December 3, 2025 • 38 mins
Brian Weinberger is the Chief Revenue Officer at Sisense, a leading analytics platform helping companies embed intelligence into every product experience. With over 30 years in sales leadership across New York’s tech scene, Brian has built and scaled go-to-market teams at every stage—from early-stage startups to category-defining giants like Yext, Segment, and Salesforce.
Discussed in this episode
- The evolution of partner selling — from VARs to SIs to ecosystems
- How to know if partner selling fits your GTM model
- The delivery-first mindset that drives retention
- Direct vs. partner motion: Microsoft vs. Salesforce
- Why enablement is the #1 green flag for partner success
- Partner marketing: how to make resellers self-sustaining
- Using AI to power future-ready GTM models
- The case for hybrid work in high-performance sales cultures
Episode Highlights
00:00 — The “year four” moment when partners are selling for you
01:07 — 30 years of selling through partners in New York
03:22 — Start partner strategy with delivery, not distribution
06:32 — Why partner selling creates “superhuman” sellers
09:59 — Salesforce vs. Microsoft: direct vs. reseller — and why the future is hybrid
12:13 — The startup hack: sell delivery on your paper, subcontract partners
17:16 — A 90-day playbook for integration partnerships
21:39 — Hiring the right people to build a partner business
27:18 — How Sisense runs delivery partners and an Australian reseller
29:55 — White-labeling Snowflake: using resell to get the giant’s attention
This episode is brought to you by our sponsor: BoomPop
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Follow Brian Weinberger
Recommended Books
- What Great Salespeople Do by Michael Bosworth & Ben Zoldan — The power of storytelling in sales
- The Power of Nice by Linda Kaplan Thaler & Robin Koval — Why kindness compounds in business
- Sacred Hoops by Phil Jackson — Coaching and leadership lessons from the Bulls dynasty
Referenced
- Sisense: https://www.sisense.com
- Snowflake: https://www.snowflake.com
- AWS: https://aws.amazon.com
- Salesforce: https://www.salesforce.com
- Microsoft: https://www.microsoft.com
- Accenture (SI example): https://www.accenture.com
The GTMnow Podcast
The GTMnow Podcast is a weekly podcast featuring interviews with the top 1% GTM executives, VCs, and founders. Conversations reveal the unshared details behind how they have grown companies, and the go-to-market strategies responsible for shaping that growth.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Brian Weinberger (00:00):
You wake up one day in year four and you're
like, oh my god, like I've builtthis entire ecosystem that's
basically selling, marketing,delivering, keeping my customers
for life.
Sophie Buonassisi (00:11):
Most teams never get to that moment because
partner selling isn't ashortcut, it's a system, a
system built quietly over yearsthrough delivery, enablement,
and trust.
And when you design it right,it becomes part of your
go-to-market engine thatcompounds faster than your
direct team ever could on itsown.
Few people understand thatsystem better than Brianberger,
zero of science and a leader whospent 30 years building partner
(00:33):
ecosystems across VARs, size,and cloud marketplaces.
In this episode, we break downhow to build a partner selling
system.
All right, let's get into it.
Brian, welcome to the podcast.
Brian Weinberger (00:56):
I'm excited to be here.
Sophie Buonassisi (00:57):
It is great to have you here.
And we're gonna dive into allthings partner selling.
But first for the listeners,give a little bit of context to
your background and why we'resitting here today talking about
partner selling.
Brian Weinberger (01:07):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So I've worked in this city,New York City, for 30 years.
Um, and it's been an incrediblejourney.
I think uh partners have been apart of every organization I've
worked at.
I mean, it's it's kind of beenthreading throughout everything
I've done in sales leadership.
In fact, I was like thinkingback.
(01:29):
So I started at One Penn Plaza,ADP, uh, great place to start
my career.
And I actually got my secondjob.
It was referred to me by at thetime was a partner.
Uh, we used to partner withaccounting firms that basically
would take us to their clientsfor payroll.
So this firm was WinnixSanders, uh, amazing firm.
(01:53):
They basically introduced me toInfinity Info Systems.
About a year later, I went togo run sales at Infinity.
Um, so yeah, partner andInfinity was a partner.
So you we were a value-addedreseller.
So back in the day, it wascalled a VAR.
Sophie Buonassisi (02:08):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (02:08):
Um, and so yeah, partners are a part of
like my entire fabric forselling.
Sophie Buonassisi (02:14):
That is incredible.
Yeah, deep rooted.
And partner is such amisunderstood, nuanced word.
How do you think about actuallydefining partner in the context
of partner sales?
Brian Weinberger (02:25):
Yeah.
Well, we were talking about, Imean, it's complex.
Sophie Buonassisi (02:30):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (02:31):
So, I mean, you can have a tech partner,
right?
So there's partners that youintegrate your product with.
Um, and that's like your entirevalue proposition is this
integration.
You could also have partnersthat deliver your solution, so
implement it.
