Growing Your Business Through Strategic Partnerships

We’re living in the age of convenience. New ways of doing business and delivering services to customers have significantly changed how organizations and companies operate and compete. Organizations need to continue adapting their products or services in order to remain relevant and competitive, but constantly adding capabilities or expanding services can take a lot of time and resources – and isn’t always a feasible approach to business growth.

Meanwhile, the challenging COVID-19 landscape is creating the need for businesses to explore new ways to market and expand their customer base, supplier network, and service offerings. For example, with little to no in-person events, it’s becoming more difficult to find ways to network, market and uncover new deals through traditional avenues like trade shows.

How can organizations like yours continue to grow your services and reach new audiences in this new environment? One way forward is to strategically partner with organizations such as Corpay Cross-Border who offer services that complement your existing offering.

Establishing strategic partnerships can allow businesses like yours to offer a more robust set of services and to expand into new areas that may be out of reach when going it alone.

The Importance of Alignment

No business can be an expert at everything, and many are limited in what they can offer. Many organizations rise to success and earn a positive reputation by the very virtue of being specialized in a specific area and by offering a precise, even narrow, service or product.

In order to remain competitive, however, it’s important for businesses to continuously explore ways to expand the products or services they offer. Partnerships allow organizations to expand their offering by aligning with other organizations, such as Corpay, with complementary services or products. This allows both businesses to expand into new spaces, while potentially providing a more convenient, end-to-end experience for your downstream customers.

In order to do this, however, a business must first understand their own and their prospective partner’s client base to ensure both partners are aligned on the audiences they are looking to target, and that their services would be an appropriate fit for their prospective partner’s customers.

Next, it’s important to consider goals. If your business operates in the international space, as Corpay does, it’s important that all partners share synergies in this respect. This ensures that current customers can continue to access services internationally.

Lastly, it’s vital for your business to work with partners that your customers will trust. Partners like Corpay can help you build credibility, as we have built a reputation for excellence in the space we operate in. Businesses should research all prospective partners to verify credibility and trustworthiness among current customers. Partnering with Corpay can even enhance your business’ credibility since you can use your partnership with Corpay to show your prospective clients the caliber of companies partnering with your business.

Expanding Your Ecosystem

For many industries, COVID-19 has led to a rapid change in business dynamics. Starting with the widespread cancellation of in-person meetings and events, many organizations feel like they’re starting from square one and are entirely rethinking their approach.

The pandemic has highlighted just how important partnerships are, and the various ways they can be leveraged so that businesses can continue to network and reach new audiences when events and in-person meetings might not be an option.

Partners can act as an extension of your team or an outside sales force, expanding your business’ ability to reach new prospective clients.

Partners can also extend a business’s marketing efforts. Whether it involves co-branding, developing entire marketing campaigns together or cohosting an occasional webinar or social media campaign, partners can extend any type of marketing effort to completely new audiences.

Partnering with Corpay may also help you retain current clients. When businesses can offer additional services, the way that Corpay can help you do, it lessens the chances that those clients will leave for a more fulsome service elsewhere. Additionally, in some cases, Corpay can help you attain additional revenue through revenue sharing or referral commissions. Revenue share and referral programs have become an increasingly important component for Corpay’s partners, as these programs introduce an additional revenue stream that has the potential to increase your top line revenue.

The Value of Partnerships

While the pandemic has highlighted the importance of credible and reliable partnerships, they have always been a vital way for businesses to survive and thrive.

If your business chooses to partner with a third-party like Corpay, you can seize the opportunity to expand your team and offer a more complete service to customers.  This can also help you renew your focus on your core capabilities and maintaining ownership of the space you operate in.