Hi ,
I have been thinking a lot about using strategic partnerships to generate the early customer traction. I feel a lot of startups can save costs if they go for a strategic partnership with another startup. That way they can easily cash on their common customers and would be a win win situation for all. I would like to know experiences of readers here. Have you ever tried such partnerships? Were you successful? What were the challenges?
Also , I would like to know how we can accomplish networking between startups looking out for such partnerships in an efficient way.
Latest posts by Mohit (see all)
- IIM Ahmedabad Finance Conclave 2010 - December 28, 2009
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Hi Mohit – I think its a Hobson’s choice as the excercise of cracking the customer accquisiton cycle will still remain a challenge. Given that this is a common issue among most of the startups – after co-opting the offerings – the company will be back to square one in terms of figuring out how do I convert prospects into customers.
I think what would be a better idea for a startup to do is to tag along with a bigger and more established player (should be a end-user) and co-opt his service/ product offering with the end-user. This way the start-up is playing on his strenghts and piggybacking on the established player for the initial traction
Hi,
can you plz enlighten me a bit more about wt excatly you want to do in terms of designing/ implementation/ maketing/ promotion/ general issues ot be addressed and level of competiiton??
i had thought of doing such things long back but cudn’t just decide on how to start and from whr to start.
right now an engauged with my own startup in Delhi since a yr time.
f interested do respond @ nishant@glozon.com
Regards,
nishant
Saurabh,
nice comments.
I am sure you as a user would have privacy concerns. But if the business owner understands these concerns, then there is a solution to it definitely. The user should have an option to not take up the shared service . Also only a mapped random identification number can be shared and a protocol can be designed to solve this.
As a business owner, i think what i meant was more towards complimentary partnerships. About your concern, why not have it on my site itself. Well, it can happen that 2 websites are in entirely different verticals but can still be partners. I am quite sure about that.
Dear Mohit,
You have an interesting point but I was wondering what if the customers are not happy?
Putting on a users hat, when I signup with an Internet based service, I assume that my privacy would be sacrosanct. My identity and contact information would not be shared. If there is an user sharing agreement between services, I would not want to sign up because a service provider can sell my information to anyone and everyone.
Second if I put on a business owners hat, I would want my product offering to be different from everyone else (if I have to have a sustainable business ever). Further I would attract only a certain kind of users. If I am to share them with someone else, there are two things. Either the guy I am sharing with is too similar to my service (my users might migrate altogether). Or the service is complementary so that my users are somehow benefited with this new service. And if there is such complementary service, I would rather have it on my website than giving it to other people.
Obviously first thoughts. Please tell me if my arguments hold any ground.
Regards,
SG
It is in line with what incubators set out to achieve ..
Collaboration between start-ups is complicated by the fact that
1) The product/service & the business model are still being worked out and you don’t know who will end up as a competitor.
2) Everyone’s looking for customers with deep pockets (not penny-pinching fellow start-ups) to do business with.
I concur with what you are saying. Networking is a great help. Not just between start-ups in India, but also with aspiring entrepreneurs of Indian origin abroad (like yours truly!)
I think blogs like these and forums like TiE are a great help.