What is up PartnerUp!?
Chip Rodgers and Alexis Scott of WorkSpan join the PartnerUp crew to break down Day 3 of PL[X] and talk partner led marketing. Chip and Alexis have deep knowledge of category creation, demand generation, digital marketing, and account-based marketing. They emphasize the importance of building meaningful relationships through open dialouge.
Alexis shares the differences between qualitative and quantitative metrics in partner led marketing. She says that by planting seeds in your market, you’ll eventually be able to harvest the fruit. By developing deep connections and trust, your marketing grows organically.
This episode was recorded LIVE at PL[X] – you don’t want to miss it!
3 Key Takeaways
- “Partnerships are places you go to give, not places you go to take.” - Jared Fuller
Go in with a give-first mindset, and good things will come back to you. Enter into a partnership wanting to take, that partnership won't bear as much fruit. - Influence and Trust are two of the most immeasurable things that you can have
The way we use data needs to change because many of the most important things in business (and life) are qualitative and implicitly hard to measure. - Even beginners have something to teach you
Don't fall prey to the belief that you know everything. Beginners might have a vantage point that you lack because you've been so deep into a subject/industry for so long.
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Full Transcript:
Jared Fuller 00:00
Hey what is up partner up? We're back. We're live. Oh my gosh, day three partner live marketing data to Alexa, have it over 1500 people have been live so far. The holy cow in the week, we seriously probably only have the diehards left right now in the IC chats going off. You're joining us in the podcast room, we're joined by two friends over, we're expanding ecosystem aces. Chip Rogers. Alexis, thanks so much for hanging out with us after hours.
Chip Rodgers 00:39
Yeah, yeah, gosh, Jared, Isaac, amazing, amazing job really, for, you know, just putting this putting this together, I was saying I sent you an email yesterday, just kind of like, one on one, like, you're you guys have just killed it, you know, this is this, this event, Pl x is the first time that I've been in a virtual event and felt like this kind of energy of a physical event of like being there, you know, just like, great content moving quickly, you know, like, just kind of calling everybody back into sessions. And I don't know, it's just a great energy.
Jared Fuller 01:19
You know, I, I printed out that email, and I framed it and I gave it to my wife to see, see what I do matter. What I do, Matt, look at what Chip said from workspace, this is really important.
Isaac Morehouse 01:31
More chatting backstage? Because, you know, today part Well, that's good. Well, it was heartfelt. I
Chip Rodgers 01:36
meant it, it was you guys are just really,
Jared Fuller 01:38
I really appreciate that ship, I feel like the energy and the people and the enthusiasm is, is honest and real. Like we put our hearts and souls into this. And I hope everyone else feels it too.
Isaac Morehouse 01:47
So today's been all about, you know, living in your community, marketing, you know, as a as a member of an ecosystem, building an ecosystem. We were talking backstage about Alexis, I was giving you a shout out like, you show up on the scene, and you're all over LinkedIn, Hey, everyone, I'm new to this role. I'm new to this space, I come from sales, teach me all about partnerships. Let's go and you're like immediately embraced and a part of this community is such a great individual example of how to do that. And you were telling me that you like, immediately started connecting with a whole bunch of people just just from doing that. So I'd love to hear what what made you decide to do that? And what do you feel like you've gained by kind of going out there and given an open invitation to learn from people.
Alexis Scott 02:34
So two things, number one, that's just my personality. That's how I am in business like I, if I'm in I'm all in. And the biggest piece of the puzzle for me in learning is building those relationships, having one on one conversations, I can watch webinars, and I can watch tutorials, and I can read articles. But there's nothing like having a conversation with someone, and the ability to ask questions and connect with them. And I don't care if you're in sales or partnerships or marketing or whatever. But relationships are the key to a successful career, in my opinion. And so I just knew like from the gate, I needed to focus on that and building relationships, and leveraging those relationships, hopefully, as they grow. And as I learn more, but that was my strategy and partnerships, this community is so welcoming. Like I cannot say that or stress that enough. Like I got an incredible response. I was joking around until on ship. I booked nine meetings that day and sales speak. And you know, had those calls the subsequent week, but people were awesome. It was really fun. And I hope to actually do more. I have more plans. filling me with a little bit. But you know, my calendar is always open for partnerships, folks who want to shmack and talk business and talk personal and just, you know, become allies in this journey together. I'm here.
Jared Fuller 03:57
I love it. I love it. I see Greg in the chat, Greg, someone that we've been following us for a while and booked a meeting and talk with us shout out Greg, I can't quite see what you're saying. Yeah.
Alexis Scott 04:09
Life is about time and relationships.
