How Klaviyo and Hawke Media Operate a Successful Partnership

Ashley G: [00:00:00] How can we develop these co-marketing opportunities that combines our insights from other Klayvio customers create this awesome content that's branded for the partner and get it in front of potential new business. 

[00:00:13] Ashley S: [00:00:13] The way I position ourselves, the partnerships team to all of our partners is that right?

[00:00:17] We are their internal evangelist here at Hawk. 

[00:00:20] Ashley G: [00:00:20] Really just ensuring that you're well aware of the levers that you can pull on in order to make yourself

[00:00:30] Alex Glenn: [00:00:30] solution. 

[00:00:32] Ashley S: [00:00:32] Welcome to make them famous. The podcast about partner, 

[00:00:36] Alex Glenn: [00:00:36] the only podcast uncover both how partner teams enabled their partners. 

[00:00:41] Ashley S: [00:00:41] Other department leaders enable their partner teams to achieve success. 

[00:00:46] Alex Glenn: [00:00:46] All right, welcome back everybody. In this episode, we are lucky enough to have two people with experience on both sides of the partnership equation.

[00:00:54] Ashley Golmes senior channel customer success manager at Klayvio, who was formerly customer success at zest, as well as a supervisor and manager at a very large digital agency in Boston. And of course, our friend Ashley Scorpio, VP of partnerships at hock media, who has joined me in courses, masterminds and other podcast episodes.

[00:01:15] This discussion is all about partner success in large ecosystems. What keeps hot media? An agency with over 200 employees and over 500 active partners. So close to the Klayvio partner program, how Klaviyo's partner, team ideates and execute campaigns to bring partners closer to the brand and or execute a growth initiative to increase referral revenue.

[00:01:41] What the first few months with an agency looks like at Klaviyo. We hear what Ashley's Scorpio likes to see and get in the early stages of a partnership program, how important it is to get new partners, to fully understand how to leverage resources inside the program. Creating OKR is with partners. And what Ashley Golmes advice would be to her former self, getting into channel success.

[00:02:09] This is one that you want to listen to all the way through, but first let's hear from our sponsors. Of course, we couldn't make this podcast famous without our amazing sponsors for sponsorship we aimed for not only great products. But tech use to power some of the top partner programs around we've invited partner stack share work and send DOSO to be those sponsors partner stack.

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[00:04:07] Now let's get back into the episode. Thank you for joining me today. So first question is going to be over two Golmes and we're doing last names here, obviously. So I'm going to try to use last names to make sure that we don't get confused, but gums let's do an intro to yourself. And then we like to hear one or two words that describe the state of your partner 

[00:04:26] Ashley G: [00:04:26] program today.

[00:04:26] Yeah, of course. Happy to be here. Uh, so I am currently a senior channel customer success. Manager here at Klayvio. Um, I have been, you know, in this space for a while now, uh, prior to Klayvio I was over at Zacchaeus. I actually have some agency background myself. Um, but as far as one word that would describe, you know, the current state of our partner program today.

[00:04:53] I wouldn't say diverse, um, or we're growing partner ecosystem is, you know, really unique. It consists of a variety of partners that like Klayvio are very, uh, customer first. So, you know, across these partners, they're all playing the role of enabling our customers. To be successful. 

[00:05:11] Alex Glenn: [00:05:11] Awesome. That's a great word.

[00:05:13] Diverse. We haven't heard that one yet. So Scorpio over you. Give me the intro. Um, and, uh, talk about a little bit about the verticals you're in and some of your partner types, as well as any mentions that you want to bring them out, to give people an idea of how you're partnering. 

[00:05:26] Ashley S: [00:05:26] Absolutely. I'm Ashley Scorpio.

[00:05:28] I am the VP of partnerships at Hawk media. Uh, your outsource CMO. We are a full service digital marketing agency. Um, we are actually fully distributed now due to the pandemic. We've gone fully remote permanently. So we're distributed across 20 different States in the U S and we offer custom data-driven marketing strategies to businesses of all sizes, um, from.

[00:05:50] Pre-seed startups all the way to SMBs and growth stage companies. We've managed, um, marketing for over 1500 brands since our inception. And in the past seven years, we've actually grown to over 165 employees. So I manage our partner program here. We have a robust. Partner program. That is the word I would choose to describe it.

[00:06:13] We have hundreds of partners across five different primary categories, and we pursue a number of different initiatives with them across co marketing. Um, as well as business development and helping, um, our partners grow and promote their businesses and sort of cross amplifying each other. So that's the primary goal of our program.

[00:06:37] In addition to of course sourcing the best in class solutions for our clients, from our partner ecosystem, like Klayvio and I myself have been in the agency and e-commerce space for about five years and in marketing for about 12. So I came to the agency world through the client side of digital marketing.

[00:06:59] And, uh, here we are on the partnership side, getting to work with all these fantastic partners across the space. 

