Partnering with a big name in tech has its benefits — like acquiring new customers, expanding to new markets, and even breaking into new product categories.
That is, if you can get your partner's sales team to co-sell with you.
Over the course of two years, the partnerships team at Aircall has succeeded in getting buy-in from their strategic partners' sales teams across multiple global offices. As a result, they've more than tripled their partner-sourced revenue.
Today, we're sharing how Aircall began co-selling with a sales team of thousands and how their entire go-to-market (GTM) org is adopting an Ecosystem-Led approach.
— Olivia Ramirez, Managing Editor
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When Hami Neisari, now the Head of Partnerships UK&I at Aircall, started working with Salesforce & HubSpot across EMEA, APAC & LATAM in 2019, he and his team struggled to get their strategic partners’ sales reps on calls to educate them about Aircall and their joint value proposition.
In the early days of Aircall's strategic partnerships with Salesforce and HubSpot, Neisari and his partner account managers (PAMs) would reach out to their partners’ customer-facing teams inviting them to enablement sessions. The enablement sessions would educate them about the joint value of Aircall, a cloud-based call center software, and their customer relationship management (CRM) software.
To Aircall, the mutual value of partnering was obvious. Many of Aircall’s prospects and opportunities were interested in buying or already using their CRM partners’ software. By selling Aircall and the CRM software together, they could increase deal sizes for their partners' sales teams, boost CRM product usage, and help them expand their existing accounts.
However, Aircall's team had little to no luck getting their partners' teams on a call. Their outreach efforts led to:
Uninterested sales reps and customer success managers (CSMs) — They were busy and hadn’t seen evidence the partnership's success (yet)
Inefficiencies — Aircall’s team reached out to individual sales reps on an ad hoc basis and had trouble mapping them to their respective teams
A low number of referrals — They were unable to get individual sales reps on board and thus couldn’t expand their efforts to co-selling with sales reps in other regions
Neisari’s team decided to implement a new strategy for establishing effective relationships with their strategic partners — one built on trust and conviction.
Rather than trying to establish relationships with every individual contributor (IC) and team leader, they’d start with gaining the trust of just one account executive (AE). And once they’d established a relationship with the respective AE, they’d then showcase their mutual win to the AE’s higher up. At that point, they’d offer to educate the rest of the sales team — but only for 15 minutes and at a time that was most convenient for them.
Once co-selling with the respective team was successful, they’d ask for an intro to the manager’s higher up. And then once that was successful, they’d ask for another.
But behind every seemingly simple process is a thoughtful strategy. And as you’ll learn below, everything from the way in which Neisari’s team conducted their first calls with their partners' AEs to how they mapped their partners’ org charts contributed to their success.
Within two years of launching their strategic partnerships with Salesforce and HubSpot, Aircall has:
Increased the sourced revenue contribution from partners from 10-15% to more than 50% of new sales per quarter
Increased their partnerships team from 15 to 50 employees globally
Expanded their co-selling motions across markets and gained access to customers in new verticals
Launched a “global taskforce” calling on each of their GTM teams to prioritize growing their strategic partnerships and shifted to a “mesh network” to enable each GTM team to work directly with their partners at scale
Today, Aircall and their partners co-sell together in the following ways:
Joint prospecting of net new accounts
Making warm intros into their respective customer bases
Aircall’s PAMs monitor partner referral deals and oversee the alignment of their respective sales teams
Below, we’ll share how Aircall initiated their first co-selling motions with their strategic partners and expanded the partnerships globally.
#1: They asked for 15 minutes of their partner's AE’s time
Sales reps have a lot of calls to make in a day, and it’s no surprise that chatting with a new partner isn’t high on their list. There’s no evidence (yet) that the partner can help them, and they’ve got a quota to meet.
But it’s much easier to say “Yes” to a 15-minute call than it is to say "Yes" to an enablement session — especially when you bring an update about the AE's open opportunity.
Before Aircall’s PAMs would reach out to one of their partners' AEs, they would identify an open opportunity in their pipeline who was interested in buying their partner’s CRM software. Then, they would ask for 15 minutes of their partner's AE’s time to update them about the opportunity and their potential rev share.
Below is a step-by-step of the pre-work Aircall’s PAMs conducted before jumping on a call with a partner's AE:
They identified which prospects had requested a demo with a Salesforce or HubSpot integration. To do so, they monitored which open opportunities in their CRM had the Salesforce or HubSpot integration attached. These opps were either already using Salesforce or HubSpot or were interested in using it.
Aircall’s PAM would ask their internal AE for context about the opportunity, or they'd retrieve the information directly from their CRM (information like who their AE was speaking with at the account, what’s been discussed already, the account’s pain points, and its likelihood of closing).