Jared Fuller 04:12
There we go. I've been I'm such a like, I just beat dead horses all the time. And I say the same thing over and over again. And I can't get this out of my head partnerships are places you go to give not places you go to take. And for that reason, the partner ecosystem is by far the best ecosystem. I mean, I've been a part of every other one from the beginning of kind of like go to market being like a community for modern sales pros to all sorts of different communities and like this is just a place where like, we're all trying to help each other and is as evidenced by that like that's just what an amazing anecdote. GIF How you feeling right now. How are you feeling like bringing Alexis on and like going through this whole motion?
Chip Rodgers 04:55
Oh, it's this is this is great. And I love it. You're You're right Lexus is sort of embodies this the concept of this whole day, you know that it's a partner led marketing and this this partnering community really is about it's not, you know, we were, we were talking earlier, it's like you get you get an email from the somebody's in the footer, it says business development representative, and they're like, We want to have a meeting. I'm like, I don't even know who you are. And it's it is it's about community and relationships and developing those those connections. I love hearing what you're talking about, like, you know, give before you get, you know, in my session this morning with Liz Fuller, it was exactly part of marketing is the same thing.
Jared Fuller 05:50
Real quick, real quick. Yeah. I just want to say Liz fuller has objectively the best last name. She had a joke in there, Jared, fuller, Liz fuller anyways,
Isaac Morehouse 06:03
hey, so I want to go back to this, Alexis, you're like, hey, I go post on LinkedIn. I, you know, I booked nine calls off of this. And we were joking beforehand, like, where does that get attributed? You know, not going to, it's not going to show up as I did a really real genuine transparent. Hey, everybody, I'm here to learn, give me your best advice, LinkedIn post. And that led to nine calls. Instead, it's gonna show up some other attributed to some other thing is not quite right.
Alexis Scott 06:36
He gets screenshots. It's working, it's working. And he gets a random screenshot, like, any day of the week, where I'm like, hey, look, so I need to come up with a better system. But I am trying to think of ways in which we can attribute you know, the kind of social selling slash marketing strategy that to me, you know, it's strategic in the sense of like, Yes, I have a job to do, like, I'm here to amplify the Expand brand and to grow it and to engage in in interesting conversations with people. But it's also inherent for me to just like, make friends with people, like on any of these calls, I wasn't trying to sell anything, even on a call that was a person who had already engaged with our sales team, he asked me to meet with me, and I hopped on the call thinking like, this entire call is going to just be about like, tell me about partnerships. Tell me about how you got into it. And he starts going into like the deal. And he's telling me about his decision makers and the timeline. And I'm like, furiously scribbling notes down, like, Oh, my God, this is not what I thought. And, you know, it just creates this open dialogue, of just like, no expectations, like these calls.
Isaac Morehouse 07:50
So I've been thinking about this a lot lately this, this idea of like, quantifying the qualitative, but so like, start with the qualitative because you said screenshots and you said, like, oh, it's kind of like a hack, whatever. No, I think that's like the most important stuff we have. We have a Slack channel called hacker love. And we share every time somebody says something, oh, thanks so much for this, this letter, or this event was great. And we share it in there. And it's like pure qualitative. It's like you know it when you see it. You know, when someone when you're making an impact, when someone says something and says, Oh, I love the way that you know, Chip chip session at pls was amazing. I loved the way that he did this. We'll post that in there. And that's purely qualitative. It's a judgment call. It makes us all feel good. But then what you get to do over time, you can quantify those qualitative stuff, Jared, just the other day was like, Hey, guys, I just went through the hacker love channel, since we launched in April 1200 things we've posted in there. Now you kind of have this. And I love the idea of starting with the quality because usually you start with the quantitative okay, what can be measured? And then you know, you do your weekly reports, how many website visits? How many this? How many that? And we all none of us really feel very excited by that you kind of do you're like, oh, we have this many visits and this many clicks. I guess that means something. You're it makes the whole team excited. See a picture of someone in a hacker love channel, say you guys absolutely blew my mind with that session. That one comment means more than seeing a 25% increase in traffic week to week. And then after you quantify or qualify a qualitative stuff, then you can start to aggregate and do some quantification. I don't know there's something in there. There's something
Jared Fuller 09:22
massive in there. I mean, hacker look fuels my heart. That's my favorite Slack channel. I launched it on day one. And I said, we live and die by this channel. Whether or not the people that we supposedly serve and the people we supposedly help, are they saying publicly how we do so or how we don't live
Isaac Morehouse 09:40
alone. In fact, if three days go by without something posted that channel, Jared might actually die that's like, it's like, you know, he feeds everybody go give some emoji love down there. If you're in marketing, and you're like, you know what the qualitative stuff is actually a lot more meaningful to me than the quantitative stuff. See, there we go. See those cards that?