[00:07:05] Alex Glenn: [00:07:05] Wonderful. And we love having you back, Ms. Scorpio. We always do some cool content together, lots of training, lots of stuff to help the partner teams understand your persona. And it's a very unique one.

[00:07:14] And I think one of the things that makes this partnership super successful, or at least Klayvio from Klaviyo's side, as well as from Hawk media side, you guys know partnerships from both sides, which makes things a little bit easier to understand the personas that you're working with day to day. And I want to hear from gums.

[00:07:28] If you can give me the layout on who's involved in your partner team, what types of roles? Not necessarily names of people, but what types of roles do you need to rely on to execute your partnership program as it consists of today? And what types of personas are you working with? Yeah. 

[00:07:43] Ashley G: [00:07:43] Great question. So Klaviyo's partner team is unique because it really incorporates all of us.

[00:07:48] Of our business, uh, partner programs really supported by, you know, many teams, whether that be sales, who collaborates with our partners on opportunities, marketing, who's dedicated to co-marketing initiatives with our partners, success and support, uh, those teams, you know, both enable partners and our shared customers, product works closely with our partners as well.

[00:08:09] Their feedback is super valuable when it comes to developing our features and functionality. Enablement that supports efforts in ongoing training and development team. And of course, you know, everything is supported overall by Klayvio leadership. Uh, so as far as tools and resources, uh, the core tools that we, you know, leverage outside Klayvio itself, uh, would be, we have a partner portal, uh, with all bounds.

[00:08:33] So it's essentially provides that personalized experience for each partner. When it comes to managing our shared customers, it allows them to track performance and growth. Uh, and access to those shared resources as well. So we're always, you know, evaluating different tools to potentially adopt that really support our partners growth, um, and their 

[00:08:54] Alex Glenn: [00:08:54] experience with us.

[00:08:55] Okay. Okay. And is there anything coming up that you guys are exploring, moving to migration or any, any new types of tools that are interesting that you guys are using? Yeah. 

[00:09:04] Ashley G: [00:09:04] So one of the awesome things that we're going to be rolling out, um, with all bound is we're going to be. Giving our partners access to what we're calling health score reporting.

[00:09:13] It's really a tool designed to give them a holistic look of their overall, you know, managed accounts performance. So, you know, typically when you're in Klayvio, you're looking at an account like one-to-one like, how is this brand performing overall with this new reporting health score? They're going to be able to see like, okay, you know, if I'm Hawk, I'll be able to see out of all of my managed customers, where are we really moving?

[00:09:36] The needle across all of those 

[00:09:37] Alex Glenn: [00:09:37] customers. So that'll mean a lot for you guys, as well as your partner. So as a partner, I'll be able to understand better what the campaign that we just did together, how it impacted the progression of that brand, that partnership. That's really cool. Very interesting. Okay.

[00:09:51] Awesome. Well, Ashley, um, Scorpio. I want to go back to you for a minute. If I could. What is your relationship with Klayvio specifically? You have a little bit different relationship with all the tech out there. So I just want to preface, please edit this when you start your answer, but you deal with partnerships from a co-marketing.

[00:10:07] Co-selling go to market strategy a little bit different than the actual implementation and the referral of that software, but please let us know. What is your specific relationship with Klaviyo and how did you find out about the product? 

[00:10:19] Ashley S: [00:10:19] Certainly I would say with Klayvio it's all of the above. We're pretty well integrated together across our partnerships and our lifecycle teams with the Klaviyo teams.

[00:10:30] So we are in constant contact. We have shared Slack channels, we email and talk over zoom and on the phone regularly, sometimes even texts. Um, we get really great customer support, uh, from the Cleevio team for any of our clients. We're managing lifecycle marketing for that. Need it. And to your point, we also do a lot of cross promotion and co-marketing so, you know, we love to bring on speakers, uh, from Klaviyo to any of our virtual events and panels or round tables that we're doing.

[00:11:01] Um, we also are currently. In process of creating some new case studies together, which is, again, something we also do regularly because we have so many shared mutual clients that we are managing marketing for and in particular email for on Klaviyo's platform. Um, so it really varies. We of course also do a lot of referrals and cross selling and account mapping on the business development side of things as well.

[00:11:26] Like you mentioned, um, you know, if there's any. Clients that we're working with that would benefit from leveraging Klayvio. We of course make that recommendation and in turn that warm introduction to Klayvio directly as well. Um, and so, yeah, I mean, that's sort of the basis of our relationship. I would say.

[00:11:42] Um, we've known about Klayvio for quite some time, because I believe we were actually one of Klaviyo's first. Agency partners and our founder and CEO, Eric , um, has had a relationship with them since their inception. And so, yeah, I mean, we've grown together as our agency has grown over the course of the past seven years.

