Your health and wellness business is not only about increasing sales and growing revenue. It’s not just about establishing yourself as a brand name or opening up a second, third, fourth, or fifth store. Your business is not just about being in control of your own fortunes and destiny. Your business is about finding partnerships so you can stay true to your business goals and your business motto.
Strategic partners are like best friends. They keep you on your path to success (good friends do that) and keep you true to your intended goal. Strategic partnerships are mutually beneficial partnerships to help you steer towards your goals.
The thing is, it can be hard to find a strategic partner—let alone a partner in general.
In this blog post, you will learn how to find strategic partnerships so you can make your business as successful as possible and reach your business goals!
But first, let’s define what a strategic partner is.
What is a Strategic Partner?
A strategic partner is another business you have an agreement with to share business goals, success, and growth with. In layman’s terms, a strategic partner is your business’s BFF (best friend forever!). There are actually different kinds of business partnerships.
Here are two of the most common and popular business partnerships.
- Horizontal Partnership: This is when businesses sell the same type of product or services but decide to join as an alliance to improve their position in the market.
- Vertical Partnership: This is when businesses team up with companies within the same supply chain to streamline things (and sales).
There are other partnerships but we picked the more popular ones.
Why Do I Need a Strategic Partner?
This is a good question. But it’s sort of like asking, “Why do I need a friend?” Just like having a friend is an essential part of the human experience; having a strategic partner is an essential part of the business experience. There are a number of reasons why you need a strategic partnership.
A strategic partnership is a powerful tool you can leverage to gain an edge on your competition. In fact, recent research found that roughly 85 percent of company proprietors think partnerships are crucial for business success.
There are quite a few why partnerships are a reliable growth plan:
- Expansion into newer markets
- Improved brand awareness
- Access to new customer base
- Increased supply chain fulfillment
- Quickening of innovation
To have a successful partnership, you must have a solid strategy to grow your business and your partners. To do this, you have to make sure that your partners and your goals are aligned.
It’s important to note that a partnership is a huge endeavor and you have to be ready for the work at nurturing and maintaining this partnership. It’s not only hard to maintain a partnership, it’s hard to get started. Why’s that? Because it can be hard to find the right partner.
Unfortunately, most companies fail because they don’t find the right partner. According to a recent report:
- 43 percent of partnerships fail
- 45 percent can not maintain long-term success
- 67 percent of companies don’t strategize enough
So how do you find the right strategic partner?
How to Find Strategic Partnerships
Here’s how to find strategic partnerships that can help enhance your health and wellness business in the United States.
List Your Business Goals
First, it’s important to list your business goals. You want to not only list your goals but put a date on when you expect to achieve these goals. This can help you find a partner who is on the same boat (and if they aren’t on the same boat, you can get on the same boat).
Think About Companies That Can Help You Achieve Your Goals
Once you’ve written down your goals, think about the type of companies that can help you achieve your goals. For the health and wellness industry, these can be any company that sells or is related to health and wellness.
Identify Benefits Potential Partners Could Gain With You
Remember, a partnership is not just so you can grow your business, it’s also to help your partner grow their business, too. For example, if you are a Yoga instructor you could partner with a yoga mat company. This means you will have products you can use for your yoga classes or session, and they will have a partner who can help them sell (or rent out) their product.
It’s important to really think about the benefits. Make a list. Try to be impartial (I understand how hard that can be). Really thinking about the benefits; this will help you save you time and lots of headaches—trust me.
Review Your List And Start Looking for Companies
Now that you have an idea of what companies you can work with, it’s time to search for companies that can help you grow your business (and you can help them grow their business, too).
Join an Association
If you are looking for a strategic partner, joining an association can help. For example, if you are a foreign company owner who wants to move their health and wellness business into the American market, you can join the American International Health & Beauty Association.
An association like AIHBA can offer you wonderful resources (some of them free of charge with a paid membership). Here are some resources that can help you meet and grow strategic partnership relationships:
- Access to all members: By joining the American International Health & Beauty Association you will have access to hundreds of members. By signing up to become a paying member of AIHBA, you have the potential to enhance your business and build strategic partnerships.
- Contact Members: Being able to connect with health and wellness business professionals is essential for you to grow your business in the United States. With the American International Health and Beauty Association, you can easily contact members and grow partnerships.
- Get Business Credit Reports: When you decide you want to enter into a business partnership, you need to know everything you can about your potential business partner. You can track a business’s success by purchasing a business credit report. A Business credit report will help you access a company’s operations, financial performance, and filling records.
- Business Background Check: Before entering into a partnership with another company, it’s important to know who they are. AIHBA offers extensive business background checks.
- Access to a Trustworthiness Score: Trustworthiness is an essential part of a business relationship. AIHBA offers research for a particular individual or business so you can check their trustworthy score.
- Search and Suggested Partnerships: Business partners will help you stay focused on your business’ goals. However, finding a business partner is not easy. AIHBA offers paying members of our association the ability to search and find business partners.
Conclusion
Now that you know how to find strategic partnerships, it’s time for you to join a strategic partnership today. As we said, this is a mutually beneficial relationship that can have positive consequences for your business.
You can easily find a strategic partnership when you join the American International Health & Beauty Association. AIHBA offers foreign health and wellness businesses the opportunity to join an association dedicated to enhancing their business interests in the United States of America.
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out. AIHBA is here to help your company reach its true potential. Our service representatives will be pleased to help you.
If you have a custom request, contact us today at +1 (888) 407-3022 or email us at info@aihba.com.
