In over 10 years of operating and investing in Consumer Electronics and Smart Home, I have encountered a variety of go-to-market strategies, coupled with an even larger number of partnership programs, that were designed to help companies go faster, expand product scope or provide that just-needed PR boost at the right moment.

Along the way something changed my thinking and ultimately my approach. I came to realize that the team efforts needed to prospect, scope, negotiate and roll out many of these product partnerships commonly failed to deliver on the lofty expectations that catalyzed the relationship.

As I transitioned from Greenwave Systems to lead August’s sales, business development and platform partnership efforts in February 2015, I created a new playbook to help prioritize our efforts. Below are a few excerpts and while examples are from the Smart Home industry the general themes can be applied broadly.

1. Make sure your end user wins

The primary question is, “How does the proposed partnership benefit your end user?” Will it generate better interoperability; improve the user experience (UX) or lower total cost of ownership (TCO) for your product? Can it reduce friction in the set-up or run-time experiences? Ultimately, these partnerships need to help the end user experience greater delight with our CE products. If you can’t map a clear end-user benefit to the partnership you may want to reconsider its priority.

2. Use data to determine priority

The amount of data available now for connected products and services is staggering. Online reviews across Amazon.com, Best Buy, etc., incoming customer support tickets, industry analyst feedback, Net Promoter scores (NPS), etc. An important aspect to drive priority in a partnership pipeline is to mine the various data sets and stack rank the proposed partnerships. With some of our August partners, including our recent IFTTT integration, expanded Apple HomeKit and Works with Nest partnerships, we were able to clear our hurdle rate because we knew our customers and prospects were asking for it (and had the data to prove it!).

3. Reduce your target list by at least 50%

Is your CEO or Board of Directors telling you to partner with every new platform announced, or every new retail or service provider entry into the Smart Home market? Chances are these newcomers won’t be immediately (or ultimately) successful, so instead of forming new partnerships you should consider using your current resources to improve your current offerings. To make your partnerships successful you may want to consider cutting your target list by 50% or more. Double down on those partnerships that are bearing fruit and then recalibrate the expectations and qualification process to approve the partnerships.

4. Establish clear success metrics (and then actually review them!)

Sure, generating PR is great, but actually establishing a fully functioning strategic partnership is even better. What is the appropriate timeline to announce? Will there be an expected bump in sales velocity due to ongoing synergies with the proposed customer base? It’s very important that you review the “good, bad and ugly” on at least a quarterly basis following your partnership’s launch. Business intelligence software such as Looker can dissect and help you visualize the efficacy of the various integrations. And, by the way, if business conditions change or demand diminishes, be willing to de-prioritize a partnership that isn’t going to be material to the business.

5. Treat Partnerships as a 'Product'

The partnership process is a larger extension of product lifecycle management, so why not consider treating the partnership as a product? Would you let your product go without a feature roadmap, bug list, NPS goals, etc.? Of course not. In many cases these partnerships require precious engineering support to sustain quality so be sure to do the trade-offs against other high-priority items. Consider a dedicated product management resource to help focus the efforts and mediate the process between your partnership and engineering teams.

6. Negotiate Team-to-Team, not BD-to-BD

As I’ve transitioned from more platform and B2B-oriented deals at 4Home and Motorola, to consumer-focused relationships at August, I’ve come to realize that having a broader base of support is crucial to getting both accurate upfront scoping and post-close execution on deals. I recently added the Platform Product Management function to my Revenue organization to ensure the proper linkage into the product and engineering teams and to establish a more complete feedback loop. When it comes to partnership negotiation, rather than just sprinting through the process as business-to-business teams, I recommend bringing in key stakeholders from Marketing, Product, and Engineering into the conversation so everyone has a clear understanding of the team goals. This also allows you to determine if there is good rapport amongst the implementation teams as well as ensuring that internal resources are aligned in the strategic value of the partnership.

7. Look outside your own window for inspiration

So many industries overlap now that what was once viewed as exogenous to your core business could be very relevant in the near future. Just look at the recent news regarding Tesla’s proposal to acquire SolarCity. If you are a Consumer Electronics executive, step outside your office and you could meet new and interesting people from the telematics industry, as well as those in virtual reality and artificial intelligence. The Internet of Things Consortium is one group that actively promotes this by encouraging discussion and debate amongst a wide set of stakeholders, including Nestle, Nielsen and Honeywell. But regardless of which organization you affiliate the practice of exploring new industries and new technologies can inform a more cogent partnership strategy.

8. BONUS HABIT – Sharpen your Saw

Just like engineering or product management skills, business acumen needs to be constantly updated and upgraded. Moving away from the days of 40-page definitive agreements into more fluid 1-page software integration agreements or teaming sheets, it is important to stay up to date with the current best practices. I stay current by reading wider business publications (from WSJ to McKinsey Quarterly and of course CE Pro!), religiously mining Twitter and LinkedIn as well as Techcrunch for BD insights, and, most importantly, networking with my CXO and VP/GM peers in the industry. Whether it's Scott Shillington from Tile, Arthur Orduna from ADT, or Roel Peeters from Roost, having breakfast or coffee with other leaders always energizes me. In addition, I walk away with new perspectives that I can apply directly to challenges of leading a fast growing, high profile startup.

What about you? What are partnership best practices that have delighted your users or helped you gain velocity? Can you recommend any additional tools or blogs that are helpful? Who are the partnership leaders you trade notes with? Let me know – tweet me @naywilliams or @AugustHomeInc.

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