[00:12:03] Um, so yeah, I would say. That's how we originally got connected to Klaviyo. And then of course at this point in time, Klaviyo is a Titan in the industry in particular, in the e-commerce vertical. Um, you know, you asked me to touch upon what verticals does Hawk media serve. We are vertical agnostic. We can provide excellent digital marketing solutions for anyone.

[00:12:24] But our bread and butter is definitely in e-commerce and the vast majority of our clients are e-tailers are e-commerce 

[00:12:32] Alex Glenn: [00:12:32] merchants. That term e-tailers. Yeah. And I want to continue, um, just with one more question for you, Scorpio the program existed before you came on, but. Obviously you're running the shift now.

[00:12:43] So what keeps you in the program week to week? What keeps you excited? What keeps you motivated to continue working closely with the Klaviyo? 

[00:12:51] Ashley S: [00:12:51] Yeah, the Hawk partner program has been around for a few years now. And I've been at the helm for just over a year of myself. Now I've been in the partnership, a game on the agency side for some time though, prior to joining Hawk, which is awesome because it is a very close knit ecosystem.

[00:13:07] So I'm like. The other Ashley mentioned, oftentimes you will, especially if you work in partnerships, you'll end up working with some of the same people, across many different roles in many different companies, because it is so close knit, which is, which is great. Um, obviously in a pre pandemic world, we also got to get together in person, which was always so lovely.

[00:13:27] And hopefully that's something we can look forward to. Uh, soon I would say, um, Because partnerships is all about people, uh, relationship building, bridge, building, relationship management, I would say that's the number one thing that motivates most partnerships. People is, um, getting connected to others and deepening the partnership and seeing the best way to support the clients and the partner and how we can all grow together holistically.

[00:13:55] Um, I really view partnerships as sort of the, the tide on which all ships rise. And rise together. So I think the collaborative nature of it is something that I personally love and adore, and that's not just the partners that we work with externally, but of course the phenomenal, um, members of my team that I get to work with directly too.

[00:14:15] Um, so that's. Partnerships is the people right that you get to work with across the board. So that's a big part of it, but of course the other thing that's exciting is getting to, um, pursue really interesting projects with our partners, whether that's a specific cross seller upsell initiative, whether that's enablement or education or certification from our teams, to make sure that we are leveling up.

[00:14:39] The service, um, that we are providing to our clients by deepening our skills and knowledge on the Klayvio platform or others. I think those are some of the most exciting parts about partnerships 

[00:14:49] Alex Glenn: [00:14:49] answer. Yeah. You mentioned the slogan, the people are your partners. I think a lot of people forget. They think about partnerships as hock media, and Klayvio.

[00:14:57] Not, you know, it's, it's actually Scorpio and actually Golmes working together week to week on execution. So I do want to turn it back over to Ashley gums. If you could give us your view on the world of partnerships, you have a very interesting perspective coming from the agency world and then into SAS and working at, uh, Zayas, which has a great partner program.

[00:15:17] And now Klayvio, which I think is one of the best partner programs around. Uh, so you have a very unique perspective. If you can answer. How do you view the world of partnerships and then let's go into what makes an effective partner ecosystem. We call it a circle, right? Where there's a tech player as well as agencies, as well as you coming together to do awesome stuff.

[00:15:39] But please answer those two questions. 

[00:15:42] Ashley G: [00:15:42] Yeah, of course. And to be honest, I feel like I could answer that question in a variety of different ways. But I think it's something, you know, the world of partnerships is an ever evolving ecosystem and, you know, that's what we call it. So an ecosystem that everyone plays a valuable role in and at the center of all of that are our brands.

[00:16:03] So these brands look to resources like Klayvio like Hawk and inside of this partner ecosystem to kind of build them up and make sure, um, You know, that they're more successful and can be more successful than they already are. So the world of partnerships is something that I would describe as a place that's very opportunistic, um, in that there are a ton of resources that can be leveraged, uh, within, and they are all devoted to ensuring, you know, success on behalf of the brands.

[00:16:32] Um, what was it that Aristotle said the whole is greater than the sum of its parts? So the partnership world, um, you know, there were a ton of parts if you will, but they all share the same objective, which is to achieve that name. 

[00:16:47] Alex Glenn: [00:16:47] So lots of moving parts, lots going on. Um, so I want to go back to like the Genesis of.

[00:16:52] Something that will move the needle and you know, so you've got to execute, but you also have to come up with new ideas. You've got to present opportunities to Ashley and your other partners, and you don't need to use Hawk media in this example, if it's, um, something else comes to mind, but what is the ideation to execution steps of pulling a new partner?

[00:17:14] In closer to the brand. And, um, what are some of the things that you guys do as a team? Some of the, either thought exercises, mind mapping, or just, you know, getting into groups and coming up with these things and then talk us through how that execution rolls. 

[00:17:29] Ashley G: [00:17:29] Yeah. So, I mean, I think first and foremost, um, ensuring partner alignment, um, with the folks here at Klayvio is definitely critical to that.