Jared Fuller 10:04
Isaac, I'd like for you to measure those hearts for me and talk about the ROI tabulator from this podcast session right now, we really need to, like be able to attribute this and that and like go through this. So I mean, at the end of the day, I think there is we're at this really interesting precipice where, like, I sat through, you know, everyone's sessions today, I watched replays where I was in between where, like, I was the speaker, and like, I can, I'm a consumer, as much as I'm a producer of this content, like, I genuinely care that much. And there is this interesting, like, line to ride between, like, we do need data. But how we used to use data, in marketing seems like it's fundamentally changed, like Isaac's point was just go back and listen to that, again, that's such a good example of like, where qualitative can become quantitative. How y'all are really closer to this with like, marketers at work span, and like the work that you're doing, like ecosystem bases and talking to people like you're the OG partnerships, podcast or chip, like you were doing this before any of us? How was this like, really interesting intersection where we're at between qualitative and quantitative? What's your point of view on this?
Chip Rodgers 11:16
I just think it's a great, it's a great point, I think, you know, building building the energy of this of a community and having people, you know, connecting and sharing and trying to help each other. Right, you know, I'm thinking even of the, the, the partner operations survey that was launched yesterday with, you know, that was Canalys, and partnership leaders and, and HubSpot, and just, you know, it's just like great content for everyone. 600 people contributed to it, and you so you get a real sense of what's what's going on. I think that kind of content and sharing that you got to start with that, to, to really bring bring people together and feel like it's, you know, it's your goes back to Jared, your gift to get it's like, you know, you have to start with giving really interesting content and good content and kind of trying to bring people together. Totally, I mean,
Isaac Morehouse 12:19
jump in and jump in Alexis. Yeah. Okay.
Alexis Scott 12:25
I understood the question differently. And so I want to answer it from from a different perspective. And Chip is my leader. So at least I think he's on board with you know, when you look at this kind of like, dark social, or like, guerilla marketing, right, where you're just going at it, and kind of like what I did, like, we're just going to talk to people, we're going to have great conversations, we're going to get people interested that brand evangelism, brand awareness. There has to be and this is like a requirement, trust from leadership, that a you know what you're doing, and be, they're gonna give you the time it takes to build up that momentum. This is not going to be a quick turnaround. It's not going to be like in a month, I'm going to be like, Oh, look, I booked 20 calls and they all want to learn about work span, and they all want to pay us a million dollars. And you could put my name on that. That's not how this works. In a year, there might be someone who heard me on this podcast, and goes, You know what, I think we're finally ready to invest that chick, Alexis on that podcast, I liked her. What was that company she worked for? Oh, workspan, man. Let me book a demo. That's how this works. It's it's planting the seeds and allowing them the time to grow. And eventually, there will be that chance for attribution. But I think that so many companies are so quick to like, give me the data, give me the data, give me the data. They're not even giving us a chance to grow. The other thing is, this, in my opinion, this is largely not scalable. So people like myself who have this innate ability to build connection, rapport evangelize, we are not a dime a dozen. And I say that confidently. It is a unique personality, a unique skill set. And if a company thinks they're gonna hire 10, like, okay, Alexis is doing great job. She's got all these customers, let me hire nine more. It doesn't work like that. It just
Jared Fuller 14:19
don't we all want to be that way, though. Like, we all want to feel like some sense of a deeper connection. And maybe that's why in this world, we're feeling less connected to the ads and the copy and the content and the Google searches and the reviews, and we're feeling more connected to the people. It's because of that deeper sense of connection. Like, I just don't know that I can rely for my information on all these things that are being gained. Like every channel gets gamed. Every acquisition thing, everything that happens where it gets gamed where, you know, original people might have been very genuine that I could trust like the first review sites for X, Y or Z was like, Wow, that's so honest and genuine. And then boom, roll out the box of $50 gift card, if you leave us a review, right? Like, then all of a sudden, it's like, wait a second, I don't think that that's the thing that it was whatever I came to you at the beginning it change. But over time, I feel like those people like they don't
Isaac Morehouse 15:20
