’Tis the Season to Celebrate Your Partners

2018 is winding down and many of us are already looking ahead to 2019 and beyond — how can we take our business to the next level, break the next ceiling, and reach the next milestone? As we ask these questions and dig for answers, we must remember one of our most powerful assets — each other.

Those of us in the Salesforce ecosystem understand the immense value of connectivity and partnership. At nCino, we’ve found this model so integral to our mission of transforming the financial services industry that we’ve curated our own ecosystem to help strengthen our product and deliver our services. There are so many companies supporting Financial Services that it is an integral part of success to create programs where business and applications can work well together.

If your company plans to make partnership a priority in the coming year, these tips will help you survive and thrive in any ecosystem.

Create business-specific APIs that facilitate collaboration

Because of the way companies rely and build on one another within our various ecosystems, a single company can’t be a system all on its own. And really, why would it want to? One of the benefits of an ecosystem is the many opportunities for mutually beneficial partnerships. The same way nCino designed and built a Bank Operating System that helps financial institutions be more competitive and agile, other companies can create systems and products that enhance and complement one another.

As you think about product integrations, consider business specific APIs. Rather than force partners to navigate your data model or work hard to gain an in-depth understanding of how your system functions, create business specific APIs to make integrations quicker so they can remain backward compatible at upgrade. This means you must consider what’s best for the ecosystem as a whole, which might be a little different from what’s best for your individual company or product. Being a good and effective partner means being mindful to take the ecosystem’s needs into account. You will also need to document these APIs and publish them on a community that your partners can access.

Create clear expectations that outline partner responsibilities

When you join an ecosystem, you agree to uphold and align with a shared culture. In the nCino ecosystem, for example, we partner with technology providers and financial institutions that share our goal of transforming the financial services industry and support our “hustle in comfort” philosophy. This means that not every great company will be a great fit for our specific ecosystem. Before you reach out to potential partners, make sure they’re clear about your mission, vision, and values.

Once you’re ready to partner with another company or integrate with a product, it’s important to be just as clear about other aspects of the relationship. Make sure your agreement includes things like intellectual property ownership, terms for renewal and termination, customer data and usage protection, referral agreements and anything else that will protect you, your company, your customers, and your other partners. By setting these expectations in the beginning, you ensure that everyone in your ecosystem is on the same page, pursuing the same goal and exceeding the same expectations.

Be inclusive and encourage growth by creating partnership levels

As you build your partner ecosystem or look at ecosystems to join, don’t always skip over smaller companies and startups in favor of larger, more established names. As long as a company can honor the partner responsibilities and is a cultural fit, at least consider working with them. You may even find these up-and-coming companies have fresh ideas and perspectives that can breathe new life into your products and services, or show you a different way of approaching a challenge. It’s also a great chance to mentor new companies and help create the next generation of transformative partners.

Remember: when one of us succeeds, the whole ecosystem wins. As you set your company goals for 2019, I hope partnership makes the list — for your sake, and ours.