Key learnings from Catalyst Conference

#Catalyst24, hosted by Partnership Leaders brought together partnership operators from over 70+ countries together to share learnings, understand leading best practices & market trends, network and unite to accelerate the impact that partnerships as a growth lever can have, so companies can go faster, together.

If you're a founder, leader or partnerships operator, here's my conference recap with some actionable tips you can take to the exec table for discussion.

Kudos to Asher Mathew Chris Samila , Tai Rattigan ( we missed you not being there!) SarahBeth Donaghy, CMP & everyone involved in bringing the Partnership Leaders community, and event to life.

Held in Chicago's best Summer time weather last week, 600+ partnership professionals gathered at this conference to learn, share ideas, network and contribute to building the future.

I headed home reassured on the potential for partnerships, and reaffirmed our belief to the impact we can have at Hockey Stick Advisory enabling partnerships for growth.

1) The State of Partnerships in Public & Private markets is shifting

Asher Mathew opened the conference with a keynote on the state of play across the industry.

Private markets is seeing capital raising being significantly harder than the cheap money era of 2020 amongst a COVID economy, the changing role of partners and their impact is growing, we are seeing a growing trend of Chief Partner Officers with a view across the entire organisation. The option to build, buy or partner is emphasising increasingly towards partnering as a strategic growth asset and to create a competitive moat.

Public markets is seeing less IPO's in current economic climate, and there's a growing trend towards partnering as a growth driver. This creates an opportunity for partnership operators to step up and earn a seat at the exec table. Asher emphasised there's never been a better time to have a seat at the exec table Greg Sarafin , from EY who was deservedly awarded a lifetime achievement award also reinforced this, if you can transform tech investments into measurable results.

The main theme of the conference was to showcase a line to revenue, the road to profitability to capitalise on the possibilities that partnerships can present.

What this means for your business: The industry is increasingly *partner curious* more than ever, there's an openness to explore a better together narrative which will create more partner led opportunities. Rich Gardner from Klaviyo encouraged attendees to make CEO level bets following laying solid foundations, whilst Dai Vu from Google cautioned that if you don’t know your partnerships outputs as revenue, you’re a cost centre.

What to do: have a data led exec discussion which key partners close to the core of your business you can aim to 10X your partner motions, whilst carefully considering WHY they would partner with you, and what you can bring to the table. Every company is aspiring to have predictable partner led revenue, so how can you be that for prioritised partners, and if not what else can you offer.

2) Market Sizing, the Partnerships economy is growing at double the rate of the uncertain global economy

On Day 2, the industry leading analyst Jay McBain from Canalys led a keynote on the market , size, opportunity and the need for radical execution beyond the hype phase.

Key stats

• The Channel economy is growing at 6.2%, double the global economy growth rate???
• Of the $105 trillion world economy, 75% of world economy goes indirect, everything is partner assisted??
• Services are growing faster than hardware and software, companies cannot go it alone, and are resourcing and changing their business models to accomodate.
• Partner sentiment remains positive despite economic headwinds, with 45% of world population having elections this year.

84% of sales pros are not surprisingly saying that partner selling has a bigger impact than direct, and 58% of those that don’t, expect to do so within a year.??

• There are 7 x spots around a customer to add value as a trusted advisor to get to the outcome, with influence coming from across the 20 partner types??
• Integration first buyers demand great customer outcomes.

These trends are unlocking significant new partnership opportunities & creating new players in the market, across technology, strategic alliances & creating incredible commercial business outcomes.

However, Jay cautioned the need to move from the hype and possibilities that partnerships can offer, to the need to get to work, showcase impact and build predictable partner led revenue as a profitable GTM channel.

What this means for your business: The partnerships trend is only going to accelerate, your ideal partners will work with something else if you don't go deep, if not already harnessing this efficient growth channel. Consider your roadmap, and broader customer needs, and who can help drive great customer outcomes, together.

Scott Brinker from HubSpot in his platform journey session highlighted whilst product typically wants to own everything, and sales will always want more pipeline, partners can bridge the gap to solve jobs, and reinforced

you cannot expect to market your way to success, there is a broader opportunity to enable partners together, that requires company wide buy in to accelerate scale.

What this means for your business: you cannot afford to be left behind with this efficient growth driver, nor likely have the CapEx to build the old model of a large outbound sales team, your leadership team need to understand and endorse how and where partnerships can contribute, delivered in a profitable way.

What to do next: Discuss with your leadership team the touch points across sales, marketing, CX, partnerships and ops where partners can assist to go faster together to create great customer outcomes.

3) The No.1 Predictor of Ecosystem Success is not necessarily what you think

What data supports the success of a partner program delivering the biggest ROI? Brad Pace from Impartner Software led an insightful session on a data driven enablement assessment of their portfolio of clients.

Building on 4 x their key pillars, the #1 pillar for success wasn't GTM efforts, nor intent or optics, but something more simple.

Companies which set goals, set targets, attainment & allocation with their partners produced the biggest partner ROI more than any other pillar. Why? They unlock organisational commitment on both sides

In current state, do you have a ROI validated, CFO endorsed partner program?

