Why Partnerships Fail (Ft. Alex Glenn)

Business partnerships fail more often than they succeed. It's a sad but very real truth. Learn why partnerships fail and how not to partner. On the flip side, learn how you should partner and why money is not the main incentive for a partnership program. Learn from the partner expert, Alex Glenn, Co-Founder & CEO at Partnerhub, and listen to real-life stories of partnership successes and nightmares.

Access to the presentation described in the podcast is linked here.

RevOps is a brand new concept for most. RevOps is the unification of all functions to prioritize revenue as the primary objective. It’s the toppling of silos that divide a company and keep teams from working together effectively. The goal is to implement cross-divisional ops, data practices, and a collaborative framework enabling marketing, sales, CS, product, and finance to work together.

It seems we’ve forgotten everything we know about trust and relationships. Andy Paul demands that we all sell without selling out! So much so, he wrote a book on it! It’s time we re-humanize sales, ditch the automation, burn the robotic scripts, and start over. Selling isn’t a race. It’s an art. Take the time to research and leverage the data-driven intelligence you need to support a quality-over-quantity process.

Creativity is something we all have. Even if you’re analytical, you’re guaranteed to have at least one form of creativity in you, so get scrappy! Creativity doesn’t mean ”artsy.” It isn’t exclusive to designers, artists, marketers, or musicians either! Creativity comes in many forms, like innovation, critical thinking, problem-solving, solutions architecture, and many other ”uncreative” and ”unsexy” things!

The future of the sales and marketing industry will rely on data-driven RevOps practices that leverage closed-network (a.k.a. closed-circuit) sales environments and predictable prospecting capabilities. Adem and Rob go deep ”down the rabbit hole” to surface the process behind successfully doing so and unearth the issues that are currently hidden within the modern sales and marketing process.

The sales industry has lost most of its credibility. It’s largely due to the obsession with efficiency at the sacrifice of effectiveness. The culprit responsible for the death of the salesperson is sales automation technology, which caused the gross overuse of scripted high-volume messaging, turning sales into a half-rate assembly line.

A discussion around the idiocracy that the sales industry has devolved into. WTF happened? How the hell did we end up here? The lack of relationship-building, the increase in high-volume outreach (a.k.a. ”spamming”), and the blatant disregard for the buyer’s journey have destroyed the integrity of the salesperson.

Digital marketing for SMBs is a challenge. ”There’s no way I have budget for that” is the most common reaction to the idea. Mike Ruffing, marketing veteran, who specializes in taking scaled enterprise marketing processes and ”de-scaling” them to work effectively for small businesses with a shoestring budget.

Agile is not exclusively for the engineering and product department. The method enables you to fall in love with the problem, not the solution. Simon takes us through ”the three growth levers,” shortening the path to ”wow,” and how to turn fixed costs into variable costs.

TikTok is uncharted territory for the B2B space. It has over 1.2 Billion users! It’s ripe for the picking! How can you best leverage TikTok to create awareness at a mass scale? How can you start generating leads through short-hand, dynamic content? Learn from TikTok expert and influencer Will Aitken how it’s possible to leverage TikTok for your business today!

Podcasting is a fun yet challenging way to make genuine long-term connections. Whether you’re podcasting for business or pleasure—they’re great for finding new clients or partners. It’s an effective way to build strong relationships quickly. Invite your #1 prospect as a guest on your podcast. By the end (assuming all went well), it’s almost guaranteed they’ll be open to talking business with you.

”Simplexity” is an intriguing concept. We overcomplicate everything when it all boils down to something so simple. ”Simplexity” is the best method for diagnosing the actual cause of an organization’s problems—rather than the symptoms. We tend to overcomplicate everything and see things one-dimensionally, which keeps us focused on the wrong solutions.

Becoming a social media influencer doesn’t happen overnight. Platforms like LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc., are very powerful tools for B2B + B2C marketers and business owners, but not a magic pill. Your personal brand and a strong public-facing company culture are essential. Rob and our star guest, Tony Pec, discuss how you can make it to the top.

Many ad agencies are not transparent and often hide their process from you. They come off as ”shady” or ”insincere” when interfacing with clients. This creates a high tension in their client-provider relationship, followed by a rocky road of high churn and failure rate. This can be avoided by providing clients with the details about their process/roadmap and transparency around their decisions.

Hate to break it to everyone, but high volume is DEAD. The amount of ”noise” generated by businesses in the marketplace created a toxic environment for demand generation, delivering valuable content, and selling. We’re all playing the ”numbers game.” Turns out this ”game” dug the mile-wide hole most businesses are stuck in.

The challenge agency owners face is attaining profitable growth. Their margins are stripped due to the sheer amount of resources it takes to achieve their clients’ desired results which robs them of their ability to grow or scale. Agencies often tend to get ”stuck”—it happens all the time.

Dan Newman and Rob Turley share their knowledge of generating qualified leads effectively and efficiently. It requires a deep understanding of your buyer’s persona that revolves around relationship building with buyer safety. Being relevant and capturing the buyer’s perspective to speak their language is essential.

Learn from two C-level Millennials about how to hire Millennials. Enough said.

Gaining a following and generating constant content that maintains your digital relevance is more challenging than it sounds. What does every business, business owner, influencer, and networker need in common? To stay relevant, follow trends, and keep their audience’s attention. Thomas, master of contextual relevance, and Rob talk about the best practices and technologies you can use to build your following, generate content, and become or remain relevant.

Marcus Hemsley, Founder of Fountain Partnership, and master of evidence-based marketing has an intense debate about what is broken in the marketing industry. Learn the greatest mistakes, how to avoid them, and the best practices to ensure your success. Get the results you deserve by focusing on the outcome. Don’t mislead yourself by focusing on the marketing activity itself.