So essentially, Jill, Joe mentioned in the comments there that the longtail of content and to Alexis is point like, hey, maybe a year later someone comes across this. So at my previous company, to two companies, previous bid practice is a bootcamp program like college alternative for young people who want to go work at startups. And we did a survey of our customers and even people who would apply to the program and ask them, What are the top podcasts that you listen to? And so we got all this data back. And of course, it's like, you know, Tim Ferriss, and whatever, and whatever. And we're a small bootstrap company. So of course, the initial thing that you would think is, okay, whoever were the main ones that everyone listened to, we should go run ads with them. And instead, I did the opposite. I said, Hey, let's let's look at the ones that are really small podcast, right? That get mentioned, like once or twice. And let's go ask that person told me about this podcast. And if they were a rabid fan, like, Oh, I've listened to this for forever, we'd say, okay, great, we would reach out to that podcaster and say, Hey, we have someone that joined our program, they skipped College, did our boot camp got a job without a degree? They've been a rabid listener of yours for years, would you want to have them come on and tell their story, and if it was relevant, relevant to that subject matter? They'd be like, Oh, my gosh, they get to come on and be like, Oh, I'm such a fan of your show. I've been listening for forever. You know, I skipped college. And it worked out for me. Here's my story. So we did that at these really smaller podcasts that had this like devoted fan base. And then for like, the next three years, we would have people that would come on in the How did you hear about us, they would say, I heard about you on this podcast, then we got to go to that podcaster and say, since that episode, we've had five people join our program. How about I come on your podcast and talk about it. And then I will go on as the CEO and be like, your podcast audience is such a great fit for this program. Every time we get one of them in the door, they crush it. And it created this flywheel where there was this like mute match massive like love fest. It was a small market podcast, but it ended up generating like this. And to this day, I met a guy I'm kidding you not. I met a guy at a party in rural Tennessee, where I now live with a neighbor that some some guy that I just met, he's like, we're having a pig roast, some guy walks up to me and goes, Are you Isaac Morehouse? Because I heard you on a podcast four years ago, talking about skipping College, and you inspired me to go do something. And it was this really small. But again, like, instead of looking at the quantitative data of whose audience is the biggest, we went qualitative and said, Who's the most rabid fan, because that will get us a chance to get them on that podcast? And like it just it ended up creating this long tail that's still pays dividends today.
Chip Rodgers 18:02
Well, and I think it also points points to you know, Jared, what you were talking about earlier is, is that, you know, a, an idea, a channel a concept, you know, a marketing program, whatever only lasts, it's like, it just doesn't, you have to keep trying new things. I mean, that was a brilliant, a brilliant idea. And, you know, those things are, it's always it's, it's like, you just can't, you can't, it's sometimes it's not repeatable, or you can't, like, you know, make make it go on forever. Because then it's like, all of a sudden, bots come. Yeah.
Jared Fuller 18:41
Games, right. Like, I mean, Isaac, you've read infinite games, right? Yeah. Like, it's really incredible how things will get gamed how like that that magic, that serendipity that the thing that made the spark that made you go Holy smokes, that's amazing. It'll all follow like how much you want to bet that what we've done here with PLX gets copied multiple times, there's going to be a flood of virtual events, remote experience, partnerships, stuff that happens after this event. And that's all great and fine. And I think that's part of the innovators dilemma as well, is that like, as you popularize a thing, and make it famous and do it? Well, the thing that got you here won't get you there. Right, like, exactly. Find those moments of serendipity that like those things that like
Isaac Morehouse 19:32
business books, by the way. There was giving you a formula that's already out of date, right? I mean, there's good stuff to be gleaned. But in general, I'm always like, Yeah, could have been a blog post.
Jared Fuller 19:42
The book was garbage.
Isaac Morehouse 19:44
That's the only exception. That's the only good business book.
Jared Fuller 19:51
I hold on, but we did publish his blog posts, too.
Isaac Morehouse 19:54
We did. That's true. Yeah, exactly. It is also a blog.
Jared Fuller 19:56
I mean, literally, I had someone today comment on LinkedIn. I'm actually such a big fan of Jared Fuller's partner up method that he detailed in chapter six. And I was like, that's called the partner up method. I did a call,
Isaac Morehouse 20:09
we better go start using that. Yeah, I was like, I have no idea. That's right. If you notice your customers giving names to things that you have said seize on that. I like that. That's okay.
Alexis Scott 20:19
On this note, we had a big moment for workspan on the other day, one of our customers like, I was blown away. This is a person familiar with work span was in their job description. We are now like, you know, like, must be familiar with Outlook must be familiar with Google must be familiar with whatever. Cheers. That's cool.
Isaac Morehouse 20:45
Oh, I love that. I love that. Yeah, to have that in a in a bio. And yeah, you start to see those job descriptions.
