As Laundryheap continues to expand its retail sector and hospitality partnerships, we’ve learnt that there are three critical factors when it comes to launching a partnership that’s successful and long-standing:
Ensure you have business synergy
It’s vital to understand how a partnership between your businesses can work in your favour – make sure that you explore all of the possible outcomes from this relationship and determine how both teams can really add value to each other’s brand and mission. Be transparent about your motivations and your limitations to build trust before you commit to a deal. This way, you’ll be able to gauge how your proposed partnership will fit around your respective values and long-term plans.
Whilst it’s important to enter prospective partnership deals with an open mind and the ability to compromise on certain aspects of your plan, don’t be afraid to speak up and make your ‘red lines’ known. Partnerships shouldn’t weaken any of your core principles or values just for the sake of access to new markets.
Act as co-creators
Both businesses need to share responsibility for the planning and execution of your new deal. Assembling a ‘partnership team’ with employees from both sides will ensure that the relevant parameters are discussed and a strategy that derives the maximum benefit for both sides is mapped out. It can also help to involve independent facilitators at an early stage, as they can work to streamline the process, iron out any kinks, and make the partnership as durable as possible.
Don’t forget to communicate
Internal communication will be vital during the strategic and roll-out phases of a new partnership, but make sure you don’t forget to plan for how you will communicate with external stakeholders once you’re ready to launch.
Ensuring new partnerships are marketed correctly can be make or break. Spend time finessing the messaging around how and why this will add value to your existing, new, and shared customers; where you’ll need to market or advertise that message to ensure it reaches the right people; and what additional marketing strategies you’ll need to deploy to ensure engagement with the new offering. The best planned partnership in the world will be worthless if no-one hears about it, so make sure not to neglect the role marketing and external communications will play once you go-live.
