May 18, 2022

Nima Badiey: The Key to Successful Alliances

49 minutes

We often think of channel partners, the ones selling our products, as the most vital element of our partner ecosystem. Nima Badiey, Global VP of Alliances at GitLab, shares why alliances are an invaluable component of your partner strategy and how to make them successful.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Here are 10 things I learned from Nima about Alliances and how to make them successful:

Channels tend to be transactional partners like resellers, distributors, systems integrators and MSPS. Alliances can include everything from cloud partnerships and hyperscalers to platform and technology partnerships including ISVs and OEMs.

Alliances help you meet the customer where they are with the combined solution they want to buy.

GitLab breaks Alliances into three pillars: cloud with hyperscalers like Amazon and Google; platform with the likes of VMware and Red Hat; and technology with a long tail of ISVs including Slack and ServiceNow.

GitLab’s Alliance investments going forward are based on three philosophies. The first is to extend existing partnerships with deeper integrations. The second is to expand their total portfolio with new partnerships to fill in emerging gaps. And the third is exploring new partnerships in absolutely new greenfield areas where the haven’t operated before.

Alliances and Channels are blending. For example, cloud Alliance partners are becoming transactional partners via their marketplaces, partnering with channel resellers and system integrators.

Partnerships are the same as a personal relationship with a spouse. There’s a courting period, but everything gets real when you get married. The day of your wedding is like the day of signing the partner agreement. Now your relationship doesn’t end the day that you get married. You will continue investing in that relationship, you’ll build a home together, you build a family together, you’ll grow together. That’s the same way to think about partnerships. It starts when you’ve inked a deal. What are you going to do to invest in that partnership and make it grow?

Prove that you’re compatitable during the dating stage to be sure you have the basis for a successful partnership.

Don’t expect your Alliance partners to care about you and share their accounts with you until you invest in the partnership, enable the partner, invite them to co-sell with you, and demonstrate your commitment.

GitLab hires partner managers for empathy as a primary skill set. It’s a quick test to see if the candidate is a good listener with a strong, open, learning mindset.

More companies are merging Alliances and Channels under the same organization. At GitLab, it was all merged under the CRO organization.

LINKS & RESOURCES

Follow Nima on LinkedIn

Read the GitLab Alliances Handbook

Learn more about Allbound

The post Nima Badiey: The Key to Successful Alliances first appeared on Channel Journeys.

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