Partner motion
A partner motion routes revenue through a third party, reseller, referral partner, systems integrator or marketplace, each with different economics, control and data visibility.
The four common forms are not interchangeable. Referral keeps the customer relationship and pays a finder’s fee. Resale transfers the relationship and the margin. Co-sell shares both and requires the tightest operational coordination. Marketplace listings trade a platform fee for distribution you do not control.
Every form degrades data. A partner-originated deal arrives with less information than a direct one, often without the contact-level detail the customer success model assumes. Designing for that degradation, deciding what minimum record a partner deal must carry to be accepted, is what keeps the reporting model intact.
Where it breaks
Partner deals enter the pipeline with no end-customer contacts, and renewal forecasting for that cohort becomes guesswork.
Related terms
- Channel conflict
- Channel conflict occurs when two routes to market can legitimately claim the same buyer, and no rule decides which one wins.
- Go-to-market motion
- A go-to-market motion is a repeatable path by which a specific offer reaches a specific segment, including the channel, the qualification standard, the selling model and the economics that make it viable.
- Coverage model
- A coverage model specifies how many accounts of what type each seller or team is responsible for, and what level of attention each account tier receives.
- Routing
- Routing is the deterministic assignment of a record to an owner based on registered rules, segment, territory, coverage, and existing account relationship.
Field notes on this
- Write the stop rule before the pilot starts
A market-entry pilot with no decision rule written before exposure cannot end. It gets extended until it is the default motion, without anyone choosing that.