And then the decision is do youwant partners to co-sell with
(02:54):
you or do you want them toresell?
So there's a lot of um options.
So I think that's exciting.
And I hope to help people likewalk through like how you make
decisions on determining likehow to go to market with
partners.
Sophie Buonassisi (03:10):
And there are a lot of if then what decisions
to be made around partnerselling.
How does it fit into thegreater go-to-market kind of
context for anyone listing?
Brian Weinberger (03:22):
So I I like the first thing I think about is
your product.
Like how technical is yourproduct?
And it's okay.
Like it doesn't have to betechnical or not or uh or not
technical.
But the reason I think aboutthat is like really the
delivery.
Because at the end of the day,you can build the greatest sales
(03:44):
organization.
But if your product doesn'tstick and you don't have
customers for life, which iswhat um we always say, uh I said
since Salesforce.
Uh but basically if theimplementation is super
technical, then who's gonnadeliver it?
Is it are you gonna hireprofessional services, which it
(04:05):
turns a lot of companies offthat you have to hire a whole
staff to deliver it, or do youwant to find um these
implementation partners, youknow, SIs, system integrators,
subject matter experts, I don'tknow, consultancies to actually
help you deliver.
I think that's the firstquestion.
Sophie Buonassisi (04:24):
Delivery.
Yes.
Brian Weinberger (04:26):
What's your delivery model?
And then you can work backwardsfrom there.
Sophie Buonassisi (04:31):
Got it.
Got it.
And then what are the greenflags that partner selling is a
good motion for me?
And what are the red flags thatmaybe I should not build a
partner motion on?
Brian Weinberger (04:45):
The the word that comes to mind is
enablement.
Okay.
So I always think about um, asI think about delivery, how
technical it is, then you goback to how easy is it for um,
I'll say this, an average personto do like sort of an ordinary
person to do extraordinarythings, which is kind of what
(05:07):
selling is about.
And so how easy it is, how easyis it for a person to pick up
this category?
I mean, so let me give youexamples, right?
I spent time in the FPA space,financial planning and analysis.
And we're asking people earlyin their career to basically get
(05:28):
on the same side of the tableas like a 20-plus year financial
like guru, veteran.
So that's the question like,how quickly can you enable sort
of a seller to be an expert atthat category and your product?
So, and their industry.
(05:49):
So there's a lot of factorsthere.
So I tend to think about maybeum why not do both?
Why not um build a direct salesteam?
Yeah, think about how yourproduct's gonna be delivered,
but then de-risk by finding acouple of consultant
(06:12):
consultants, consulting firmsthat actually are almost like a
one-stop shop.
Sophie Buonassisi (06:19):
Yeah, and they can kind of do it
end-to-end.
Almost to to back up a littlebit, like why should somebody
consider a partner sellingmotion?
What's the value in buildingthat?
Brian Weinberger (06:32):
There's a ton.
Um There's a ton.
I mean, look, you take yourcar, your car breaks down, you
take it to an auto mechanic.
Sophie Buonassisi (06:40):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (06:41):
Typically, you want to go to an auto mechanic
that actually knows more aboutyour car than you ever would
imagine.
That's how I think about these.
Are they better at your fieldthan you'll ever be?
Um, so that's valuable.
Yeah.
Right.
Because you want, um, I alwaysknow that you, when you meet
with a prospect or a client, youshould know more about your
(07:03):
product than they do.
So that's the goal.
Sophie Buonassisi (07:07):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (07:08):
These consultants' partners may know
more about your product than youdo and the customer.
So that's valuable.
They can help you.
Um, you always want to bring inlike an SMA, a subject matter
expert.
They can help you win deals forsure.
They can help you keep clientsforever.
Um, and that's also the goal.
You don't want to just build asales motion that's
(07:30):
transactional.
And, you know, a year later,you got to go find more
customers because these areleaving.
So, you know, you have to thinkabout the entire I c I kind of
talk about the entire cycle fromtop of the funnel all the way
to customer for life.
Sophie Buonassisi (07:45):
Let's say it makes sense and someone's bought
into the the concept of partnerselling.
I think a lot of people aspireto build a partner selling
notion because from a firstprinciples approach, it makes a
lot of sense.
But like you said, it's notalways the correct path for
certain companies.
And that question of what isyour delivery is that North Star
(08:05):
in terms of directing someone,whether it's the right path for
them.
But let's say it makes senseand someone wants to explore it.
We've hit the kind of areasthat we'd want to hit on the
delivery question.
It sounds like if you were tosummarize what those things are,
almost like a checkbox on thedelivery side.
What would the core parts ofthat be?
(08:26):
Technical?
Brian Weinberger (08:28):
Well, I mean, delivery is a big word, but
there's usually like call itfive, six different steps that
need to happen with delivery.
Sophie Buonassisi (08:37):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (08:37):
So that's the question.
Like, how many steps in yourdelivery?