[00:17:37] Um, and. You know, I'll use Hawk as an example, but it's something I do with my other partners as well is, you know, we do come together and allow ourselves the time to have, you know, what we call strategy sessions. So it will be the opportunity to collaborate, uh, with a partner, you know, in an informal setting really where it's like, we can kind of map out, Hey, you know, what are we currently doing with our shared customers?

[00:18:01] What are other things that we can be doing, and it's almost like a white boarding exercise as you will. So the objective is coming out of those types of strategy sessions. There's clear objectives on both Klaviyo's side of the house partner side of the house, on those action items and next steps to facilitate.

[00:18:19] Um, and then kind of implement towards a strategy with our shared customers, which is something that's awesome. And I do think, you know, having those informal sessions really brings, um, the relationship closer together. Um, and you kind of share a level of comfort knowing that everyone's on the same team.

[00:18:37] Alex Glenn: [00:18:37] Awesome. The important thing there, I think I kind of want to get into is just the difference between. You guys at your stage now versus, you know, maybe, and maybe pull from the Zacchaeus experience that could be more relevant because they have a newer partner program, but there's things that you want to do to make sure that you're increasing referral revenue and you're increasing new, obviously accounts being set up through your partner, channel partner, source revenue, but then there's things that you need to do to keep your partners.

[00:19:09] Engaged right. Hawk media is not a partner that I think you need to worry about so much in the sense that. They probably create enough inbound to make the partnership worthwhile without doing much. But as a partner team, you have to come back to your partners with these types of campaigns and initiatives and ideas.

[00:19:28] And is there anything that you guys like to do early on in the partner enablement process to really just solidify that reciprocity to say, you're in our partner program now here's what you get and you're going to love it. Right? Those first few months with the partners there, anything you guys like to do.

[00:19:43] So 

[00:19:43] Ashley G: [00:19:43] from the get-go, when we talk about, you know, Bringing that new partner into our partner program here at Klayvio from the moment they register. Um, and they become a partner. They're going to have an dedicated resource just to onboarding them. So what we really like to do is ensure that, you know, the partner has as many resources as possible.

[00:20:04] Um, That sets them up for success if you will. So, one of the things that, you know, while we can have a resource, um, you know, in a person and have them kind of coached through the onboarding process, it's really, you know, we have an entire team dedicated towards enablement resources. So what we like to do is get them set up with, you know, we have these like amazing product certifications.

[00:20:27] We have training modules, that's tailored specifically to partners. So really ensuring that, you know, over that. 30 60, 90 day period, which is pretty critical for their onboarding, that we're enabling them when it comes to, you know, how they can be effective in the program. But of course, you know, Klaviyo as a platform, ensuring that they are completely up to speed at all times, they feel super comfortable with our features and functionality is really going to be the premise on how they influence their customer success.

[00:21:01] Alex Glenn: [00:21:01] Great answer. So there's a lot going on. You guys do have certifications, like you mentioned, you do have a lot of assets exchange. I imagine some of that's in your PRM. Are there any other things that you guys like to use to exchange assets and create that LMS? Yeah. For the certification, any tools, platforms, anything to mention that's relevant.

[00:21:18] Ashley G: [00:21:18] Yeah. Yeah. So right now we're leveraging skill jar. Um, you know, the beauty of skill jar is, you know, in a partner program. While we have, you know, so many teams are different shapes, different sizes. Uh, it's a platform that as we're going through these certifications, as we're going through these trainings, um, someone in my role like customer success has visibility into, you know, completion rates, um, scores, things like that, but it also enables, you know, our partners leadership.

[00:21:45] Teams to have insight into, you know, how their team is adopting those resources as well. So I would say that that's definitely critical because it's, you know, we're giving them these resources, but it helps us ensure that they are taking advantage of that. 

[00:22:00] Alex Glenn: [00:22:00] Awesome. Yeah. That's, that's always good to hear, you know, for some of the other partner teams, uh, many of them haven't gotten to this phase yet, so thank you for that.

[00:22:07] And I'd like to quickly remind all the listeners, we have communities to support you in the growth of your partner programs. Or finding vetting and going to market with partners. If you're an agency for the tech partner teams, if you head to collective dot partner programs.io, you can find the partner programs, collective, where there are agency led, round tables, trainings, events, everything that you would need in order to learn how to grow with agency partners.

[00:22:36] If your agency had to community dot partner programs.io, that's where you'll find. More agency led round tables, the partner tracks that you need to succeed. And of course the support from everyone here at partner programs. Anyways, I'll let you get back to the episode. So Scorpio back to you, if you don't mind, Shiming in here, we want to hear, obviously you're past the three month, uh, the first year you're past the first several years with Klaviyo.

