business alliance

How do you reach more of your target demographic—the group beyond your current client base? One answer to this question is to form strategic alliances with other businesses.

Strategic alliances can appear in many forms— referrals, supply agreements, joint ventures, co-marketing, and shared production to name a few. Such partnerships benefit your business because they team you up with other businesses that target the same or similar demographics, but don’t offer the same services or products as your business. Strategic alliances open the door for opportunities to increase consumer awareness, gain new customers, and grow your business.

So how do you choose an alliance partner? Identifying a good fit can be difficult because there are several factors that come into play. Determine the appropriate alliance for your business, then seek the best partner or partners for you. For instance, if you make cakes, consider a bridal boutique or a wedding and event planner. If you’re a building contractor or home remodeler, think mortgage brokers and banks. Now that you have candidates for potential alliances, ask the following questions to help determine the best partners.

• Are your businesses compatible?
• Are you both going after the same market with a different product or service?
• Do you share similar values and goals?
• Is your potential strategic alliance partner someone you can trust?
• Will you have equal or similar amounts of control in the relationship?
• Are you capable of working together?

If the answers to these questions are ‘yes,’ you have most likely found a good alliance partner. You don’t have to completely open the gates and share your entire business and plans; maintaining identity, independence, and important trade secrets are vital to every business. Instead, for example begin to build a business relationship by starting out small with referrals. When you identify a client with a need your alliance partner can meet, refer that client to your alliance partner.

Continue to cultivate this relationship. Doing so puts you in front of more customers within your target. These are your partner’s customers—people that fit your ideal client criteria, but currently aren’t in your customer base. Because you and your partner do not offer the same products or services, you can feel comfortable continuing to refer business back and forth. This is a twofold benefit that grows the customer base for your business and your partner’s, while simultaneously providing those customers with trustworthy resources to meet multiple needs.

Once you’ve been working together for some time (strategic alliances can often take a year or more to build) and you’ve established a solid, trustworthy business relationship, you can continue building upon that foundation.

For example, strategic alliances create opportunities for some businesses and their partners to offer informational seminars. These seminars place you face-to-face with more of your combined customer base. Seminars also allow you to speak directly to a targeted, relevant group about what you offer, and the benefits your product or service can provide. Providing such valuable information establishes you as the expert in your field, making customers more likely to visit your business and refer others when needs for your services or products arise.

As with any relationship, it is important to evaluate your strategic alliances continually. Perhaps your alliance is only for the short term. If a long-term partnership is what you have in mind, open communication is important. Make sure you and your partner are on the same page, that your goals are in line, and that you still share the same values. Doing so will ensure you have a flourishing, lasting, and mutually beneficial strategic alliance.

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