Jared Fuller 20:52
Actually, I want to ask that chip. What do you think is the like, because you can orchestrate things across like, you have co marketing co selling co servicing, like you have you have these different things. I think you have like a very comprehensive approach to like ecosystem management and expand for larger organization, smaller organizations. But I think the reality is, what do you call that person that is trying to orchestrate across work span. So I'll give you an example. It drift. Whenever we were starting conversational marketing, it was It wasn't like that revolutionary. I mean, we were really good at marketing. So we made it sound like it was the most revolutionary thing in the world. But we started it was a chatbot. Yeah, it was a chatbot. But hey, hold on, you had to be able to talk in a different way. Right? Like, these conversations were different in chat. And they were an email than they were on the website, but they were in person. So we actually started to create this category of conversational marketers. And there was conversational marketing managers. So like, you have a website with a million people. That's a full time job.
Isaac Morehouse 21:51
And they can go from San conversant and drift to sand, conversational marketing expert.
Jared Fuller 21:57
So they were active on the title post. Yeah, for conversational marketing managers. And then we got to publish, you know, hey, here's your guide for hiring your first conversational marketer. Job. What do you what do you think that person is for workspace? Because it's, it's like a little bit of everything, like, what is that person?
Isaac Morehouse 22:16
There, he's gonna talk about eco ops. I know, we've heard some different candidates out. Ali can't
Jared Fuller 22:21
join me right now. He's like, throwing a bunch of shade at me. So like, maybe he's
Isaac Morehouse 22:26
I hope you're here. Go ahead, check. Sorry.
Chip Rodgers 22:28
No, that's and I think the the thing that ties it together as ecosystem, right, so it's like, you're starting, you're seeing all these ecosystem chief ecosystem officer, like, you know, their heads of ecosystems, and, you know, ecosystem Ops is a good is a good one, I think it's, you know, that's the sort of the putting the mechanics together behind the scenes, like, how are you going to manage all this stuff and make it scalable, and make it you know, so that people are actually connecting, and you got the right technology is integrated and all that. That's the role of, you know, behind the scenes to make it to make it work. And, you know, the the leaders are at an ecosystem level, because you've got a lot of different kinds of partner activities that are happening, sort of within that umbrella. It's, you know, there, you're always going to have resellers, but then you get in, you got tech partners, you got cloud partners, you got GSIs, you got, you know, all these different kinds of MSP. So how do you you have to pull it all together under an umbrella?
Isaac Morehouse 23:29
I'm thinking workspace wizard.
Jared Fuller 23:33
Please don't do that. genius marketing snippets that I'm just like, wow. And then he'll throw some brands. Oh, I
Isaac Morehouse 23:40
have a lot of duds
Jared Fuller 23:42
you got a lot of I got a lot of bad I have a lot of there's something about what came to mind for me is like I think it's a bit on the nose to call it like an ecosystem orchestrator. I think really what you're trying to do is pay attention to there's there's two nodes, there's like trust and influence, right? And influence by definition is like measuring your ability to impact something, you know, whether it be from awareness to consideration to purchase. I mean, it's one of the default roles in Salesforce and CRM is influencer. And the reality is, is that every single role in a sales cycle is you're the influencer or you're a detractor. There's no one between right like you're one or the other. So there's something about this orchestration that happens across the buyers journey.
Isaac Morehouse 24:30
What if it was like a like a co growth orchestrator or CO marketing orchestrator?
Jared Fuller 24:35
There's there's something to do with it. Like I've heard this sentiment throughout the conference that like, influence and trust are two of the most immeasurable things that you can have and as a marketing organization that's addicted to the funnel. You can't see it on this screen, but we might have to open up the partner hacker swag store because this is
Isaac Morehouse 24:56
I love that. Funnel says Forget the funnel, when it spells forget with four letters.
Jared Fuller 25:05
So we might have to open the store here is that there's something about these things that we can't measure to your opening point, Isaac, that trust influence that we need to pay attention to. But because we lack a metric, and we lack a name that we can't, and I'm curious, what do
Isaac Morehouse 25:23
you want? What would you want to call people who are converting and we're expand, what would you want? What would you want them to be titled?
Alexis Scott 25:31
Like the person who is kind of running the entire workspace and solution for that company? Yes. What would you call them? Like the I don't know. The flywheel right now. I love it the flywheel? Why will
Isaac Morehouse 25:49
I love it? I love it. That's
Jared Fuller 25:51
actually pretty good. I liked that a lot.