Aircall’s PAM would identify the AE or account manager (AM) on the partner’s side through a shared Slack channel or through their partner's PAM
Aircall’s PAM would send a dedicated email to the partner's AE or AM informing them about the opp’s interest in Aircall and their integration. In the email, they'd invite the partner's AE or AM to a 10-15 minute call with Aircall’s PAM and AE.
“We often found that even if we scheduled 10 to 15 minutes with our partners, they would still go over,” says Hami Neisari, Head of Partnerships UK&I at Aircall. “But it’s nice for them just to know that, ‘At best, 15 minutes, I can jump off.’”
The 15-minute call breakdown
Neisari trains each new PAM in his region (UK & Ireland) to prioritize small talk during their first call with their partner’s AE. He suggests spending five to 10 minutes getting to know the partner's AE and getting a feel for their personality.
“[These are] the partner AEs in your market. You need to build [a] relationship so they remember you and they’ll jump on a call with you again,” says Neisari. “If you bore them or can’t read them in the first two minutes, then it’s more difficult to engage with them afterwards.”
For example: Some AEs favor written communication and analysis, some are more action and results-oriented, and others are more naturally social. Knowing these traits earlier in the partnership can help you understand how to approach each subsequent conversation most effectively.
Also during this time, Aircall's PAMs ask casual questions about their partner AE’s team to begin filling in the missing pieces of their org chart.
#2: They mapped their partners’ org charts over time
Each time Neisari’s team had a call with one of their strategic partners’ AEs, they’d ask questions to understand the structure of their partner’s org chart and who sat where. If Aircall’s PAM thought their partner's AE was on a particular stakeholder’s team, they’d validate their hunch during the call.
For example: They'd say things like, “You’re on Paul’s team, right?” or “I spoke with Claire. Do you work closely with her?”
Asking these questions also helped Aircall's PAM show that they’ve already built relationships with their partner AE's team. This helped to eliminate any first-call awkward tension and build trust right away.
As the PAM learned about their partner’s org chart, they'd use Monday.com to create a dashboard to note the members of each team and their level of buy-in across their partner’s global offices.
In the above screenshot of one of Aircall’s Monday.com dashboards (From left to right):
Column 1 “Item”: The verticals that Aircall was selling into via their strategic partners. Collapsing the dropdown arrow revealed the names of the partner's AEs who were selling into the particular vertical.
Column 2 “Aircall PAM”: The name of Aircall’s PAM who was liaising between Aircall’s sales team and their partner’s sales team (Scroll down to #3 to see how Aircall is shifting from a “star" network to a “mesh" network).
Column 3 “Penetration Rate”: This shows the level of buy-in from their partner’s AEs. “Blue” represents AEs who are already internal champions of Aircall. “Green” represents AEs who have completed Aircall’s sales enablement sessions. “Red” represents any AEs not interested in co-selling with Aircall.
Column 4 “SI Partners”: The names of the system integrator (SI) partners who were working with the partner's AEs in the region.
Columns 5-7: Use these additional columns to jot down the names of the managers, directors, and other seniority levels within your partner’s org chart in a given regional office.
Aircall’s team uses a separate Monday.com dashboard for each regional office. They also use Monday.com’s Salesforce integration to send the org chart data to Salesforce in order to tag the relevant partner AE to the open opportunity.
To note: At the end of their call with the partner's AE, the PAM and their internal AE wouldn't ask their partner for anything. The only next step: Aircall’s PAM and AE would continue to update their partner's AE about the status of the open opportunity.
Whenever a relevant deal closed, Aircall’s PAM and AE would inform their partner's AE and the PAM would discuss their rev share with them. During this time, they'd celebrate the partner AE’s win and ask for an introduction to their manager.
#3: They celebrated the win and asked for an intro up
Oftentimes, their partner's AE welcomed the idea of introducing Aircall’s PAM to their manager. It was an opportunity for them to showcase their success and introduce their process to the rest of the team.
When Aircall’s PAM would connect with the AE’s manager, they would ask if they could host a 15-minute enablement session during one of their existing sales meetings. Once again, the 15-minute timeframe presented a low-lift commitment. Additionally, hosting an enablement session during a pre-existing meeting helped to avoid no-shows and low engagement.
Once Aircall’s team hosted an enablement session and helped more of their partner's AEs close deals and account expansions, they'd ask their partner's sales manager for an introduction to their higher up — typically a director level. They would then repeat the process of rolling out their co-selling motions among the director's team.
Once that was successful, they’d ask for another introduction. And once that was successful, they'd ask for an intro to their counterpart in another regional office (and so on).