What this means for your business: Going beyond QBR's, set up committed mutual success plans with key partners early on, and go to market together ensuring alignment, commitments and exec buy-in.

We're seeing this work well with companies we are working with at Hockey Stick in building and accelerating their partner led momentum. Frie Pétré from Qollabi released a great book recently on HOW to do this with his partner operating model.

What to do next: Speak to your customers to understand their business challenges outside but close to your core offering and understand what key partners can solve them. Seek buy-in with key partners how you can work together with a committed plan to bring it to life, before getting tactical.

4) How do go from good to great

Now you have an understanding of the market trends, sizing and what's most important for ecosystem success, how can you move towards executing bringing prioritised partnerships to life. Rachel Skaff from Amazon Web Services (AWS) focused on prioritising meeting your customer needs, and what partners can solve that for them.

Nelson Wang & Kevin Dunn, PMP? from Airtable answered this deeper by closing out day 3 delivering an oversubscribed masterclass about how to build a modern partner enablement program.

I was fortunate to spend time with Nelson around the conference to dig deeper into his first principles frameworks, methodologies and how his customer led mindset enables partnerships to scale. Check out his amazing resources here.

In their session, Nelson highlighted

Partner enablement is one of the keys to ensuring the success of your customers

If you don't help your customers solve real problems through and with your partners, then you cannot expect them to be successful. Their success is your success, same applies for your partners. Key takeaways below

1. Focus on the customer: understand their business challenges and business impact, tie your partner enablement strategy to supporting those needs
2. Meet the partner on their stage of partnership maturity, enable accordingly
3. Align X-functionally how you can best support
4. Operate with a continuous improvement mindset, always building, never built
5. Customer education is NOT the same as partner education

Greg Portnoy from EULER emphasised that CEO's don't know what good partnerships look like. The language of leadership for partnerships is numbers, driven by good data. Ultimately, from partner to partner your partner program is your product, and should be treated as such.

What this means for your business: You need to understand how and where partners are tied your customer journeys, and what's required to bring those partners into those conversations in a repeatable and scalable way. Adel Farahmand from Upwork described partnerships role is to accelerate the strategy, not to be the strategy. I agree it should align to company strategy and vision, with partners enabling this to life solving customer problems.

What to do next: Work with your partners to provide contextual education and enablement on your better together narrative to create win wins. Prioritise partner ops to capture deal attribution at every touch point, as Antonio Caridad emphasised in his session, if it's not data led you're guessing.

Speak to your customers about their business challenges, understand what 3rd party companies they also use alongside you, and why. Explore how and which partners could be helpful.

5) Community is an under rated superpower to unite your ecosystem

The Partnerships Leaders community is rising the tide of partnership operators across the globe. The conference itself is the annual gathering of this engaged audience. According to LinkedIn numbers, there are 450k+ people in partnership roles, which goes to 3million + if you add ecosystem, channel and alliances surrounding. The conference hosted 600+ attendees, with a community ~2k and growing.

Those investing in their continued learning, building collaborations & alliances, harnessing best practices will be tomorrow's powerhouse partnership leaders executing profitable, partner led revenue, and will pave the way for the industry.

If curious not yet a member, check it out HERE

The surrounding ecosystem of your company today will be advocates, evangelists and power users of your product. Consider how you can empower them to amplify the voice of your brand, and an extension of your sales team.

Buyer behaviour has changed, we turn to who can help increasingly. There's an excessive amount of noise in market with never ending distractions, people are asking their trusted network for solutions, advice and recommendations. Influencer marketing, referrals, affiliates + word of mouth can be your greatest influential assets of how people buy your product, now or ahead.

For example, Justin Zimmermann drove a super impressive 1500+ registrations in 15 days with 0$ budget as a sole operator uniting many of the industries best, and amplifying across their networks and community.

Enabling your community will build a competitive moat around your offering, and reduce switching costs and churn alike. You can also amplify your partners and harness their network to grow your audiences.

What this means for your business: consider who is or could advocate for your business, partners or customers. Unite them together, truly listen to them, empower them to amplify your message and impact.

What to do next: Find out where your customers discovered you, heard about you across what touch points, where they hang out, where are there watering holes are. Consider complementary partners to amplify your brand, reach and messaging together to unite your ecosystem, together.

About Hockey Stick Advisory

Based out of Melbourne, Australia we work with founders & execs of B2B tech companies to accelerate their growth with & through their partner ecosystem. This was proudly our third Catalyst event, bringing global best practices and insights to the companies we support and enable. Our services include:

1. Building market leading partnership strategy ready for execution
2. Prioritise key partner categories
3. Reimagine their partner value proposition
4. Optimise & improve their partner programs - assess their resourcing needs for execution, done the right way.
5. Provide partner marketing services bringing the partnerships to life

Whether you're getting started or looking to optimise & grow your partnerships impact, reach out for a discussion to understand how Hockey Stick Advisory can enable partnerships for growth to build a profitable partnerships motion, without wasting time and efforts.

The market opportunity is here, don't be left behind.