Isaac Morehouse 25:53
Patricia says. That's true. But there's a there's a huge power to language, James courier who is on day one partner at startup. He has this phenomenal article. I can't remember the title. But it's basically about the importance of what you name your company. And we'd like early stage companies, he talks about name changes and things. And he also talks about language is one of the network effects like 16 network effects. Yeah, one of the one of the 16 network effects language, there is power in naming something properly. So you could say what doesn't matter what it's called? It's whatever they do, but they imagine, okay, so I used to see this I used to see this with with going back to the Praxis example, kids who would go through the Praxis boot camp, they would try to get tangible skills that they could show off when they go on the job market. Drift had this really easy way to go learn how to use drift. And so they would say, I am conversing. And they would put drift as like one of the tech items that they knew. And they would often use as a project, they would do like a video show and be like, This is me setting up a conversational marketing solution for a company. And they got to say, I'm conversing in conversational marketing, and that that was like a status symbol for them. They got to put it on LinkedIn, you give people something that has like some language around it. You can call it a gimmick all you want, but this is a marketing day. So all the people who think it's a gimmick could go away. It matters. It matters that the language matters. It's not just like, oh, whatever they do, we'll call it whatever.
Chip Rodgers 27:16
There's some it's like the HubSpot inbound course. One inbound inbound marketing certified
Jared Fuller 27:24
PMP right like for product I mean project management
Isaac Morehouse 27:28
plg right. It's like calling what used to be called virality plg product lead growth that was a big deal. Right and now you're hiring people for plg right like giving those names and those definitions and refreshing them even though they might be some old principles sometimes you need to refresh them so anyway maybe we won't maybe we'll come upon a brand new nutritionist saying
Alexis Scott 27:49
thanks to God but ask five people to give a description for alliance partner
Jared Fuller 28:01
oh my gosh yeah. But you Patricia she she said like Russia shout out to producers she she gets strategic partnerships and alliances as much as any is anyone so I think she's referring to by chapter and the partner hacker handbook partner up played away and like mastering strategic alliances. I think that's actually a fair call out back on me that like strategic alliances like what the heck does
Isaac Morehouse 28:27
that's kind of a catch all.
Jared Fuller 28:29
It's a super casual. I'm not like creating a category of software that I'm trying to like, you know, name it's like, here's how you go do strategic alliances, I was just sharing my personal anecdotes and stories. And people have started to branded themselves like literally today I heard someone call it the partner up method. And notice I was not opposed I'm not opposed to that not opposed to that
Isaac Morehouse 28:50
ecosystem ace that's there you go you
Jared Fuller 28:53
better hire an ecosystem basically the partner method call backs and that's a call to call back in comedy by the way it's called back because partner up the reason why I started it was I didn't know how to do anything other than when big things with people bigger than me partner up. Right. So I mean, it was kind of like partner up and play to win was kind of like my thesis for that. But no, totally Patricia like strategic alliances 99.9% of people don't know what they mean because they've never signed a seven eight or nine figure deal with a company bigger than them that guarantee distribution and cash, bookable revenue from that ecosystem parent back to that like that's that's a hard thing to do that very few people very few people will ever figure out because there's very few opportunities like that so like I don't want to over index on strategic alliances during marketing day because CO marketing can apply to everyone.
Isaac Morehouse 29:47
Well, Alexis, you mentioned flywheel what why did that come to mind? Tell me what you mean by that what why is the flywheel such an important concept?
Alexis Scott 29:54
Well, because I've been in product training kind of so I you know, I got all these images going around in my brain gain. But I think you know, ultimately, it's it's the different solutions that companies can leverage to really fully potentialize. That partnership, right? If you are single strategy, like, okay, let's just say we're going to cosell only, that's great, you're going to increase revenue, you're going to work together, what have you, but you're leaving money on the table. And so when you think of that flywheel and that continued growth within that partnership, and the opportunities that are available to you, if you're not thinking of that growth, and that flywheel spinning, that's a big miss, in my opinion. And so that's the kind of cool thing about that I'm learning. So like, a little bit of backstory. For those who don't know, me, I worked in partnerships, that was aka just like long term sales relationship that was not co selling, that was not co marketing, that was not co anything other than working together to achieve common business goals. So I am learning about this entirely new side of partnerships and the ecosystem that I really didn't quite know existed in the way that I'm learning now. And so it is very interesting to me the ways in which companies do call market and like I said, I'm new to this. So I'm the new kid on the block. But, you know, the fact that companies are, you know, working together to literally build products together for clients, that's really cool, too. And Workspan even has a module that's co funding, like, who even knew, like, my mind is blown by all of these opportunities that if we just stop at the first thing, we're leaving so much out there,
Jared Fuller 31:30