[00:23:01] So maybe draw on some of your other partnerships, but, um, what are some of the communication types and phases that you see typically in the more mature or the more. Just well-organized partner programs out there. What are some of the things that they all seem to do? And, um, and some of the things that maybe you don't like, and you see in more immature partner programs in the first few months, 

[00:23:24] Ashley S: [00:23:24] I'd say some of the best programs, um, or the more mature programs, um, you know, to take a page out of, uh, Marcus, Limonus his book, it's all about the process, right?

[00:23:34] The people and the process. So an established program, uh, typically has really. Well established processes in turn. Um, and that's really important because it makes it very clear to everyone what the next steps are. Um, what the best way is to approach those steps. What has typically worked historically. Um, and of course, a lot of the time it takes time to develop out these successful processes.

[00:24:01] So, you know, it's not that earlier or younger or newer programs. Cannot have this. I also understand that it's a learning curve that they might not yet have the experience under their belt to have developed out these best practices. So yeah, I'd say process is important. Um, You know, on our end, we're constantly iterating on processes for our partners and our partner program, whether that's vis-a-vis communication, whether that's for submissions of different pieces of content or referrals or anything like that, I'm very much into first principle thinking.

[00:24:36] So instead of just accepting something for the way it's always been and trying to improve upon it, Always taking a step back and trying to think about what is the problem we are trying to solve for and what is the best way to actually do that regardless of what we currently have in place. So we're constantly brainstorming and trying to be creative and think out of the box, um, to iterate on or create completely met new processes that might, um, You know, eliminate roadblocks or lead to greater efficiency or outcomes for both partners and parties involved.

[00:25:09] Um, yeah, so that's something I would say. It's great. When you have partners that are equally as organized or collaborative or flexible or open, those are, those are pretty important. Um, some. Of the difficulties that you can run into with some partners and some partner programs. And it doesn't necessarily come from immature partner programs, but I can touch on that in a moment, but even some bigger, more mature businesses brands and companies who are partners.

[00:25:39] Sometimes there's a level of bureaucracy involved. And so even though they have they're very well established and they have processes in place, sometimes there's just too much red tape. To get things done or turned around in a timely manner. So that can sometimes be a struggle if you're working with a large.

[00:26:00] Partner, um, that may be more established. Um, so that can be some of the difficulty with some of those types of partners. And of course, with some partners that have, as you mentioned, a quote unquote immature program, um, that's newer. They honestly might not have the resources. To execute on some of the things they would like to deliver, um, you know, the best laid plans sort of thing.

[00:26:22] So obviously that can be, uh, difficult at times. It's always great. If we can give them any guidance or support or help even to get shit done on their side of the table, you know, we're their partner here at we're here to help, um, But, yeah, so those are some of the pitfalls I see. Sometimes in some other partner programs with even some of the partners that we work with.

[00:26:43] Alex Glenn: [00:26:43] Yeah. I like that. You mentioned the bureaucracy and the red tape. We see this happen a lot with smaller agencies that some of the larger partner programs don't see as valuable right off the bat, but it's good to hear that even happens, um, in the larger agencies like hock media, um, where you just don't understand why.

[00:27:01] Um, this can't be done or this is taking too long or, you know, there needs to be too many people involved. You're on partnership calls with seven people and you don't know who they are or why they're on the call. And, you know, it just creates this just a different type of culture in the partnership, which a lot of agencies don't like.

[00:27:18] So I want to hear from gums again, if you can, you are on the channel success team, which has obviously different than some of the. Um, new channel development type routines that are going on, but you can tell me how you want to answer this. There are getting new partners into your program and sort of selling them on what's happening in the program and how they can be a part of it.

[00:27:41] But on the same token, there's probably a good portion of your partner program that. Are not generating anything they're not activated, if you will, or maybe they were activated and they're just kind of floundering and you have to generate new activity from those people, you want to go in and clean out the partner program.

[00:27:58] So that may be more relevant than just finding and bringing in new partners for you specifically. But talk to me about any strategies that you and your team, uh, like to execute, to get partners, either reactivated or activated quickly. And that could be just starting them off with a co-marketing routine.

[00:28:16] Maybe getting some account mapping, done anything 

[00:28:19] Ashley G: [00:28:19] at all. Yeah. And I think sometimes, you know, when we see a little bit of like, you know, when things are stagnant, when partners are either, you know, starting out and more times than not, it's they aren't aware of the resources that they have here at Klayvio.

[00:28:35] That they can leverage to get them up and running with our shared customers. So more times than not, if we find ourselves in that type of scenario where there's like really no momentum guests, some of those best practices are ensuring that, you know, they know what resources that they have. They're going to have someone, you know, There'll be able to kind of tailor these plans with all of their managed customers.

[00:28:59] You mentioned account mapping. That's definitely something, um, that we do often, uh, on the success side of things. Uh, more times than not, we're identifying opportunities within these accounts that they're managing. Right. So really just, you know, sharing our findings and insights with these partner teams kind of giving them a removing roadblocks, if you will, to kind of get them over that initial.