Partner sales rep —> Sales Manager —> Sales Manager’s Team —> Sales Director —> Sales Director’s Team —> Regional VP —> Regional VP’s team —> Regional VP in another market —> Team of Regional VP in another market
Now, they’re launching a global taskforce and shifting to a "mesh" network to co-sell at scale
Aircall's new "mesh" network:
Initially, Aircall's PAMs needed to maintain control over their co-selling motions in order to help build the foundational relationships between Aircall’s team and their partners’ teams. Their PAMs would join each of their internal AEs on their calls with their partners' AEs, and the PAM would lead the conversation.
This was called a "star" network, where the PAM served as the central point of contact for each interaction between Aircall’s team and their partners' teams.
As each partnership matured and Aircall’s partnerships team grew, keeping the PAMs at the center of their co-selling motions created a bottleneck.
Through their new “mesh" network, Aircall's team empowers its AEs to take the lead in their co-selling motions. Each AE has a direct connection to their partners' AEs, enabling them to act on new opportunities quickly and communicate with their partners' AEs in real time. They no longer need to wait for a PAM to initiate the conversation.
“Star Network” – PAM controls each conversation with partners (More control, but potential for bottlenecks)
“Mesh Network” – Each GTM stakeholder controls the conversation (More risk, but better for scale)
And the “mesh" network extends beyond the sales team. Neisari’s partnerships team has established connections between each of their internal GTM teams and the GTM teams of their strategic partners. For example: The marketing leader in a particular region has a direct connection with their partner’s marketing leader in that same region. This enables them to collaborate on co-marketing campaigns and sales enablement collateral for communicating their joint value proposition.
Tip: Not every AE or GTM stakeholder will be ready to collaborate with your partner’s team right away. Identify champions within your team to begin rolling out your “mesh" network, and then educate the rest of your team by showing how their work helped to contribute to each of their respective team's goals.
The “mesh" network also frees up their PAMs to focus on value-add activities (like developing strategies for increasing lead generation) rather than spending the majority of their time monitoring each co-selling motion.
Aircall's new global taskforce:
Aircall has also established a global taskforce consisting of each of their internal GTM leaders. Each GTM team is responsible for various initiatives that contribute to the success of the partnership.
For example: On the product team, they’ve hired a dedicated product manager to oversee the development, health, and expansion of a particular integration. And on the marketing team, they’re rolling out sales collateral covering vertical-specific use cases and pain points for their sales teams to use at scale.
Prior to launching their global taskforce, Aircall's GTM teams would manage partnership-specific initiatives on an ad hoc basis. Now, rather than reacting to an individual request, each GTM team has ongoing responsibilities that help grow the partnership at scale.
Below, you'll find additional tips for launching your first co-selling motions with a new strategic partner.
Start with the region you know. Each region has unique laws, buying behavior tendencies, and cultural nuances. Start with the one you know, and look to your existing relationships to educate yourself and your team about how to partner with the other regions.
Additionally, if you’re partnering in a competitive market, you’ll need to make the case to your strategic partners’ sales teams to co-sell with you over your competitor. Neisari recommends identifying the region and business segment where you can show value the quickest and then expanding once you’ve seen some success.
Serve as a liaison (at first). In the early days of their partnerships with Salesforce and HubSpot, Aircall's PAMs led every call between their AEs and their partners' AEs. But as their partnerships grew and their respective sales teams developed trust with one another, relying on a PAM to initiate each conversation began to create a bottleneck.
Co-selling with a new strategic partner requires a high level of care as you build and adjust your co-selling processes and establish relationships between teams. In the beginning, it was necessary for Aircall's PAMs to lead each conversation and track their mutual open opportunities in order to facilitate mutual value and ensure the needs of both teams were met.
Now, many of Aircall’s AEs are bought into Aircall's "Ecosystem-First" approach and have built autonomous relationships with their partner counterparts. This has led Aircall to shift from a "star" network with their PAMs at the center of each interaction to a "mesh" network that fosters direct collaboration between stakeholders. Their new “mesh" network enables their AEs and GTM stakeholders to reach out to their partner counterparts in real time and accelerate their time to revenue.
Identify a common ideal customer profile. Aircall uses Crossbeam with many of its partners to validate they have a similar ideal customer profile (ICP). You can also use Crossbeam to identify which of your partner’s sales reps own a particular account so you know exactly who your sales rep should reach out to and when.
Adapt your sales strategy to match your partner’s. If you’re partnering with a new strategic partner, you may need to adjust how and to whom you sell your product. For example: If your sales team is unfamiliar with selling into specific verticals, your partnerships and marketing team may need to work together to create vertical-specific sales enablement collateral and customer-facing collateral for the first time.
As you roll out your new co-selling strategy and get buy-in from your partner’s teams, start by creating only the collateral you need. Then when you’re ready to co-sell at scale, develop collateral to roll out to your internal teams org-wide.
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'Til next time!
👋 Olivia Ramirez
Managing Editor
Crossbeam
Crossbeam, 1315 Walnut Street, Suite 300, Philadelphia, PA 19107
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