I had a meeting this week with one of my client companies who are at the leading edge of the industry with their expertise and technology. They really have a tremendous market opportunity. Talking to the board members and key individuals of this small innovative company led to addressing the question:

“How we best capitalise on this international market opportunity in the marketplace?”

“We can target the market directly and talk to 30 of the relevant companies. This will definitely produce more than enough consultancy and follow on technology sales to establish us in this space.”

“The downside to this is that once we get into delivery mode it will tie up the key people very quickly and it’s hard to keep selling to continue to grow and we really only have a limited window of opportunity here”

My thoughts: “sell direct, but include securing strategic partners in your sales process.”

Then “If we can sell direct, why should we consider selling through strategic partnerships?”

How about the following reasons for selling through corporate partners:

1. The offering is defined and easy to explain. The benefits can be communicated easily. Partners will understand quickly and see the opportunity quickly.
2. Reduce Cost of Sales – You could partner with organisations who have strong commercial relationships with your target clients. They can get you straight in the door on a commercial basis, thus greatly speeding up the sales process.
3. Focus on Your Strengths – You have a limited window of opportunity before other organisations establish themselves and take over your opportunities, so there is an element of land-grab working with your selected leading organisations. They may deliver the bulk of the services, but at least you can sell the premium services and grow your team accordingly and sell software licences also.
4. Access to larger sales force – Partners will present and sell your offering in their market far faster than you can. They are more established and in the market sector and/or region you want to be in.
5. Access to broader market – You can’t be everywhere at once, but you can build up a partner network to get you into key sectors and regions.
6. Increase revenue sources – you cannot have the full pie from each customer, but should target to have a more premium piece of the pie from many customers
7. Increase licence revenue growth – increased number of consulting customers brings more software licence revenue opportunities
8. Increase shareholder value – a wider spread customer base means a more stable business and growth path, thus increased business potential and increased shareholder value.

Besides, if the company’s strength is not in sales, why not let other people sell what we do. We can always sell direct as well.

Donagh Kiernan, Maidsfield Associates

Internationalisation is the biggest single challenge facing the Irish Tech Sector today. Having ambition in Ireland, means you’re looking international quickly. Irish Tech companies almost immediately face great challenges to make their business successful.

On Tuesday the 29th of September 2009, between 10am to 2pm at the Hampton hotel in Donnybrook, Dublin 4, we invite CEO s of Irish Technology Companies to join us – Register Today, limited to 30 attendees.

The event will present talks from leading International and Irish experts, case studies from successful indigenous Irish Technology companies, and an opportunity to discuss the challenges and pitfalls of the International business landscape with your peers.

On the back of their recent partnership announcement Donagh Kiernan of Maidsfield Associates, Niall Devitt of Beyond the Boardroom and David Brock from Los Angeles based Partners In EXCELLENCE along with guest Kevin O’Leary CEO of Qumas, the internationally successful Irish software company, will present and discuss how Irish technology companies can to succeed in international markets.

The Partners In EXCELLENCE, Beyond the Boardroom and Maidsfield Associates Strategic Partnership’s focus is to help Irish Technology companies accelerate the results they achieve through their Internationalisation efforts. The partnership brings together experience and track record in helping companies successfully expand globally. Leveraging the capabilities to access new regions, markets, develop new channels and alliances; this partnership will help Irish Technologies improve the results they achieve in competing in a global market.

Whether your organisation is seeking to go international or already trading abroad the internationalisation partnership can assist you to ensure you achieve the highest levels of performance and the best results possible.

Together, Maidsfield Associates, Beyond the Boardroom and Partners In EXCELLENCE have helped Irish and other organisations achieve tremendous results in Internationalising. Organisations like Qumas, InnerWorkings, Decare Systems Ireland, Helix Health, Dolphin Software, Enterprise Ireland, IBM, HP, Canon, Motorola, Ericsson, Dassault Systemes, NCR, and others.

Timetable

10:00 Arrive, Coffee and Registration
10:30 Welcome and Introduction – Donagh Kiernan & Niall Devitt
10:40 Corporate Partnering into Markets – Donagh Kiernan
Guest: Kevin O’Leary, CEO Qumas
11:20 Hi Tech Globalisation Options – David Brock
11:50 Internationalisation Workshop – facilitated by Niall Devitt
Breaking into roundtables / groups and discussing internationalisation challenges and potential solutions
13:10 Lunch and Networking
14:00 Close

Attendees are limited to 30 – register today

To continue from the post “Why Good Strategic Partner Fit is Imperative – part 1“.
The real cost in getting it wrong is opportunity cost. Basically the lost time and opportunities in the time spent working on something that doesn’t produce. There are a number of simple things which help in building a corporate partner relationship and making it successful if you look for them and plan for them at the outset.

Parrt 1 of this post was learning why partnerships fail. Looking at the flipside of this, why do some Corporate Partner relationships work?

1. Know your prospective partners. You can tell much about a company in how they communicate. This is why Blogging and Twitter has become so prominent in building relationships. In reviewing a company’s website, blog, annual reports, press releases and general press you can find out pretty quickly if they fit the type of a company that you would like to do business with.

2. The product was good and the company really knew their customer, why they would buy and had the sales materials to back it up. They clearly had good track record in selling their solution and knew their market space

3. The market quickly saw the value in the product and clearly understood why such a corporate partnership made sense

4. The initial training, both product and sales, was very professional and enabled the partner company to be more effective faster

5. The on-site pre-sales support for the first number of opportunities was a great start and it really showed commitment to the partnership. A little hand-holding goes a long way

6. The multilevel relationships between the two partnering companies is great. With regular communication and occasional face-to-face meetings, at CEO and Divisional Head level, VPs of Sales, Marketing, Implementation and Support. Each level understands how each-others business works and it works together. Feedback works at many levels to make up for the missing direct connection to the customer

7. From the outset we all knew the expectations and we knew our responsibilities and with regular calls and meetings with straight-talking and supportive management between the companies, everything was clear and issues were dealt with swiftly. The joint market and customer focus brings clarity every time. Everyone understood that the opportunity was worth the investment.

Much greater success in corporate partnering can be achieved with better understanding and analysis, and I don’t mean over-analysis of what your business really requires and what you expect from a prospective partner.

All to get a better view of whom you should partner with and apply your time and energies with the right companies. Not every company that approaches you is the right one. Its good to be sought after but it better to spend time with the good-fit partner companies.

In Maidsfield, we work to start calling your prospective corporate partners within 5 weeks of initial engagement.

Watch out next week where we talk about how we analyse your target market with our “Ecosystem & Trends Summary Report”, combined with lists of target customers and prospective corporate partners.