[00:29:24] Alex Glenn: [00:29:24] Yeah. And we haven't heard about that yet on the podcast. So, um, if you don't mind, I could ask maybe a follow up question, um, to the resources exchange. You guys have a very well-developed program. There's lots going on. There's lots of opportunity. And there's lots of knowledge and just value in what's happened, you know, what's w w what you guys have been doing, what you've done.

[00:29:47] Um, so I want to split that in half. If you could, if I'm a partner in your program, how do you talk to me about getting involved in some of the marketing efforts that Klayvio is executing? 

[00:29:57] Ashley G: [00:29:57] Of course. So I think we're, if we're not there yet, we're pretty close to 60,000 customers on Klayvio. Um, so as you can imagine, Ross, all of those customers, we've been able to identify, you know, trends, successes, uh, benchmarking across different verticals and industries.

[00:30:17] So, you know, if we can identify or work with a partner more times than not, you know, we have someone like hock who's agnostic. We may have a partner that focuses on one specific vertical. Um, or industry, let's say, you know, it's health and wellness. So based on some of the other customers that we have our insights and learnings, how can we develop these co-marketing opportunities that combines our insights from other Klayvio customers create this awesome content.

[00:30:46] Branded for the partner and get it in front of potential new business. 

[00:30:50] Alex Glenn: [00:30:50] Awesome. Awesome. And then the other side of that is just getting them closer to the resources of the partner program that exists, you know, as some could be in your PRM, some could be, um, just in the network itself. Um, so looping partners in, on things, bringing them closer.

[00:31:08] And this is more of a community question, I guess, than anything you guys have a really strong community. You've got really strong partner affinity from the partners that I've talked to. Um, and I'll pull an example from a recent discussion we had with, um, Josh over at Arctic leaf, who is a Klayvio partner, but he does this routine where.

[00:31:26] With his partner manager, he does a, we call it a memorandum, but everybody has a different name for it. It's pretty much like an executive summary of what the partnership is going to be. Um, what his goals are. Uh, so you make sure all of his partner managers know his agency goals, his target vertical, all the things that he wants to do with his agency that's related to the partnership.

[00:31:49] Um, and that, uh, you know, whether it gets signed or not, doesn't matter. But the important thing is. Bringing them very close to you as a partner manager, as a partner itself, just like you would a business partner by creating one of these sort of documents or just a plan that's in place. Do you do anything like that with your partners?

[00:32:10] Ashley G: [00:32:10] Yeah, absolutely. And one of my favorite things to say is, you know, my partners success ensures my success and I am a big proponent of insuring, you know, when I'm getting started with a new partner, it's very important to set expectations and have that alignment. And I think, you know, the practice that you just walked through is a great example of, you know, sometimes putting pen to paper and making sure all of those.

[00:32:34] He objectives, um, are really outlined. And it's something that, you know, if there are areas of opportunity that a partner has identified and comes to me and, you know, they want to Uplevel themselves as a partner in that capacity, like that's essentially what I'm here for. And I want to enable them to do that.

[00:32:52] So ensuring that you go through kind of one of those practices from the get-go is something that I always make sure that I am prioritizing for sure. 

[00:33:02] Alex Glenn: [00:33:02] Awesome. Yeah. And, and part of that is making sure that you are talking as much about their business. I would say, as Klayvio not more about their business, I'll go back to Ashley Scorpio for your take on this, what the pie chart would be of discussions, you know, so if you had a pie chart and.

[00:33:20] Of all the discussions that you've had with partners, the calls, right? The one-on-ones not the group stuff, but the one-on-ones from onboarding through the maturity of their partnership. Now what percentage of that would be about Klaviyo's product stuff? And what percentage of that would be about their agency business and then anything else that is maybe a big slice?

[00:33:41] I think 

[00:33:41] Ashley S: [00:33:41] it would depend on which parties on our end are involved. So any of the calls between Hawk and Klayvio that would involve the lifecycle team on our side would obviously center nearly a hundred percent around clients client's needs the Klayvio platform. Um, best practices. Any technical support or troubleshooting or anything like that.

[00:34:06] Um, any other conversations between, so that's, that's the thing about partnerships it's so robust. It's not just one partnerships person speaking to one other partnerships person. The partnerships are supported across either organization with many other teams. So, you know, on our end for the Klayvio partnership, it's supported by our partnerships team, our client success team, our sales team.

[00:34:28] Our marketing team. And of course our lifecycle team, just for example, and you know, I already touched on sort of what the majority of the conversations would be for the life cycle to Klaviyo conversations. Partnerships to partnerships would be more broad. It would be a mix of all of the above, whether it's, um, Business development, go to market strategy, cross selling account mapping.

