Joint venture partner marketing

Joint venture, partner or collaboration marketing can be a very effective way of:

Rapidly generating a responsive list of new prospects
Recruiting a referral group as a key element of your referral strategy
Generating in-bound links to your website, and by doing so improve your site's SEO

Set up a Preferred Partner link on your website

Recruit local businesses who will offer your customers and website visitors a discount on their products and services.

Not only will your customers get added value, but you also gain the database of prospects who have redeemed their coupon discount from your partners.

Your goal with referral partners is to be the first person on their minds when someone asks them about your products and services.

Brainstorm some ideas. Here are a few to start you off:

Be their number one referrer.
Make sure that you also have a referral mindset. Before you get you must give, which means that in order to get lots of referrals from these people you must be giving them referrals.
Sponsor networking events or social gatherings for them.
Try not to invite their competitors.

Have a good cross section. You might hold several of these parties throughout the year so that you can invite several different potential referrers from the same industry.
Put each one of them on your newsletter list.
Give them helpful information that they can use to boost their own sales.
Invite them to an all-expense paid luncheon that has a great speaker.
Treat them like stars.

Leave a lasting impression.
Purchase an information product/white paper that is valuable to their business and give it to them as a free gift.
They will thank you for your interest in wanting to help them grow their business.
If they are potentially a big referrer consider sending them something (like a fruit basket for the office?) every month. This will keep you in their minds all year long.

The cost of organising a joint venture can be close to zero. There will be some meeting and arranging expenses.