When done right, partnerships are a huge accelerator for growth. But here's the issue: most founders, laser-focused on finding PMF, often delay experimenting partnerships longer than they should. Big mistake. While you're focused on direct sales, you could be missing out on a goldmine of opportunity that partnerships can unlock.
I recently spoke with Kevin Kriebel, SVP of Partnerships at Drata to get his perspective on how partnerships can drive significant growth for early-stage startups. Kevin brings years of experience building partnership strategies from the ground up at high-growth companies like Drata and Expanse (later acquired by Palo Alto Networks). Kevin actually started his career in sales, landing his first SDR role at Okta before working his way up to AE. (You’ll see why he credits his sales background as the key to his success in partnerships.)
Getting Started with Partnerships
When should founders start thinking about partnerships? The ideal time is right after achieving product-market fit and establishing your go-to-market approach. At this stage, you've moved beyond testing with your target audience and have gained enough traction to train and educate an external team on your core value proposition and messaging.
While Kevin now leads partnerships at Drata, he remembers what it's like in the early days,"In the early stage, you're wearing all the hats - you're the product, the seller, everything," he explains. However, Kevin stresses that founders should also be considering the indirect revenue paths that partnerships can create.
As you begin to develop your partnership strategy, Kevin emphasizes a crucial mindset shift. "I tackle partnerships with a sales mentality, not a traditional business development one," he shares. This approach sets the foundation for success. "Many BD professionals are smart, but they're often incentivized in ways that don't drive additive results for the business. The key is to focus on measurable outcomes that directly impact the bottom line."
As for who to target for your first partners? Kevin advises selecting a few indirect routes and testing them systematically.
Choosing Partners is All About Strategic Experimentation
Building a partnership strategy typically begins with the CEO or a founding team member, as early-stage startups often can't dedicate resources to a partnership hire. These leaders usually nurture the first 5-10 partnership relationships.
Kevin advises founders to identify multiple potential partnership channels early on. "The goal is to find at least 3 categories of indirect routes that you haven't proven yet, but have strong conviction about based on market knowledge," he explains. With unlimited budget, Kevin recommends hiring one person for each channel to test multiple strategies simultaneously.
However, recognizing that not all startups have such resources, he suggests a more focused approach: "If you can't afford multiple hires, start with one. Choose the channel you believe has the highest potential impact and put your resources there." This method allows you to iterate through your ideas until you find the right approach, expanding to other channels as you prove the value of partnerships and gain traction.
Focus on Lean, Agile Partners
While it's tempting to chase big-name partners, Kevin advocates for a different approach, especially in the early stages - this is especially important if you are focused on service providers or consultants. "In the early days, go find those leaner, 10 to 50 person boutique shops," he advises. These smaller partners are often more eager to innovate and grow alongside startups, leading to faster results.
But what about balancing short-term wins with long-term goals? Kevin suggests thinking about your partner path as a strategic journey. Start with partners that allow you to see traction quickly, but don't lose sight of your long-term objectives.
For instance, you might aspire to become a technology partner of a large cloud provider or to unlock relationships with AWS reps. Just because you're not tackling these heavyweight partners first, doesn't mean you should ignore them entirely. Instead, use your relationships with smaller, more agile partners as a proving ground:
- Test and refine your partnership processes
- Generate demand and build a track record of success
- Create compelling case studies and success stories
Kevin cautions against putting all your eggs in the big-partner basket too soon: "A lot of these companies I talk to say, 'We're going to partner with Accenture,' thinking it's a shortcut to success. But here's the reality: you need quick wins, not long-term promises. You could hire someone to pursue Accenture, but two years later, you might still be waiting for results. Meanwhile, you've missed out on countless opportunities with more agile partners who could have driven real growth for your business."
One important call-out: when building early partnerships no matter which type of partners you choose, be sure to focus on mutual value creation, not just what partners can do for you. Understand your partners' motivations beyond financial incentives—maybe your product offers new tech that helps them re-engage customers or positions them as industry leaders. Learn these motivations and create content that supports this story and makes it easy for partners to include you in conversations or refer deals. Remember, you have to give to get.
