A few weeks ago, we talked about the shift from 1:1 selling (the grind) to 1:1:M selling (the lever) in this post.
The goal is to stop building your own yacht from scratch and start acccessing the "yachts" where your customers are already gathered.
The first question is always: Which yacht?
Here are 3 steps to help you start:
Step 1: ICP Clarity (The Prerequisite)
You cannot define your Ideal Partner Profile (IPP) until you have extreme clarity on your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP).
If you don’t know exactly who you are selling to, you can’t identify who already has their attention. Most founders fail here because their ICP is too broad (e.g., "B2B SaaS companies").
Narrow it down. If your ICP is "Seed-stage FinTech founders in the UK," your IPP becomes obvious. If your ICP is "everyone," your IPP is "no one."
Step 2: The Anatomy of an IPP
In a perfect world, your Ideal Partner is a non-competitive business that has high-trust access to your ICP.
They are the "Captains." They’ve already done the hard work of building the audience, earning the trust, and gathering the crowd.
Your IPPs generally fall into three buckets:
The "Before & After" Partners: Who does your customer hire immediately before they need you? Who do they hire immediately after?
The Tech Stack Partners: What software are they already logged into every morning?
The Service Ecosystem: What consultants or agencies are they already paying a retainer to?
Step 3: Think Ecosystems
To map this out, stop looking at your competitors and start looking at the Customer Journey.
Ask yourself: "When my ICP has the problem I solve, who are they already talking to?"
Sell SEO? Your IPP is a Web Dev agency (they build the site but don't rank it).
Sell Sales Training? Your IPP is a CRM implementation partner (they provide the tool but not the skill).
Sell Email Software? Your IPP is a Content Strategy agency.
Action:
Grab a piece of paper and draw two columns.
Column A: Your specific ICP.
Column B: 5 non-competitive businesses that solve a different problem for that same person.
Those 5 businesses in Column B?
That is the start of your IPP Hitlist.
Next week, I’ll show you how to score these partners using the R.A.R.E. framework so you know exactly who to reach out to first.
Keep stacking 🧱
TG