Getting what you want requires you understand what your partner wants

Part 2 of 5 on Negotiation Relationship Planners

I once managed the credit-card program for the alumni association of a well-known state university. The card carried the arguably boring alumni logo and the association’s unique name. Response was OK, but it wasn’t anything to write home about.

So when we started planning our quarterly progress meeting, they asked us to add “Disappointing Results” to the agenda, which didn’t do much for our confidence or mood.

During our discussion about our goals for the meeting, someone said, “Wouldn’t it be great if we could get the [extremely recognizable athletics logo] on the card. But we knew the athletic department would balk and the alumni would do the happy dance.Still, it was a great idea, so we spent the next hour brainstorming how we might do that in advance of the meeting without telling everyone what we had in mind.

We knew Athletics — through a third party responsible for optimizing sponsorship, licensing, and ticketing revenue — would ask for more money than we could pay…unless we added other bank products like branded deposits into the mix. We added an extra day to schedule separate meetings with all parties and leave time to bring everyone together in the same room. And then we created a series of questions to help us determine what everyone needed to make this happen.

“To get what you want, help them get what they want”

I can’t get into more detail about how it all happened, but suffice it to say that we found some touchpoints that indicated a path forward that involved revenue sharing, the ability to access segmented lists, and more. We got the deal done, opened the door for branded deposits with other schools, and helped everyone make more money (including us). It was classic “Help Me Help You” (Jerry Maguire) and followed the principles of sports agent Ron Shapiro, who said, “To get what you want, help them get what they want.”

But first, you must figure out what THEY want and confirm what you want. That’s where the Relationship Planner comes in and in particular, today’s section on the Partner Organization. Part 1 looked at the Program Structure.

The biggest challenge can be teaching everyone to ask the right questions the right way. Avoid yes or no questions and ask open-ended questions; hypothesize (if we could do X for you, what could you do?); answer questions with questions (irritating if not done right); and ask them to tell you more).  

Let’s look at the partner organization section

• What is its mission statement? If you’re working with a subsidiary of a larger organization, check for the parent’s mission AND the subsidiary’s mission. You can normally find these on the website in some form.

• What are the challenges/trends/opportunities facing the organization? You may find these in your notes, through a Google search (including articles about the organization), in its annual report or messages to members. You might also ask your marketing partner because your collateral may address some of it.

• How does the organization segment its list? It’s very possible that your primary contact (or the organization’s CEO or executive director may not know). That’s why it’s important to schedule time during a call or face-to-face meeting to ask that question. Remember to keep asking the question to give the list person a chance to think about all the possible answers. Ask if they have data that differentiates the different segments (e.g., open rates, engagement rates). And then ask which segments are most important to the organization and whether you can help them further segment the list.

• What role does the organization want us to play? Then ask if that role could be expanded. You may very well get a blank look or a request for more money. This is often a good place to hypothesize (“what if we could…”).

• Who is the target audience for our product? Different segments may want different things, as outlined above, and it may open the door to other products for specific audiences.

• How does the organization currently deploy our product? You should know most of the answer to this question based on your marketing efforts.

• What is the biggest differentiator for our product? Their answer may be different from what you think it is. It may be worth seeing if you could do a focus group to understand different views. This is a great opportunity to demonstrate you’re listening rather than doing a cookie-cutter program.

• Who’s the competition for our product? Who else are our customers using? For credit cards, as an example, it might be a premium card or a travel card or a different affinity.

• Do we depend on anyone else for delivery of our product (e.g., does the organization have other partners that leverage this product)?

• How can we demonstrate the value of other product lines to this podcast?

• Do we have an objection planner for this organization? What are their objections? These might be common complaints or just questions about process, constitutent service or product benefits? Can we anticipate what they might ask at our next meeting based on what others are asking us?

• When we meet with them, are they engaged? Are they attentive when we speak? What types of questions do they ask? What is their body language like when we present? Are they on their phones throughout? Do they head for the doors during breaks and come back late? If they’re on Zoom, do they have their cameras or is it clear they’re doing other things (e.g., reading email)?

• What do they want? It’s normally best to get them to make the first offer as an anchor.

• Do we have a preparation planner for the next thing we want? For the next thing after that? Your senior leadership is going to want to make sure you’re thinking about deepening the relationship.

• Do we have an escalation process for complaints, concerns, or questions? Consider this question going in both directions.

I work with companies and salespeople to create Relationship Planners in either 1:1 or group settings. Here’s a link to a streamlined Relationship Planner that you can download from my ungated Resources page (that means you don’t have to provide your email address to get it) and use on your own. But there’s a more detailed planning process that we can do as a webinar, workshop, or in-person consulting.

What other questions would you want to know about your partner that might help you figure out what they need or how you can be more successful? Please add them to the Comments.

Next time, we’ll talk about cross-selling opportunities.