The Art of Strategic AllianceI run a small meeting, event and conference planning company based in New York City area. As an entrepeneur and small business owner with a limited advertising and marketing budget, developing business partnerships has been really helped me to get word out about services that I offer. For example, I have aligned myself with a DJ company as preferred planner for their clients and am actively receiving business and referrals from this source. Also, due to my partnership with a travel agency, I am now handling meetings, conferences and events for inbound corporate groups from abroad. Forming strategic alliances has been and will continue to be a significant part of my long term business plan and model for exponential growth.
I have practiced proverbial "art" of building non-competitive alliances with like minded companies, not just as a new entrepeneur, but also as a business building tool in all of my previous positions. While, on whole, this strategy has yielded very positive results and significant revenue, there have been some negative consequences. So, I would like to share with you a very basic list of "do's and dont's" for creating successful business partnerships.
-Do seek out companies where your services would be a natural addition to resources currently offered. For example, if you are a catering service specializing in healthy cuisine, you might want to partner with health club to offer special incentives to gym goers.
-Do choose organizations whose business ethic and overall image are at least generally compatible with yours. The last thing you want is to be associated with an organization who has questionable business practices. Although you may financially gain from such a partnership in short term, that type of "bad business karma" can only affect you negatively in long term.
-Do determine beforehand whether you will be operating under aegis of your own company or your partner's organization. If you are ABC company and your partner is XYZ corporation, will you be marketed seperately as ABC company or an extension of your partner XYZ Inc.? Are you looking strictly for access to new clientele or for an opportunity for exposure as ABC company?