One of the most versatile and dynamic moves available to businesses is the formation of business partnerships with a similar business or businesses that complement their own products or services. Regardless of what form a business partnership takes -- short term, long term, deeply integrated or something more casual, all have the potential to drive in new business, strengthen existing business and generally improve the lives of all the businesses involved.
So, with the importance and value of business partnerships in mind, we came up with seven tips to help you establish and maintain strong business partnerships, which you can find below.
7 Tips For Developing A Business Partnerships:
Tip #1. Develop A Unified Vision: The start of any business partnership should begin with a firm understanding of what the purpose of your partnership is. What motivates each of your companies? What drew you to one another? The factors that align your businesses will serve as the basis for your partnership's plan. That partnership plan should include all the various details concerning how your businesses will interact with one another.
Tip #2. Address Individual Needs: While a partnership may be a unified initiative, it is still driven by independent businesses, each with their own needs and wants. Part of maintaining a strong business partnership is to avoid being self-serving and instead being sensitive to each other's wants and needs, providing support when available. The more you help each other out with your individual goals, the stronger your partnership becomes and the more likely you are to achieve your unified goals.
Tip #3. Identify Strengths & Weaknesses: Every business has their strengths and weaknesses. One of the benefits to establishing a business partnership is finding ways to complement your individual businesses where one excels and the other falls short (and vice-versa). Beyond creating a more powerful entity by maximizing your strengths and minimizing your weaknesses, your businesses should theoretically learn and grow from one another, strengthening as not only a team, but improving individually, as well.
Tip #4. Establish Partnership Roles: Business partnerships do come with their risks, however, and one of them is stepping on each other's toes or overstepping boundaries. You presumably established your business partnership because of very clear, defined advantages a cooperative venture would yield for you each respectively. As part of the plan development touched upon in Tip #1, you should put into writing what each partner's roles are, what their limitations are and even include accountability as a precaution.
Tip #5. Show Respect Throughout Partnership: A business partnership is a relationship. That means you need to be responsive and communicate regularly to keep one another abreast of mutual interests and project statuses. You need to be honest about situations that affect one business or the other to avoid damaging your relationship, and carefully manage any disagreements that may turn up by mistake or misfortune. Like any relationship, communication is key. So be honest and keep in touch regularly so you both are always on the same page.
Tip #6. Maximize Partnerships With Webpages: One of the best ways to get the most out of your business partnership is to mutually agree to develop a partner page on your respective websites. Now, most businesses stop with something simple, like a list of their business partners accompanied by the business' logo. But partner pages can be extremely lucrative, driving traffic to your partner's website from yours and to yours from theirs. Ultimately, you should design partner pages so that they add value to both your companies and your websites. So when designing a partner page, make them as dynamic and compelling for visitors as you can.
Tip #7. End Partnerships Peacefully: As we have already established, partnerships are relationships, and just as with interpersonal relationships, there are ups and downs. When these downs start to negatively affect both businesses in a partnership, the most prudent business decision may be to go your separate ways. The trick, of course, is to navigate these separations so the partnership concludes amicably. Any bad blood, so to speak, will only ever be bad for both your businesses. So when forced to end your business partnership, work hard to part ways peacefully.
Executive Summary: Business partnerships can be a powerful for venture two or more businesses. But fundamentally, both companies need to be extra sensitive and cautious about each business' individual needs -- especially if your companies are relatively new to one another. Business partnerships come and go. So should you find yourself in this situation part ways peacefully and amicably. Doing so will preserve each other's image.
Your Next Step: If you want to find out more about how Dale Carnegie® Training can make your business more effective, or need more information on this subject, please send us an e-mail at the address below.
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