’s explore how to establish profitable marketing partnerships, illustrated with real-world examples. But first, let’s cover the fundamentals.
What does partnership marketing entail?
Partnership marketing involves two companies or brands collaborating to reach a wider audience, benefiting both parties. These collaborations can be between brands and influencers or between two brands that don’t directly compete. A classic example is the collaboration between Uber and Spotify. Both brands offer services that complement each other, making their partnership a natural fit.
Why should you consider partner marketing?
The effectiveness of partnership marketing is evident in these compelling statistics:
- 54% of businesses report that brand partnerships contribute to over 20% of their overall revenue.
- 68% of consumers base their purchase decisions on what they see in partnership campaigns.
- 74% of organizations identify brand partnerships and affiliate marketing as top priorities.
6 Strategies to Develop Lucrative Marketing Partnerships
Let’s delve into seven approaches to develop partnerships that distinguish themselves and enhance your brand’s visibility through affiliate marketing, a powerful form of brand collaboration.
1. Partner with Businesses That Share Your Values
When exploring partnership marketing, carefully consider both your values and your potential partner’s values. For instance, a collaboration between H&M and Raw Beauty would likely send conflicting messages to their respective audiences. H&M, a fast-fashion brand, contrasts sharply with Raw Beauty, which champions slow fashion, organic skincare, and mindful consumption.
The basis of their collaboration would appear flawed, as it wouldn’t reflect their stated values. Such a partnership, lacking alignment in brand personality and objectives, would likely harm one or both brands.
Therefore, prioritize collaborating with organizations that share your goals and business philosophy.
2. Prioritize Partnerships That Offer Turnkey Solutions
Turnkey solutions seamlessly integrate into existing systems without causing disruptions. They function on a “plug and play” basis, while custom solutions necessitate modifications. While these terms typically apply to software, they’re also relevant to brand partnerships. Consider the Doritos Locos Taco—a Taco Bell taco featuring a Doritos shell.
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This partnership between Doritos and Taco Bell exemplifies a “turnkey” approach as it didn’t require either brand to alter their products or business models—Taco Bell simply introduced a new menu item.
3. Ensure Your Goals Are Aligned with Your Partner’s
In partner marketing, clearly defining the collaboration’s ultimate objective is crucial. Do you aim to:
- Drive sales growth?
- Expand into untapped markets?
- Elevate brand awareness?
- Promote a specific message? Identifying the end goal facilitates brainstorming collaborations and forging impactful partnerships. It also enables both brands to establish measurable targets. This highlights why the partnership between Forever 21, a fashion brand, and Atkins, a weight loss brand, failed. When Forever 21 included Atkins bars in customer orders, it was perceived as insensitive, implying that customers needed to lose weight, a form of body shaming.
Image source A well-structured partnership proposal with clearly defined shared goals can pave the way for success for both you and your partner brand.
4. Target Different Audiences
This might seem counterintuitive! While shared goals are essential, overlapping audiences won’t help you expand your reach. You’ll likely engage the same audience you’ve already reached, potentially collaborating with a competitor. One of the primary advantages of partnerships is the opportunity to increase brand awareness and sales among new demographics. Consider the partnership between Nike and Apple. Although their target audiences differ in many ways, they share similarities in lifestyle, values, and motivations. This partnership allowed both brands to tap into new yet relevant customer bases.
5. Actively Promote Your Partner
Cross-promotion involves one brand featuring another brand’s products or logos across various platforms. The possibilities are vast, from social media and websites to newsletters, emails, push notifications, and other marketing channels. Beyond specific co-marketing campaigns, ensure you consistently promote your partner’s brand to nurture a strong relationship.
Free guide:6. Leverage Combined Customer Data
Collective data is a valuable asset in partner marketing. Each company possesses data on its products and customer behavior—such as purchase history, items added to carts but not purchased, and more. This data can help you tailor offers for your joint campaigns, develop resonant communication strategies, and set achievable goals.
4 Examples of Successful Partnership Marketing
As previously mentioned, partnership marketing requires a strategic approach. However, with a well-defined framework and plan, brand partnerships can be instrumental in driving business growth. Let’s examine a few successful partnerships that yielded impressive results.
1. Constant Contact and Partner Services
Constant Contact is a specialized digital marketing agency that collaborates with diverse independent entities, including small businesses, educational startups, universities, and corporations, to provide marketing solutions tailored to their specific needs. This partnership model is spearheaded by a single dominant brand, Constant Contact, where other brands maintain a less prominent public profile. This approach is effective when there’s significant goodwill and trust associated with the leading brand, while smaller brands might not enjoy the same level of recognition.
The services offered by other brands are integrated under the umbrella of the dominant brand, creating a mutually beneficial relationship.
2. American Forests and TAZO Tea
American Forests is an organization dedicated to establishing thriving forests across the United States. A pioneer in sustainability, it creates green spaces nationwide to combat climate change. In 2021, American Forests joined forces with TAZO teas to launch TAZO Trees Corps— an initiative that employed local workforces to plant trees, mitigating climate change while providing job opportunities for people of color and individuals from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds.
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The Tazo-American Forests partnership received widespread acclaim, encouraging collective action, and making a tangible positive impact on the environment.
3. East Forty Brewing + Dream Factory
The East Forty Brewing + Dream Factory partnership had the potential to be mismatched but turned out to be remarkably successful. Dream Factory, a children’s rights NGO, partnered with East Forty, a brewery—seemingly disparate entities! Together, they launched a beer called Dream Catcher, with proceeds benefiting the NGO.
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This collaboration fostered the cross-pollination of ideas, efforts, and audiences, maximizing their reach.
4. Figma + Asana
Figma, an online collaborative interface design tool, partnered with Asana, a work management software for teams. Their collaboration resulted in the Asana widget for Figma, enabling teams to collaborate seamlessly with real-time updates and input. This partnership provided Asana users with a dedicated design platform and enhanced Figma’s value proposition by integrating work management features.
Unlock the Potential of Partner Marketing
In essence, if your goal is to enhance brand visibility and reach a broader audience, partnership marketing offers a compelling solution! The key to profitable partnerships lies in understanding how to approach and strategically design collaborations. By doing so, you can avoid common pitfalls and reap the full benefits of marketing partnerships. Here’s a recap of our seven tips for successful partner marketing:
- Partner with businesses that share your values.
- Prioritize partnerships that offer turnkey solutions.
- Ensure your goals align with your partner’s.
- Target different audiences.
- Actively promote your partner.
- Leverage combined customer data.