Overview
You identify, negotiate, and manage strategic partnerships that drive pipeline and expand Versapay's market reach. This includes ERP/accounting software integrations (NetSuite, Sage Intacct, Dynamics), reseller/referral partnerships, and co-marketing relationships. You're not closing deals directly - you're building channels and relationships that generate leads for the sales team and make Versapay stickier through deeper ecosystem integration.
Role Snapshot
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Role Type | Partnerships/Channel Development |
| Sales Motion | Partner Channel + Strategic Alliances |
| Deal Complexity | Strategic (long negotiation cycles with enterprise partners) |
| Sales Cycle | 3-9 months to launch new partnership |
| Deal Size | N/A (measured by partner-sourced pipeline) |
| Quota (est.) | Partner-sourced pipeline target (e.g., $X in qualified leads/quarter) |
Company Context
Stage: Growth stage (362 employees, established product, expanding market)
Size: 362 employees
Growth: Actively hiring across functions, scaling GTM motion
Market Position: Challenger in AR automation space - competing against legacy manual processes, newer fintech players, and established players in the ERP ecosystem
GTM Reality
Pipeline Sources:
- Direct sales team (AEs selling to finance/accounting buyers)
- Partnerships are becoming a more strategic pipeline channel
- ERP integrations create stickiness and referral opportunities
Partnership Structure:
- You likely report to VP Sales or Head of Partnerships
- Work closely with Sales, Marketing, Product, and Customer Success
- May have 1-2 partner managers or coordinators under you as the program scales
Competitive Landscape
Main Competitors: Other AR automation platforms, manual processes, built-in ERP functionality
How They Differentiate: Deep ERP integrations, AI-powered cash application, unified invoice-to-cash platform
Common Objections: "Our ERP already does some of this", "We have a manual process that works", "Integration complexity concerns"
Win Themes: Automation ROI, working capital unlock, time savings for finance teams, seamless ERP integration
What You'll Actually Do
Time Breakdown
Partner Prospecting (25%) | Partner Enablement (30%) | Deal Support (20%) | Internal Coordination (25%)
Key Activities
- Partner Sourcing & Outreach: Research potential partners (accounting firms, ERP consultants, payment processors, complementary SaaS), reach out cold, pitch partnership value prop. Most won't respond or won't be interested.
- Negotiation & Contracting: Navigate legal reviews, revenue share terms, co-marketing commitments. Lots of back-and-forth with legal and finance teams. Deals take months.
- Partner Enablement: Create sales materials, run training sessions for partner sales teams, build integration documentation. You're teaching other people how to sell/implement your product.
- Pipeline Management: Track partner-sourced leads, push partners to register opportunities, troubleshoot why their deals aren't closing. Lots of Salesforce hygiene and partner portal admin.
- Co-Marketing Execution: Coordinate webinars, case studies, joint content. Herding cats between your marketing team and partner marketing teams with different priorities and timelines.
- Executive Alignment: Present partnership strategy to leadership, justify ROI on partnership investments, negotiate for more resources.
The Honest Reality
What's Hard
- Long, Uncertain Cycles: Takes 6-12 months to see real pipeline from a new partnership. You're constantly justifying "when will this pay off?"
- Competing Priorities: Partners have their own products to sell. You're asking them to prioritize your stuff when they have 10 other partnerships.
- Internal Navigation: Getting engineering to prioritize integration work, marketing to create partner materials, sales to follow up on partner leads - you don't directly control any of these teams.
- Relationship Maintenance: Partners go cold, contacts leave, priorities shift. You're constantly re-engaging and rebuilding momentum.
- Measurement Difficulty: Hard to attribute revenue cleanly. Fights over "was this really partner-sourced or would sales have found them anyway?"
What Success Looks Like
- 3-5 active, productive partnerships generating $X in qualified pipeline per quarter
- X% of new customer pipeline coming through partner channels
- Partner-sourced deals closing at Y% rate (benchmark against direct sales)
- Integration roadmap aligned with top partner priorities
Who You're Selling To
Primary Partners:
- ERP implementation consultants (NetSuite partners, Sage partners)
- Accounting/bookkeeping firms serving mid-market companies
- Payment processors and financial services platforms
- Complementary SaaS vendors (AP automation, treasury management)
What They Care About:
- Revenue share and deal registration protection
- Ease of integration and implementation (don't want customer issues)
- Marketing support and co-selling resources
- Strategic alignment (is this a priority partnership for you or one of 50?)
Requirements
- 3-5 years in partnerships, channel sales, or business development (ideally in B2B SaaS or fintech)
- Track record of building partnerships from scratch and growing them to meaningful pipeline contribution
- Strong project management - you're juggling multiple partners at different stages simultaneously
- Cross-functional influence - getting things done without direct authority over product, marketing, sales
- Technical enough to understand API integrations, implementation requirements, and platform architecture
- Comfortable with ambiguity - this isn't a plug-and-play playbook, you're building as you go