that it's amazing how like, someone who's a first timer, so to speak, and teach you things about how to make it more simple. And the way he just said that was such a simple breakdown. I mean, it was just it was such a simple breakdown of like, if you're an Executive leader, or if you're in partnerships, trying to get executive buy in, it's like, Hey, we've established some good co selling motion with X, Y or Z partner. Why would we not connect? I've talked about this in the past, it's called getting the answers to the test. And the gentleman that taught me about getting the answers to the test was actually John McMahon. John McMahon has a book called The qualified sales leader. He's on the board of directors of snowflake. He's the gentleman that invented the title chief revenue officer. And the first meeting I ever had with John McMahon. He said, there's over 100 people that have the title of chief revenue officer that used to work for me. I was like, Oh, my God, this guy's like the real deal. And John McMahon is the real deal, like the most terrifying person to ever have in a pipeline review ever. And here's what he said to me. He said, You're making all of this too complicated. This is about having the answers to the test. So whether it's prospecting and you're a BDR? Why would you show up to the test of a meeting or request for a meeting? Without all the answers to the test? That's what good sales is good sales is about having all the answers before you show up. So if I'm thinking about CO selling, let's apply that to both sides of the flywheel co marketing. Why would we not go to that marketing partner and go? How do we best message this so that way, whenever we have a co selling opportunity, we knock it out of the park. And then on the opposite side of the spectrum co servicing? Why aren't our CSM is connecting whenever we have overlap on how to best service that customer and their continuity of experience, get the answers to the test, because you might be working with someone else than that partner is, you might uncover something about their business case, in my best account executives that drift my best CSMs adrift, they would do calls with their partners, where they would never actually show up to the call with the customer together. And all that they would do is they would trade information. All that they would try to do is better understand the customer's objectives and show up and that happened across the funnel across the flywheel. And I think you just did a great job of illustrating that how this isn't that complicated. If it's about the flywheel. It's not just about getting the deal done. It's about going, Hey, you're also trying to help your customer achieve their ABM goals. What What have you heard is most important to them so that way on my next call, I can help them to it seems like the most genuine thing imaginable. It's real, it's authentic.
Chip Rodgers 34:22
And life is very different these days. I mean, it used to be you could sell a big, you know, on prem deal, and then just like walk away, essentially, right? But you know, it's like you got to, you got to earn your keep every day. So how do you align he makes sure that your partners are aligned you that you're that everybody's because you got to think about the fault. Everybody's thinking about renewals, right? So you got to think about the full lifecycle of every customer engagement, not just from your perspective, but how are your partners like what's the whole experience of you all as partners together? How are you delivering that to your customer?
Alexis Scott 34:56
Well, I think too, like with with the way that the economy has shifted and what have you, we're entering an age of creativity, like we've never seen before. Because you have to, like, we cannot continue to go on the way that we were. And whether with partners in sales and marketing, what have you, every team is going to be challenged to come up with innovative and creative solutions that they have not tried before. Because it's just a necessity.
Chip Rodgers 35:27
Because if you say, Well, yeah,
Isaac Morehouse 35:31
we're bringing, we're bringing this home, I want to bring back to Jared, you said, you know, hey, Alexa, is what a great insight here you are coming in as a, as an outsider with this great insight. There's like a really well known phenomenon of in breakthroughs in science in engineering, people who are from a different field, they enter a new field. And they immediately have a breakthrough that people who have worked in that field for their whole lives are blind to because we're too close to this call. I can't remember the name of the guy. There's a real phenomenon here. It's so common their problem? Sure there is a name for it. But it's because you have you come in and you don't know what's supposed to be impossible, or what's supposed to be hard, right? what's already been defined. And you're like, Oh, I work in aerospace. Now. I'm looking at bioink try that didn't work similar. Right, exactly. You're like, what if we did this? Right. So this is my, this is my call out my CTA here. For anybody who's not working in partnerships. Come join, to come take the partner pill and bring the insights from your world into this world. You don't even have to have a title that says partner in it, take the partner pill and start starting engaging with the partnerships community and employing a partnership strategy, you are going to bring insights that people who worked in partnerships, no offense to people who have been around in partnerships for years, you're gonna miss things because you've been too close to it for too long, and you need some fresh blood. You need Alexis to pop in and be like, Hey, I'm new to all this. What if we just did this? What about this, right? That's where That's where those are going to come from. So you don't need to sit on the sidelines and say, Well, I don't know anything about partnerships. Jump in.
Jared Fuller 37:09
I got something to follow on that. That's such a beautiful story. Any fans of Ralph Waldo Emerson, I'm a big Emerson fan. I really truly
Isaac Morehouse 37:20
am Alex's back.
