Grow exceptional partners
Growing exceptional partnerships requires you to prioritise, nurture and retain your best partners so you can develop them into transformational partners.
Have you got a portfolio of wonderful partners that you think cannot just be great, but can be exceptional?
Yaaaay, congratulations. Now, how do you get them thinking about how they can be exceptional? How will you find the time to develop all the partnerships you currently manage? What about the ones who aren’t performing and you’re not sure what to do next? If you’re looking to grow your portfolio, and protect your partnerships by keeping them fresh, nurtured, and valued then we can help.
Helping ambitious partnership managers achieve better results
module 1
Prioritise
- Analyse your current portfolio
- Prioritise your time using our value matrix
- Understand which partners have true potential
- Identify the energy suckers
- Transactional vs strategic partnerships
- Create a portfolio plan
module 2
maximise value
- Add value to your existing partners
- Open new opportunities
- Know the best questions to ask
- Create solutions with your partners
- Identify roadblocks
- Take partners from good to great
module 3
Amplify
- Run best practise partnership reviews
- Measure success
- Thank and recognise
- Involve the C-Suite in your organisation
- Create an internal coalition
- It takes a village
- Invite, insert, and inspire your partners
Helping ambitious partnership managers achieve better results
Ovarian Cancer Australia- case study
The situation
Have you ever been so busy managing partnerships that you can’t see the wood for the trees anymore? Thinking time is a luxury when you’re juggling the constant demands of your partners.
This was the case for the Ovarian Cancer Australia (OCA) partnerships team. They’d built a bunch of partnerships with some great corporates, including L’Oréal, Interflora, Terry White Chemmart and Hanes Australia. They had some terrific campaigns and activations, but the team wondered if they could get better return for all of their and their partner’s efforts. It’s frustrating, and exhausting, for a talented team trying to pack a lot of impact into their day. OCA has some ambitious goals for the future, so the team wanted more value in their partnerships to support that growth. They needed a fresh set of eyes to provide a different perspective and new ideas.
The solution
Stellar Partnerships provided a combination of perspective, insights, problem solving and possibilities. The first step was a deep dive analysis into the existing portfolio. It became clear that some partners had the potential for growth, whilst others were proving harder to develop better value even with a lot of time and energy invested. The OCA team also realised that their partnerships portfolio had a narrow focus on fundraising and marketing, which were very resource intensive.
The second step involved a workshop with key stakeholders and the CEO to understand OCA’s priorities and strategic direction. This enabled the team to identify what it needs from corporate partners to support OCA’s growth and get clarity on the types of new partners that are the best fit. The penny dropped for OCA when they realised that the push for fundraising income had left a bucket of other value, including advocacy and new channels and audiences, untapped.
The result
OCA is refreshing and revitalising its corporate partnerships portfolio. The team is exploring ways to divest or delegate some partnerships and is refocusing its efforts on the best opportunities for growth. OCA has an action plan, a new set of priorities and clear focus for the way ahead. Its leadership team is on board and has gained a whole new understanding of the value that partnerships could bring to OCA.