Strategies for Prioritizing Tech Partners and Refining the Tech Partner Experience

In this discussion, Kelly Sarabyn, Co-Founder of the SaaS Ecosystem Alliance, speaks with Krishanth Thangarajah, Senior Director and Head of EMEA and LATAM Partnerships at Yellow.ai. Krishanth shares his experience from three years at Freshworks, where he led partnership initiatives that added 600 integrations in his first year and eventually became Head of Partnerships, overseeing partner tiering and long-tail partner strategies.

Prioritizing Partners and Integrations

Krishanth emphasizes that successful prioritization starts with understanding who is asking for integrations and whether they solve genuine product gaps. Key variables include:

• Customer demand: Track integration requests from customers as a primary data point
• Engineering bandwidth: Assess availability before committing to any partnership
• Use case validation: Ensure the integration addresses a real problem and is technically feasible
• Data flow considerations: Determine if it's one-way or two-way, update frequency (real-time, 15 minutes, daily), and API capabilities
• Common customers: Validate use cases with existing shared customers to build a data-driven case for product teams

The conversation highlights that engineering time is often the most expensive resource, making early scoping critical to avoid committing to integrations that require 100+ hours without proper validation.

Scoping Use Cases with Product Teams

Partnership and product team alignment is essential for tech partnership success. Krishanth recommends:

• Pre-validation: Work with product teams early, using customer data to convince them of an integration's value
• Engineering assessment: Evaluate bandwidth on both sides before moving forward
• Middleware considerations: Determine if third-party integration builders are needed and who maintains the middleware as scale increases
• Ongoing follow-up: Partner managers must regularly check in with product teams on prioritization and progress, especially in companies without dedicated integration PMs
• API support: Partner managers should support PMs with API requests and help navigate product-led integration priorities

Measuring Impact on Retention and Upsells

Demonstrating business impact remains a challenge for many organizations. Krishanth shares Freshworks' approach:

• Churn analysis: Bucket customers by number of integrations (0 apps, 1-2 apps, 3-5 apps, 5+ apps) and compare churn rates year-over-year
• Data correlation: Show that customers with more integrations experience lower churn
• Installation metrics: Track number of installs as a key performance indicator
• Marketing effectiveness: Measure leads generated from co-sponsored activities and co-marketing efforts using UTM tracking
• Co-sell pipeline: Track lead introductions from partner marketplaces and joint RFPs, building a funnel to show faster deal closures when partners are involved

"Customers are more inclined towards using your solution as well because they trust the partner."

Collecting Qualitative Data

Supplementing quantitative data with qualitative evidence strengthens the case for integrations:

• Reviews and ratings: Encourage customers to rate integrations in marketplaces
• Testimonials: Work with CSMs to include integration questions during regular customer feedback sessions
• Case studies: When developing customer case studies, incorporate integration-specific questions to capture testimonials
• Shared load approach: Partner managers from both companies can divide customer outreach to collect integration feedback
• Minimum requirements: Freshworks required long-tail partners to have at least 10 integrations and 2-3 customer case studies to qualify for deeper investment

Evolving Customer Expectations

Customers have become significantly more sophisticated in evaluating integrations over the past three years:

• Solution-focused buyers: SMBs and mid-market customers now expect integrated solutions, not just product connections
• Use case scrutiny: Customers increasingly examine marketplace listings and reach out to CSMs or support with specific integration questions
• Risk of underdelivery: superficial integrations that don't meet objectives can drive customers to seek alternatives
• Competitive advantage: Deep, well-documented integrations that solve specific problems create differentiation

Long-Tail Partner Experience

Managing long-tail partners requires clear expectations and scalable processes:

• Tier definitions: Clearly communicate criteria for moving between tiers (e.g., from tier three to tier two) based on integrations, case studies, and customer adoption
• Clustered approach: Group 4-5 long-tail partners with complementary use cases into joint stories or verticalized campaigns to reduce costs and increase partner satisfaction
• Investment thresholds: Require partners to demonstrate commitment (minimum integrations, customer testimonials) before investing MDF or co-marketing resources
• Maintenance planning: Monitor partner satisfaction and have fallback mechanisms if partners choose to discontinue integrations, especially for integrations serving 20+ customers

Partner Portals and Platform Management

The discussion addresses when partner portals make sense:

• Enterprise scale: Companies like Freshworks, Shopify, and Salesforce maintain developer portals where partners submit apps for review (code, QA, content)
• Mid-market challenges: Portal management requires significant IT resources that may not be justified for smaller companies
• Alternative solutions: Platforms like Pandium can help manage partner listings and developer portals without building in-house teams
• Realistic expectations: Portal usage is typically a one-time or infrequent activity (every 6-12 months) when adding use cases, not a daily engagement tool
• Data value: Sophisticated portals provide install data, usage metrics, and demographic information that can be valuable for marketing, though APIs often require developer resources to access

Vetting and Approving Integrations

Krishanth shares Freshworks' tiered approach to integration approval:

• Verified integrations: Apps built on SDK platforms undergo three-step review (code, QA, content) and receive "Verified by Freshworks" status with full support
• External apps: Integrations using open APIs can be listed but are clearly marked as not verified by Freshworks, leaving risk to the customer's discretion
• Quality over quantity: Focus on 50-100 integrations that actually work rather than thousands of listings
• Maintenance responsibility: Avoid allowing hackathon projects or student-built apps that won't be maintained, as they erode marketplace trust
• Customer clarity: Marketplaces should clearly indicate which integrations are certified and supported versus those that are not

Advice for Smaller Companies

For smaller companies seeking to partner with larger ecosystems:

• Portal screening: Freshworks uses a questionnaire to filter serious partners, asking about existing marketplace solutions, defined use cases, and API documentation review
• Goal alignment: Understand the larger company's ecosystem goals, partner page structure, and partner types before reaching out
• Visibility: Publicly discuss your integration, share customer testimonials, and demonstrate usage to get noticed
• Persistent outreach: Use partner support emails and maintain consistent communication about use cases and customer adoption
• Customer proof: Success ultimately comes from demonstrating real customer usage and value

Final Advice for Tech Partnership Leaders

Krishanth cautions against premature revenue targets for tech partner ecosystems:

• Value-first approach: Focus on customer value rather than immediate revenue generation
• Stage-appropriate goals: Early-stage ecosystems should prioritize value delivery and customer success over co-selling targets
• Sustainable models: Revenue focus alone is not sustainable long-term; build foundations around customer value first

The conversation provides practical frameworks for organizations at various stages of building their tech partnership programs, from prioritization and scoping to measurement and long-tail partner management.

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This podcast is hosted by Pandium, the only embedded integration platform that facilitates faster code-first development of integrations, allowing B2B SaaS companies to launch integrations at scale without sacrificing customization and control.

Learn more about Pandium here: https://www.pandium.com/

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