Partnering can be an important part of a solution providers business.

Be Aggressive

Solution providers in the IT world are often not as aggressive as they could be with partnering.  They may join a formal channel partner program from a major vendor – Sun, AMD, HP, IBM – and believe they are actually partnering.  In reality, you don’t start partnering as solution providers until you actually make contact with peer-sized companies.  You can’t really effectively partner with companies that are a thousand times bigger than yours.

Don’t Focus on Products

Solution providers often spend a lot of time looking for the latest and greatest in products and platforms.  A better use of time is looking for partnering opportunities with other solution providers and focusing on relationships with clients by trying to offer the most comprehensive services.

Strengthening through Partnerships

Those solution providers that are successful with partnering can really strengthen services.  When you use partnering, you offer a more comprehensive solution without investing a lot of money and time in building internal expertise.

Demand Generation and Partnering

Those solution providers that are successful with partnering strengthen their demand generation procedures.  Referrals from other solution providers speeds up the sales process tremendously because of the strength of such a recommendation.

Added by:  Joshua Feinberg