Jen Spencer, CEO of SmartBug Media, is coming to the summit!

She’s a legend in the HubSpot ecosystem and will share her take on how (and why) you should attach partners to your customers. Register here.

Stop looking for your IPP?

Imagine you’re at Catalyst listening to a presentation on Nearbound when the presenter says…

“I hate the phrase Ideal Partner Profile.”

It’s Jared Fuller and he’s dropping another one of his controversial opinions.

Your shock is apparent, objections swirl in your mind, but you listen as Jared continues...

“You don’t decide who your ideal partner profile is, your customers do.

Partnering is not a company-first decision. It’s a customer-first decision.

Your customer is the one who’s going to tell you who to partner with because it’s who they ALREADY work with.

Ask your customers who they work with, then list the names they say.

One by one by one. Over and over. Across every department. All the time.

You get your marketing team to work with who they mention. You get your sales team to work with who they mention. Success, etc.

Companies and partner programs trying to define their "Ideal Partner Profile" are getting it wrong.

You don’t decide who your ideal partner profile is, your customers do.

Surround your business with the people and companies your customers already trust, in every department.

That’s customer-centric, data-driven, fact-based, and undeniable.

If you don’t know who your customers do business with, then stop screwing around with definitions and start picking up the phone and talking to damn customers.”

Any thoughts to add? Comment on his LinkedIn post.

Networks are the new moats

Tesla just dropped another Nearbound masterstroke—announcing a partnership with Hilton to install 20,000 charging stations at Hilton properties throughout North America (by 2025).

This is a genius play for (3) reasons:

1. Tesla is shifting customer demand. Instead of waiting for customers to demand it, they’re setting the pace, establishing themselves as the dominant manufacturer in the category, and challenging other EV companies to keep up.

2. Tesla is building a network of companies to lead in the sustainable energy revolution. Tesla’s thinking bigger than electric cars. They’re thinking about the sustainable energy revolution. Instead of playing to win in the EV space, Tesla is building a network of allies to win the whole revolution.

3. Partnerships are essential to achieving market leadership. Musk isn’t dabbling here. He’s going all-in. One partnership after the next. Remember Tesla’s recent partnership with Ford?

Read more about Tesla’s partnership with Hilton.

That’s Nearbound at work. 👏

Is the new brand partnership option on LinkedIn a good idea?

When you go to your post settings in LinkedIn, you now have an option for brand partnerships.

Turning it on will publicly label your post as a brand partnership.

LinkedIn added the feature to make sure their community knows when people and companies are getting paid to promote.

 It’s a cool feature, but in my opinion, the strongest accountability for brand partnerships doesn’t come from LinkedIn, it comes from the customer.

Brands partnerships implicitly create skin in the game. If a company or influencer promotes something their audience doesn’t value, they’ll lose trust.

Trust is a commodity no brand or creator ever wants to lose.

Reply to this email with your opinion.

Stuff you don’t want to miss!

• Sept 27, 2 PM EST — WTF is Partner Enablement? — Join Jessie Shipman (CEO of Fluincy and former partner enablement leader at Apple) and Scott Pollack (CEO at Firneo). It’s time to clear the fog and conquer the challenges of partner enablement. Register here.

• September 28, 12 PM EST - Game Changers: Isaac Morehouse — Isaac will join Oana Manolache to talk about how to use content creation to define a category. He’ll share the 3 elements to help you build brand awareness, drive pipeline, and unite your team. Register here.

• November 6-9th — Nearbound Summit 2023 — The future of GTM is Nearbound. Join us for the biggest-ever remote experience in GTM where B2B leaders across departments unite to share how they’re winning with Nearbound strategies and tactics. Register here.

Your network is your most valuable asset 

Only share this Nearbound Daily if you get value from it. We want to help you build trust with your network.