[00:34:50] So sort of the referral side of things or any of those co-marketing initiatives, you know, right now we're working on with we're working on some new case studies with Klayvio, um, or any other co-marketing initiative, you know, some of our upcoming virtual events and award shows round tables, you know, and hopefully in a post COVID world, some in-person events too.

[00:35:11] Um, and then of course, in addition to that, um, sort of the brainstorming creative and ideas. That I talked about. And then inversely, when they're talking directly, whether it's, uh, members of the business development teams actually talking directly to those business development teams at Hawk, or with the partnerships team involvement on our end.

[00:35:31] You know, that would center more around pipelines and comparisons and comparing notes and potentially nudging prospects across the finish line on either side. So it really depends which parties are involved in which conversation and which way they're directed. But partnerships is obviously all encompassing the way I position ourselves.

[00:35:50] The partnerships team to all of our partners is that we are their internal evangelist here at Hawk. It is our job to ensure that all of our Hawks across this big agency organization, that we are, are aware of the partner they're offering and the best way to engage and get in touch with them. So we do a lot of education and enablement internally.

[00:36:10] Um, and then of course we do the same externally to make sure our partners know who Hawk is, how to position us, who best fits our for Hawk to work with and support. So it kind of goes both ways, but I would say that's one of the beauties. Of working in partnerships is, you know, variety is the spice of life.

[00:36:28] And we get to do a little bit of everything in partnerships with our partners. Like 

[00:36:32] Alex Glenn: [00:36:32] Klayvio, that's good to know. And those were some really interesting points because we talked to partner managers that are pretty siloed. You know, we have a few partner managers that don't have access to sales and marketing and leadership like you guys do at Klayvio.

[00:36:46] Um, and they are the only ones that their partners know internally for the most part. That's obviously not best practice. We always recommend to bring in product, to bring in someone from marketing, bringing your CEO into the conversation, even if it's just email threads, but at least get them involved because the more people internally your partners know the stickier, the program will be overall.

[00:37:06] So that's one of the things that makes Klayvio great, but I want to know what else makes Klayvio. Um, very. Um, efficient as well as, uh, just very successful at acquiring new partners. Um, your product helps a ton. You guys have a great product, but in your perspective, what are some of the SLPs that you guys execute on so well that you believe is part of the success of your program?

[00:37:31] Ashley G: [00:37:31] It seems obvious, but I would say that, you know, ensuring we support our partners, everything from their acquisition efforts, you know, is a crucial component of really helping our partners standard operating procedures. I think it's going to be, you know, ensuring that they get to touch every part of the organization.

[00:37:48] So post acquisition efforts, being able to identify if we're getting, you know, some of those shared customers up and running. What parts of the organization, can we collaborate on, you know, is it a unique integration that we want to loop in our solutions team or our product team? We want to ensure that, you know, if they need ongoing support, they can leverage that through success.

[00:38:10] So I think that we're always iterating on what those standard operating procedures should be, because, you know, as we acquire partners, we're taking those insights and learnings on like, what are those most efficient, best. Practices and ensuring that the partner is having the best experience here at Klaviyo.

[00:38:27] Um, but the overall goal of obviously making our shared customers successful 

[00:38:31] Alex Glenn: [00:38:31] well said. Awesome. So I want to do two things at the last 10 minutes here. I want to go back over to Scorpio for a little bit of, I'm going to talk to you about a specific routine that all partner teams do. And you tell me what.

[00:38:45] The Klaviyo's of the world do, which is obviously what's good. And then maybe some things that you don't like under that same topic. And then we'll go back to gums for her advice to partner teams out there that wants to get bigger and better, but Scorpio, if he could tell me partner communication, what is your preference for.

[00:39:06] Frequency plus maybe community. And then maybe obviously on the flip side, what do you not like? What is, what has gone wrong in your opinion for communication? Just ongoing community. I 

[00:39:19] Ashley S: [00:39:19] love to have, um, an open door policies. So very constant contact as anything comes up, it's better to over-communicate than have something unexpected, um, emerge.

[00:39:30] Uh, so I think that's important. Like I said, I love that we have shared Slack channels with a majority of all of our partners. So that way we can, as a group Slack together in each of those channels or directly message our partners at other organizations. Um, so I think that works really well. We of course also text.

[00:39:49] Like I said with some of our partners on our personal devices, I'm open to that, but. The way that can go wrong sometimes is if it's a newer partner that you don't quite yet have that rapport with. Um, and they kind of take advantage of it a little bit. Maybe they're, uh, texting you at off hours over the weekend, or really late at night or being really, um, persistent or incessant at time.

[00:40:13] So, you know, sometimes that can be a little bit intrusive. Cause it's also good to set healthy boundaries between work and personal, especially in this pandemic world where most of us are working from home. And I believe they said on average, the average American is working in additional four hours per day, uh, at a minimum, um, in this sort of COVID lockdown work from home life.

