Who You Gonna Call? A Who’s Who for IT Services Firms Building Partnerships

Strategic partnerships with platform providers and big tech companies can be one of the most powerful ways to grow tech services, scale IT consulting, and find new IT consulting clients. But all relationships ultimately come down to the smallest unit: the individual. Nurturing relationships with key individuals within the organization is an often-overlooked part of nurturing relationships with key partners.

Here’s how to build strong relationships across key stakeholders and turn your partnerships into growth engines for your tech and IT services business.

1. Partner Managers: Your Friend on the Inside

Your partner manager is your bridge into the partner ecosystem — your advocate, connector, and collaborator. If you fail to nurture a close working relationship with them, you fail to realize the full potential of the partnership.

It also helps that they are probably the most readily accessible out of all the stakeholders you’ll come across in a partner ecosystem. Make their life easier by scheduling regular check-ins and reviews with them where you can focus on shared revenue goals, new certifications your team has earned or plans to earn, and influenced deals. You can also send short “win briefs” highlighting recent successes and next-quarter priorities.

The more aware they are of your successes, the more readily they can communicate them ahead within your partner organization. This consistent communication builds trust and visibility. When new opportunities arise within the platform, your firm will already be on their radar — helping you get clients for IT services through partner referrals and co-sell leads.

2. Sales & Account Executives: Their Business is Your Business

Co-selling is where strategic partnerships become real revenue. Sales and Account Executive teams in your partner organization want the same thing you want, which is to boost sales and generate more revenue selling the technology platform you specialize in.

Nurturing a closer working relationship with the sales team within your partner organization directly opens up several growth opportunities for you. You can collaborate on shared target accounts. Most big tech platforms have dedicated sales teams for specific regions or market niches. Working with these teams can help you gain faster access into your shared regions or niches as well.

Additionally, a close relationship with them allows you to understand the priorities for the tech platform so you can offer migration, integration, or expansion projects as appropriate to align with the platform's growth goals. This is a great way to make sure you stand out within the ecosystem. When you integrate into their sales motion — rather than acting as an external vendor — you gradually come to be seen as an indispensable extension of their team. This alignment can help you scale your IT services company faster and generate a steady stream of qualified opportunities.

3. Product Teams: Stay On Top of the Roadmap

Building influence with product teams helps position your firm as a trusted advisor within big tech partnerships. You can join roadmap briefings and offer real-world feedback from clients. One of the ways to nurture this relationship is to participate in beta programs or design-partner initiatives to gain early access and technical insights.

By staying close to the roadmap, you can gain a competitive edge that helps you align your service offerings with the products latest capabilities as well as the planned direction of growth for the platform. This keeps your solutions ahead of the curve and makes your firm more appealing to prospective IT consulting clients.

The product teams have their individual marketing resources and are always looking for customer use cases. This includes a huge co-marketing capability and an endorsement of your deep technical expertise.

4. Marketing Teams: Unlock Co-Marketing

Co-marketing is one of the most underutilized opportunities in partner programs. It’s also one of the best ways to find IT consulting clients at scale. Your partner’s Marketing Team is your key to unlocking the full scope of co-marketing opportunities on offer.

You can start off by tapping into the Market Development Funds (MDF) most platforms offer. Many partners leave up to 60% of these funds unused. Build ready-to-run campaigns using resources your partner has made available, and request your partner’s marketing team’s input on them to make sure they align with their go-to-market priorities too.

Remember to track ROI and share performance data to strengthen future funding requests. A few well-executed co-marketing plays each quarter can drive strong brand visibility within the partner ecosystem, besides delivering pipeline growth.

5. Professional Services Teams: Expand Your Delivery Capacity

Many firms mistakenly view the platform’s professional services arm as competition. In reality, they can be valuable delivery partners.
You can co-deliver solutions or take on overflow work from the partner’s internal team or bring them into existing deals to gain more credibility with customers. Standardize delivery processes to ensure smooth collaboration, which in turn will help you stand out even more as a partner. This approach also allows you to build trust and visibility within the ecosystem rapidly.

Planning Cadences

Consistent communication keeps your relationships healthy and your firm top-of-mind across the partner organization.

Here’s a simple rhythm:

• Partner Managers: Share success stories and next-quarter goals.
• Sales Executives: Align on target accounts and co-sell plays.
• Product Teams: Provide feedback and feature requests from the field.
• Marketing Teams: Launch and measure two co-marketing campaigns per quarter.
• Professional Services: Review delivery capacity and quality metrics

Regular check-ins help sustain momentum and allow you to build relationships the only way relationships can be built: through connection.

Wrapping Up

If you want to get clients for IT services, scale your tech consulting business, and compete effectively in the big tech ecosystem, you can’t afford to treat partnerships as a passive channel. By actively engaging with each stakeholder — from partner managers to marketing teams — you’ll build the kind of trusted, collaborative relationships that fuel long-term growth. In short, strategic partnerships aren’t just about brand alignment but also about business acceleration. When you nurture them intentionally, your firm becomes the go-to choice for platform partners and the customers who rely on them.

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