Partner enablement is NEVER done.

It is a continuous, iterative, ever-changing PROCESS that has no deadline or "done" status.

Whether it’s your internal teams or your partners, don’t think that once you do a lunch & learn that the box is checked.

Finished an enablement session? Great, get them added to our joint slack channel and go do a joint blog post.

You’ve done your joint blog and sent it to the company? Awesome, go build a mutual case study and get the CSMs connected.

You’ve finished the case study and shared it with Sales/CS? Perfect, set up a meeting at the next conference.

The conference is 3 months away? Ok, make sure you’re sharing relevant updates in Slack every 2-4 weeks between your monthly calls.

Oh, that partner was involved in a Sales opportunity? Get those reps connected!

You get the idea. You have to stay top of mind, and you have to help keep your partners top of mind for your teams.

You have to give people a reason to think of you and remember you and the value you bring.

This goes both for your partners as well as your internal teams.

Thanks for contributing to this section of the PhD, Marco De Paulis!

ChatGPT: The most effective partnership play of all time

ChatGPT has the most effective GTM strategy of all time.

People think ChatGPT’s success comes from its superior product but they’re wrong.

Great product never beats great go-to-market.

BUT…

Great go-to-market never beats great partnerships.

In ChatGPT’s case, the real revelation isn’t generative AI. It’s that every single company is being forced to partner with ChatGPT.

You think Microsoft, HubSpot, Salesforce (and all the rest) wouldn’t prefer to build their own AI?

Of course they would. Instead, they were forced to launch a "powered by ChatGPT," feature, further propelling the powered by partner flywheel for OpenAI.

And wow, did it ever.

1 million users in the first 5 days of launch.

100 million users by the end of January 2023.

25 million daily visits.

One year ago, "Powered by ChatGPT" was nowhere.

Today there are over TWO MILLION Google search results for "powered by ChatGPT."

ChatGPT’s best customers are driving them more demand which makes ChatGPT and “powered by” the most effective go-to-market strategy of all time.

Don’t believe me?

Maybe the $29 billion valuation is more convincing.

A tear comes to my eye 🥲 as I think about the beautiful partner play by OpenAI. Click here to listen to my riff on this stunning partner play.

Are you for real?

Partner ecosystems are such an important part of GTM that a tool is now needed to verify if advertised partnerships are real.

Venturefy AI is like a blue checkmark for businesses. It uses AI to verify B2B relationships to ensure that the relationship actually exists.

Venturefy also offers a way to protect your brand reputation. It’ll scan the web for other brands that claim to work with you and send alerts when it finds others trying to leverage your brand name.

Trust is the new data, so you’ve got to protect yours by ensuring people aren’t piggybacking your good name without your consent. Cool to see tools emerge to handle this at scale.

Happenings

• Firneo - How to Kick-Ass in Your First Partnerships Role - Wednesday, March 29th, 12 – 1 PM ET – Learn practical, tactical insights to conquer your new role so you can start putting wins on the board immediately. Register here.
• PartnerXperience Partnerships Meetup Berlin March 29th - This event is for Partnership Professionals, who would like to connect, learn and exchange best practices on how to build successful partnerships with other peers. Register here.
• InFUUSE – The Future of Business: Unleashing the Ecosystem Blueprint to Redefine Growth – Thursday, March 30th, 5 PM EST – Join Jared Fuller and an incredible panel of futurists, disruptors, innovators, and dreamers for an electrifying virtual round table to discuss the future of business. Learn why Nearbound is the GTM blueprint. Register here.
• Kiflo Roundtable: Partner Onboarding – Thursday, March 30th, 11 AM CDT – Join Juhi Saha, CEO of Partner1, Jennifer Snyder, Senior Director of Channel Partnerships at Customer.io, and Shawnie Hamer, Head of Marketing & Partner Marketing at Kiflo as they tackle partner onboarding. Register here.
• Generating & MOVING Pipeline with Partners – Thursday, March 30th, 2 PM ET – Cory Synder (from Sendoso) is meeting up with Justin Zimmerman to share how he uses tools like Crossbeam, Reveal, Slack, as well as KPIs he’s built to push pipeline & keep aligned with leadership. Register here.

Partnerships in the Wild

You can run your Zaps while you get your ZZZ’s. Eight launched a smart mattress in partnership with IFTTT. Schedule things like locking doors and turning off lights based on when you lay down for bed. Or tell Alexa to start warming up or cooling down your bed!

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