Implement Rigorous Metrics
Just as you wouldn't run your sales team without clear KPIs, your partnership strategy demands the same level of rigor and data-driven approach. "You need real metrics. Don't make it soft. Focus on the data, just like the rest of your business," Kevin emphasizes. This means moving beyond vanity metrics or vague notions of "partner engagement" to concrete, revenue-focused measurements.
At Drata, they've implemented a system that mirrors the accountability found in their sales organization. They track revenue directly sourced by partners and make this data readily available to the team through Salesforce dashboards.
Kevin breaks down partner impact into three categories, each with clear definitions:
- Sourced: The partner brought in the deal. This is equivalent to a sales rep bringing in a new opportunity.
- Meaningful Impact: The partner played a critical role in winning the deal. An example of this would be the partner’s relationship with the customer was needed in getting the decision maker(s) to approve a purchase.
- Transactional: The partner was involved but didn't significantly influence the win. This might be akin to a deal that simply passed through a reseller channel.
Tracking these categories doesn’t have to be complicated. Kevin set-up a couple fields on opportunities in their CRM to allow for sales reps to indicate when a partner was critical to winning the deal (meaningful impact). He also tracks partner engagement via the Drata sales team, where a partner can choose a specific sales rep that they want to work with on their website if the account is not already a named account. He sees this as a key indicator of how engaged his team is with partners.
When it comes to getting paid, only sourced and meaningful impact count towards partner compensation. This laser focus on high-value activities ensures that partners, like sales reps, are incentivized to work together to drive deals - eliminating the conflict that can sometimes occur with BD incentive plans that also pay out on partner transacted deals.
By applying this sales-like rigor to partnerships, Drata has transformed its partner program from a "nice to have" into a quantifiable growth engine. Kevin notes, "Today, over 30% of our net new business is sourced by partners and another 20% or so is won because of a partner despite not being sourced by the partner.”
Remember, what gets measured gets managed. By putting in place clear, revenue-focused metrics for your partnership program, you're not just tracking progress – you're setting the stage for scalable, predictable growth through partnerships.
Hiring and Compensation
Hiring for Partnerships: Unlike traditional thinking, Kevin advocates for hiring sales-minded individuals for partnership roles. "I'm a sales person that does BD," he explains. This sales-first mindset ensures a results-driven approach to partnerships. When hiring, look for:
- Individuals with experience in your target partner ecosystem (e.g., AWS experience for cloud partnerships). Hiring someone who comes from the space you’re trying to build partners with can be a huge benefit. They understand the nuances of the decision making, what incentives the reps, the culture and other insights that can’t be learned from the outside.
- People who can demonstrate a track record of hard work and driving tangible results
- Those who understand the sales process and can think creatively about indirect revenue generation
Compensation and Incentives: Just as you would structure a sales compensation plan, create a system that rewards high-performance in partnerships:
- Compensate sales reps for partner-assisted deals to encourage collaboration. This creates a win-win scenario where sales teams actively seek out partner involvement.
- Offer higher compensation to partners for sourced deals compared to transaction-only involvement. This focuses partner efforts on bringing in new business rather than just facilitating transactions.
- Structure partnership team compensation similarly to sales, with a significant portion tied to performance.
- Work closely with finance and other departments to create structures that benefit the entire organization. For example, Kevin collaborated with finance to design payment terms that incentivize customers to purchase via AWS marketplace (such as offering monthly payment options instead of annual ones). This approach simultaneously drives Drata’s industry-leading partnership with AWS.
"If you don't have agreement and alignment with the sales leader, they're not going to be preaching the same thing you are, and that is critical to the success of any partner program” Kevin notes.
Constant Engagement with Partner Community
Partnerships aren't a set-it-and-forget-it strategy. Kevin’s mantra? "Combine focus with unparalleled hustle. You can't be beat if you're the smartest, most creative, and you're moving faster." By focusing on quick wins and holding partners accountable for early results, you can quickly identify which partnerships are worth scaling.
By implementing these tips, you can build a partnership strategy that acts as a true growth engine. Remember, as Kevin's experience at Drata shows, focus on the value your partners bring and how quickly you can execute together. With the right approach, partnerships can become a cornerstone of your growth strategy and you’ll be tapping into new revenue streams in no time!