Marketplace Partnerships Lead (Vendor Acquisition & Onboarding)

Overview

You're building the vendor supply side of a new AI marketplace at a 3-person consultancy expanding into marketplace territory. You'll spend your days doing outbound to vendors, pitching a revenue-share partnership model, negotiating commercial terms, then shepherding signed partners through onboarding to get them live with quality listings. This is 0→1 work—no existing playbook, no established brand recognition, just you figuring out what works.

Role Snapshot

Company Context

Stage: Pre-seed/Bootstrap (3 employees, no funding info available)

Size: 3 employees

Growth: Pivoting from consulting to AI marketplace, building supply side from zero

Market Position: Unknown - new entrant building marketplace infrastructure

GTM Reality

Pipeline Sources:

• 100% Outbound - Cold outreach to AI vendors, SaaS companies, or service providers (unclear what type of vendors from posting)
• 0% Inbound - No brand awareness, no marketing engine yet
• 0% Partners/Referrals - Building the network from scratch

SDR/AE Structure: You are the entire vendor acquisition team. No SDR support, no AE handoff. You own it end-to-end.

SE Support: None. You're also handling onboarding/activation post-signature.

Competitive Landscape

Main Competitors: Unknown - depends on what AI marketplace category they're entering (could be AI tool aggregators, AI consulting marketplaces, AI vendor directories)

How They Differentiate: Unclear from posting - likely positioning around quality curation or specific niche focus

Common Objections:

• "Why should I give you a rev-share when I can sell direct?"
• "Your marketplace has no buyers yet"
• "How much traffic/demand do you actually have?"
• "We already have channel partners"

Win Themes: Early mover advantage, specific buyer network access (if they have it), lower customer acquisition cost vs direct sales

What You'll Actually Do

Time Breakdown

Outbound Prospecting (35%) | Active Deal Negotiations (25%) | Vendor Onboarding (30%) | Internal/Reporting (10%)

Key Activities

• Cold Outreach to Vendors: Building lists of potential vendors (AI tool companies, SaaS providers, service vendors—depends on marketplace focus), writing outreach sequences, sending 30-50 emails/day, making calls, LinkedIn messaging. Most won't respond. You're trying to book 10-15 exploratory calls per week.

• Pitching & Negotiating Partnerships: Running discovery calls to understand vendor needs, pitching the marketplace value prop (even though it's unproven), negotiating revenue-share splits (likely 15-30% take rate), hammering out legal/commercial terms, getting contracts signed. You'll hear a lot of "come back when you have more demand."

• Vendor Onboarding: Taking signed partners from contract to live. This means collecting their product assets (screenshots, videos, case studies), writing or editing their marketplace listing, coordinating technical integrations (if any), running activation checklists, chasing vendors for deliverables they promised but haven't sent. Many vendors will sign and then go dark.

• Pipeline Management: CRM hygiene (tracking outreach, deal stages, onboarding status), weekly reporting on vendors signed vs activated, analyzing conversion metrics (outreach→call, call→signed, signed→activated), identifying bottlenecks. The founder will want to see which vendor segments convert better.

The Honest Reality

What's Hard

• Chicken-and-egg problem: Vendors ask "how much demand do you have?" and you're too early to have meaningful traction. You're selling them on potential, not proof.

• Rev-share is a tough sell: Most vendors would rather keep 100% of revenue and sell direct. Convincing them to give you 15-30% when you're unproven requires serious negotiation skills and persistence.

• Vendors ghost after signing: Getting a signature is only half the battle. Vendors lose interest during onboarding, don't deliver assets on time, or deprioritize you because you're not driving revenue yet. You'll spend a lot of time chasing people.

• No playbook exists: You're figuring out ideal vendor profiles, messaging, negotiation tactics, and onboarding processes from scratch. What works for one vendor segment might not work for another.

• Misalignment with sales side: If the marketplace demand team isn't delivering buyers, your vendors will churn or stop engaging. You're dependent on coordination you don't control.

What Success Looks Like

• Signing 8-12 vendors per month with reasonable rev-share terms (not giving away the farm to get anyone to join)
• Getting 70%+ of signed vendors actually activated with quality listings within 30 days
• Building a pipeline of 40-60 active vendor prospects at various stages
• Identifying 2-3 vendor segments that convert better than others and doubling down

Who You're Selling To

Primary Buyers:

• Founders/CEOs of AI tools or SaaS companies (0-50 employees)
• VP Sales/Partnerships at mid-market AI/SaaS companies (50-200 employees)
• Service providers or consultancies offering AI implementation services

What They Care About:

• "How many qualified buyers will you send us?" (demand proof)
• "What's the revenue-share split and contract terms?" (economics)
• "What's required from us to get listed?" (effort/cost)
• "Who else is on the marketplace?" (competitive positioning)
• "What if it doesn't work out?" (exit clauses)

Requirements

• 4+ years in B2B SaaS sales, partnerships, or marketplace vendor/supply acquisition
• Proven ability to negotiate commercial agreements (ideally rev-share or partnership deals, not just software licenses)
• Strong process discipline: CRM management, pipeline tracking, structured outreach sequences
• Experience operating in 0→1 or early-stage environments where you had to figure things out without a playbook
• Clear, direct communication style—can articulate value propositions and negotiate terms without fluff
• Bonus: AI, SaaS marketplace, or two-sided marketplace experience (supply-side preferred)
• Comfortable with ambiguity and building structure where none exists