If you’re seeking to land partnerships with other online businesses, whether it’s something as simple as a link exchange or a more in-depth involvement, it can be quite a challenge to get noticed in an overloaded inbox, let alone get a reply.
Here’s a few tips that will help increase positive responses to your initial approach.
Targeting
Don’t waste your time and that of the recipient by pursuing partnerships with sites that have no relation to your own products and services. While a site about cooking could be a good match for site site about herbs, a site selling meat products would be a very poor match with a vegetarian site. Before you start your canvassing, give some thought to what other products and services your customers would purchase that are somewhat related to your own.
Phone vs. email canvassing
In my opinion, initial canvassing should be done via email. With people working in all different sorts of time zones and most of us extraordinarily busy, email is a more considerate and polite approach. Once the potential partner has responded positively, then phone meetings can be organized if need be.
Credibility
Don’t use a free email address or your own ISP address to make an initial approach from – use an email address from the domain of your site – it’s just a little more professional and helps to avoid your email being mistaken as spam. Just on that point, ensure your site is up to scratch, because your target will more than likely visit that before responding. If they don’t like what they see, it’s unlikely you’ll get a follow up.
What’s in it for me
Focus on the WIIFM factor (What’s In It For Me) in relation to the partner and how they will benefit from an arrangement with you – but don’t overhype the benefits as you’ll likely be dealing with someone experienced in the online world. Keep things positive, but keep it real.
Previous partnership successes
Partnerships create work and most people don’t want to take on extra work if there’s not a good possibility of returns on their efforts. Briefly refer to previous partnership successes that can help make the potential partner more open. For instance, state something like:
“We’ve set up a few similar partnerships with others with excellent results for both parties”
or
“One of our other arrangements has seen the partner increase their sales by X%”
Again, don’t overhype as you may be taken to task and asked to prove your claims.
Canvassing note length
In my experience, the shorter the note, the better. Capture their interest with a bit about you and the meat of the arrangement; but have templates already prepared provide greater detail, so you are able to respond quickly if your target expresses interest.
Don’t be patronizing
Don’t speak down to a potential partner by telling them something they already likely know, presenting it as being earth shattering news. For example, if you’re approaching a blog focused on the topic of search engine optimization, you’re wasting your digital breath and their time trying to explain the virtues of link exchanges.
Show that you’ve researched
So many partnership canvassing notes are sent in bulk. If you can relate something you’ve seen on the target partner’s site in the opening lines of your canvassing email, you’ll more likely get their attention.
Refer to an article or page and make an associated comment such as:
“I came across your site when looking for potential partners in this area. I thoroughly enjoyed your article on X….”
Personal approaches work better
Try and find out what your target’s name is. As soon as someone is addressed by name, it tends to boost their attention factor by a couple of notches. If it’s not on the site, it doesn’t hurt to send an email to the general contact address:
“Hello,
I’m X from X. I’d like to contact your Business Development Manager or equivalent regarding a partnership proposal I wish to submit. Could you please provide me the appropriate person’s contact details.
Thanks in advance for your assistance!
Regards,
You”
Follow up your approaches
Webmasters and site owners tend to be busy people, so don’t be too discouraged by a lack of reply. Follow up in a week or so and keep following up weekly (but no sooner), until such time you get a negative or positive response.
Always remain polite and mention the original email by either including it in the follow up, or paraphrasing it. If your first approach has been personal and you simply don’t have the time for these sorts of follow up, consquent contacts can be made en masse using list software.
I’ve experienced quite a few instances where I’ve approached a site owner time and time again with no response, then received a positive response; so polite persistence certainly does pay off.
Canvassing subject lines
Something I’ve found quite successful in grabbing attention is the following wording in a subject line:
re: (company name) partner inquiry
The “re:” infers a possible previous communication; one that the partner had responded to – this can help prompt someone to open an email as they think it may be an ongoing conversation. Including the target company name helps with recognition and the “partnership inquiry” sums up the contents of the email.
Most importantly, once you have your foot in the door with a potential partner, it’s important to keep the flow of communications going; otherwise it’s very possible the person will get distracted and you’ll be back to square one.
Good luck in your partner canvassing!