Jared Fuller 37:22
I think. I think he's just one of the most brilliant, beautiful, deep writers and poets and authors. And he had this phrase, and I'll never forget. I actually showed up to Wake Forest University as a transfer student. I went to college at San Juan College in New Mexico, San Juan College, shout out San Juan College. There's literally no one that's ever heard of it. Why did I go to college at San Juan College because I didn't know what a GPA was in high school. Meaning that's the only college that I could get into. And I had a philosophy professor that changed my life I transferred to Wake Forest after I got my Associates, a very prestigious school, you know, top 30 university that I will shut out Deeks shadow, Deeks and I had to take a I had to take a test, or writing test to prove with all the other transfer students all 30 of us that I didn't need to do rudimentary English or reading. And it was a it was an essay. And I had to answer this question around the paradox of knowledge, information and learning. And that is that a book both opens and closes the mind. And the depth of that, quote, has stayed with me ever since. Right? As we attain more knowledge, and we become quote, unquote, experts. If you don't think that beginners, right? Jeff Bezos talks about this, right? The zero mindset, if we don't think that beginners can teach us something, we're so wrong. And I'm, I remember that day sitting down because he was here was the test. The test was literally you had no idea what you're showing up to. And it was boom, Here's a snippet. It was literally a page from Ralph Waldo Emerson. And we had to write for three hours about the topic. It sounds like heaven. Wow, it was this snippet from Ralph Waldo Emerson, a book both opens and closes the mind. And I remember talking about the information paradox just innately. And my English professor after the thing was like, okay, you don't have to take the rudimentary English course I was one of 30 people that passed that and I'm an idiot. So I've taught you how I did. But to this day, it's still stuck with me that like you're only
Isaac Morehouse 39:37
somewhat if that gave yourself Safra.
Jared Fuller 39:41
Alexis, you are like such a great example of that, that like the most experienced partnerships, people that I have ever met in my entire life. A book has closed their mind, their world of knowledge on how they think the world should be. It's a closed book, but your book, it's why I open the people that are new to this movement. It's wide open. And that's why the partnerships community is by far the best community because we welcome new people with open arms, we want new ideas, we want to grow this movement and we're better off together than we are Alanna.
Isaac Morehouse 40:14
And it's Oh, geez, two that are keeping an open mind and keeping it fresh. I was talking, like, Chip, like I was talking about this with Jill on a session because I have I have run across. I'm totally new to partnerships. I'm an idiot with this stuff. Okay. So I've run across some people who've been in it for forever, and they see all this momentum. And they see what's happening with you know, pls summit with partnership leaders, all that it's like, hey, partnerships is cool now, and it makes them bitter. Because they're like, well, that's just a new language for what's been happening for IBM.
Chip Rodgers 40:46
Yeah. It's just a buzzword. It's a new thing. Yeah. Yeah. And the same thing.
Isaac Morehouse 40:53
And like chip is here. He's like, hell yeah. I've been doing it for forever. People put new words on it. I'm cool with that. The more the Bring on the new people, right. That's the that's the mentality you got to maintain.
Jared Fuller 41:03
I mean, tomorrow morning, we're opening up with a buyer conversation. So we'll transition to them with this. Tomorrow, partner lead Sales Day, and sales people, marketing people, there's a bit of a debate, you know, like, who's got what I'm opening it up with Brent Adamson. And Tiffany Bova, the author of the Challenger sale, the number one best selling sales book of the past decade. And then Tiffany the most you know, I think the number one Gartner analyst of all time based on my unders understanding and Tiffany was a lot of the same way she was like we
Isaac Morehouse 41:33
got we go with qualitative here anyway, so you don't have to quantify that. I
Jared Fuller 41:37
mean, Tiffany literally was like attack and she's like, No, this is the way that it's been and then you know, Brent's open so it's gonna be a fun day tomorrow. Chip. Alexis thank you so much for closing our partner led marketing day at the pls summit ecosystem aces listeners partner up listeners crossbar takeover go listen to each other stuff. I've had a blast. This has been a fun after hours combo. I help people the crazy people that all y'all in chat. Y'all are crazy. If you've been with us all day, and you're still here at the partner of podcast, ecosystem. Aces takeover after hours. This has been a blast.
Chip Rodgers 42:08
This was awesome. Great. Yeah, great conversation.
Alexis Scott 42:11
It was nice to meet you. Like you didn't neither one of you messaged me, but that's okay. I'll get you. What?
Isaac Morehouse 42:20
Alexis you look at that call. I swear I thought I did message I at least connected to you. So
Alexis Scott 42:25
you do connect you absolutely Connect.
Jared Fuller 42:28
We're actually going to make you right on partner hacker now. So
Isaac Morehouse 42:30
yeah, you're welcome. I'm gonna message you every day for the next year and you're gonna be
Alexis Scott 42:35
I will send you emojis. Everybody. Fantastic. Great day. Thank you.
