How to set up a sales partnership at an early-stage startup

Tap into existing demand

Creating a sales partnership with a bigger company can be a great way to reach more potential buyers and grow your sales, however most early-stage sales partnerships fail to deliver due to one or more of the following problems.

• Believing that partnerships are the key to solving a (lack of) sales problem

• Assuming that a partner will sell your product without support from you

• Getting stuck in big co bureaucracy when trying to set up a partnership

This post walks through how to avoid these mistakes and covers the following topics:

• How to determine if partnering is the right strategy to grow your sales

• How to evaluate a potential partner for fit

• How to structure a basic partnership agreement

• How to partner with a big tech co without getting stuck in corporate red tape

How to determine if partnering is the right strategy to grow your sales

The idea of having a big company’s sales team sell your product alongside their own is very alluring. After all, they are already talking to your dream buyers, the buyers’ wallets are open and an order is going to happen, so why not just sell your product as an add-on? Unfortunately, in most cases this is a fantasy.