Why are Partnerships in our Community & Nationwide so Important?
For me personally, this is one of the most fulfilling and rewarding parts about owning your own business is the fact that it allows us to develop partnerships with other community leaders and really and truly help each other in driving growth and success for each other.
In addition – it has been eye-opening the number of meetings and organizations that occur in the community to drive business growth and success. My professional advice is to get involved with all of them and be as active as you can. The more people you know and interact with; the more people that are now part of that group that know and understand your business and can be an ambassador for you with others.
So you might ask, are there any bad matches? Well to be honest, I haven’t found any yet from my personal opinion. But of course you want your partnerships to be successful, rewarding and long-standing so you want to be sure that your goals and aspirations align with one another. With all of your partnerships, make sure you are investing them with time and reciprocity. Then you should plan and communicate with these partners on a regular basis, so you can continue to build on your relationship, give/get regular updates on each other’s business, and create opportunities for an exchange of resources and opportunities.
You can constantly evaluate the progress of the relationship and what it’s doing for you or your business. However keep in mind that relationships especially like this can be mutually beneficial for many reasons, and that sometimes opportunities are like a sales pipeline: It just takes time. The beauty is that your relationships in the community will continue to evolve.
A few tips to share in building these community relationships –
- Be direct in your communication, ie Ask the right questions, Share your insights
- Add your feedback as you never when what you say will influence your comrade
- Share your values with them and hopefully you share similar values with your new community partner
- Plan ahead with your ideas and meetings so you can be sure to be in tune with one another
- Always be thinking about your relationship, for instance what groups are you in that they might benefit from to, who else is in your network that would be benefit from their product/service
As well, this goes the same for Nationwide although in the obvious larger scope.
So get out there, meet people, engage with them, and mutually prosper.