[00:40:35] So it is important to set some of those boundaries. So I think it's good to have a key channel. That's sort of your quick go-to messaging channel. And then of course, I think there's good. It's good to have a scheduled cadence for calls, whether that's weekly bi-weekly or monthly or quarterly or all of the above, depending on what level of support or touch points you need to have.

[00:40:56] Um, and then, yeah, in addition to that, I also think it's good to have an understanding, uh, for example, with zoom fatigue. And again, this is all kind of specific to our current reality with the pandemic. It's also good to have an understanding of video calls and what the expectation is. Um, whether you. You are the partner expect each other to be on video every time, or if it's the initial call and then subsequent calls or voice only, I think that's always good to have.

[00:41:22] So there's an understanding, um, and you're not putting anyone on the spot either way or pressuring them or, you know, you want everyone to feel happy and comfy and partnerships. So I think these are just little general courtesies, um, to think of that are applicable really in any working relationship, not just specific.

[00:41:39] Uh, to partnerships. 

[00:41:40] Alex Glenn: [00:41:40] Awesome. And I do want to ask about newsletters because it comes up a lot. I bet Klaviyo's newsletter. I don't get it. I bet it's um, I bet it's packed with great information. So, um, Ashley Golmes, if you could, uh, talk to me about what's inside of your newsletter. And then I want to go into some advice that you would give your former self, um, starting off as a channel success manager, but talk to me about what your newsletter is and then anything relevant around communication that you guys see.

[00:42:06] That works really well. 

[00:42:07] Ashley G: [00:42:07] Yeah, of course. And obviously, you know, Our newsletters are something that we put a lot of thought into. Um, you know, we typically send them on a monthly basis. And as you can imagine, over the course of the month, there are so many insights, you know, that we can, you know, share with our partners.

[00:42:24] So we want to ensure that we're really thoughtfully packaging it up and putting that nice bow on it when we send it out. Uh, so our typical, you know, content, um, really make sure that we're sharing things that are going to be beneficial. To the partner, right? So it's like new features and functionalities, like product releases that, um, not only, you know, what the details are, but how do you take advantage of this, um, and kind of put strategy behind it and leverage it with your customers.

[00:42:53] Um, also. You know, we have a phenomenal marketing organization that across those 60,000 customers are really like picking out insights, whether it's, you know, customers in specific verticals or industry, um, and sharing those out, um, they're typically like super relevant. There's a lot of really great data points baked in there that you can typically share, um, when it comes to like acquiring new customers.

[00:43:17] So that's always awesome. And then obviously specific to, you know, the partner world it's any. Updates, um, for our partner program, I know that this is a big year for, you know, Klayvio and our partner program while, you know, we've had it for a few years now. Uh, we recently added some new tiers to our partner program.

[00:43:38] So ensuring that across that partner base, they have a clear understanding of, you know, any changes if they need resources, if they have questions, they know exactly who to go to or where to go, um, to get answers to that. Great 

[00:43:52] Alex Glenn: [00:43:52] answer so lots to learn there and the partner newsletter, make sure it's actionable.

[00:43:57] Make sure it's valuable. Um, you know, I, I, I see a lot of newsletters that, um, are too focused on PR I guess is the term where they just talk about some great things the company has achieved, um, which is, you know, It's good to know that you're with a partner that is successful a company that is successful, but make it actionable.

[00:44:16] Like you said, make it super actionable in the sense that they can open it every single time they can get something that they can deploy in their business that day or that week. Keep it exciting. So Ashley, we're nearing the end here. I want to know Ashley GOME. Sorry. If you can give yourself some advice, starting off as partner success, you know, starting off as a customer success manager and the partner division.

[00:44:41] What would you tell yourself? What would be something you wish you had known, um, that would help out a lot in the learning curve or avoid any sort of mistakes? Yeah, 

[00:44:51] Ashley G: [00:44:51] I mean, I think that I would probably, you know, want to ensure, you know, if I had to tell my younger self it's, you know, make sure you understand what resources you have available.

[00:45:04] To you, you know, whether that's people in a mentor capacity, internal folks at your current company, really just ensuring that you're well aware of the levers that you can pull on in order to make yourself successful. Because you know, when you are working with partners, not only is your company's success online, your personal success on the line, it's ensuring that, you know, you're providing the most optimal experience to 

[00:45:29] Alex Glenn: [00:45:29] your partners.

[00:45:30] And you are lucky enough to have come from the agency world. So you don't need as much help with the agency persona, as I think a lot of partner managers and success managers of the world don't have, or they didn't have coming into their role, which helps out a lot, I believe. So. Um, anything else that we missed that you guys want to mention before we head off?

[00:45:51] Ashley S: [00:45:51] I think you've pretty much covered it. Very thorough as usual. Alex. Thank you so much for having us. Thank you again. 

[00:45:57] Ashley G: [00:45:57] Thank you.

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