Like, do you have to do like akickoff that has a deep analysis
of what you're trying toaccomplish?
Then you have to basically sortof architect it, spec it out.
Then you have to go, you know,build it.
Yeah.
And you have to go sort of testit, deploy it, et cetera.
(09:00):
Uh, beta test, qualityassurance, all these things.
Um you got to figure out whatare those steps.
I mean, right?
Because the and and it's notone size fits all because the
world, if you're a startup,you're also like, I'm gonna be
PLG, I'm gonna be product-ledgrowth.
And so if you're product-ledgrowth, you're trying to
(09:22):
eliminate all of that delivery.
You want it to be self-service.
Sophie Buonassisi (09:25):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (09:25):
So that in itself probably lends itself to
a direct sort of motion.
But if you're not, and you'rein a category like uh data,
yeah, which is a big category,right?
Data can mean a lot ofdifferent things, but like that
in itself is an entire sort ofecosystem.
And so you you may want toconsider having a co-selling
(09:49):
motion or a reselling motion ora delivery motion.
I've spent a lot of time.
Well, I've sp my my 30 yearshas been at all different size
companies.
Sophie Buonassisi (09:58):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (09:59):
Um, which is interesting.
And what I think about isbuilding an incredible scalable
software company.
And I think about the two mostprominent software companies in
my time, which is Microsoft andSalesforce.
Interesting, because they'recompletely different from top to
(10:22):
bottom.
Yeah.
Microsoft basically has acomplete reselling distribution
model.
And Salesforce had a directselling model.
And so I'm like sitting here,I'm trying to build the next
Salesforce or the nextMicrosoft.
What do I do?
Sophie Buonassisi (10:36):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (10:37):
So I think a lot of companies tried to copy,
like they went all in on eitherone, and I think the world now
is a hybrid.
That's kind of where I'velanded.
And so I like, so I'm at thehelm, CRO, we got to figure out
how to scale the business.
So scaling the business is tokeep it simple, you want to have
(11:04):
a repeatable process.
So I'm not even talking aboutthe marketing aspect, but when
it comes to selling, you want tohave a repeatable model and
delivery is also part of that.
So I think a good balance is beable to get your product off
(11:27):
the shelf quickly.
If that's a direct seller,great.
If you want to experiment withresellers, I like going to areas
where I may not have coverage.
So, like, let's just say youbuild out a North American team
and then you want to go uhinternationally.
Yeah.
You may consider a reseller.
(11:47):
But then at the end of the day,too, I go back to how technical
is your product?
Do you have your own deliverypeople, or do you want to
actually leverage the world ofSIs, system integrators,
partners?
And here's here's like anuance.
Sophie Buonassisi (12:05):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (12:07):
So I was talking about Salesforce.
A lot of companies try to copySalesforce.
Sophie Buonassisi (12:12):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (12:13):
Myself included.
So me.
Yeah.
So I I've learned thatSalesforce would, we sold direct
and then we would bring inamazing partners and they would
sell on their paper.
So we had Salesforce paper, wehad the partner paper.
That in itself is prettycomplex.
So I'm for startups out there,I actually like the idea of if
(12:38):
you're going to have a deliverymodel that's not your company,
like Salesforce did, then whydon't you sell the delivery on
your paper?
So you sell the software, yousell the delivery, and then you
subcontract the partner.
And the reason why is whenyou're a startup, it's hard
enough.
Prospects don't even know whoyou are necessarily.
(12:59):
And now they're going to meetyou and another company they've
never heard of.
I think that makes it evenharder.
So I like the idea of, hey,let's just sell our product on
our paper and we'll sell theimplementation.
Because you cannot sell productagain, depending on how
difficult your implementationis.
You can't sell it withoutonboarding services and then sub
(13:22):
it to these people and they'llbe happy because you're feeding
them.
Sophie Buonassisi (13:26):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (13:26):
And it's not even about making money,
top-line revenue for yourcompany.
It's about actually keeping thecustomer for life.
Sophie Buonassisi (13:34):
That's the North Star.
Brian Weinberger (13:36):
Yes.
Absolutely.
I mean, uh churn is like it'severywhere now because we're on
the backside of the softwarerevolution.
We all enjoyed the softwarerevolution.
Um, and now it's like morevalue, right?
Stickier, more value, keep themfor life.
(13:57):
And so a lot of that is youcan't have software sitting on
the shelf that wasn't deliveredcorrectly.
So that's where it's comingfrom.
Sophie Buonassisi (14:05):
Yeah, we've kind of seen the pendulum swing
over to reduction in churn,customer success, really leaning
into that in the past fewyears.
Yeah.
And that undoubtedly has shinea light on that part of partner
selling.
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And you mentioned SIs,resellers, you know, there's so
many different types ofpartners.
What are the core ones and whatdo they mean for anyone kind of
(15:10):
wondering what those acronymstruly mean?
Brian Weinberger (15:14):
So let me try to break it down and not confuse
people.
But basically, like let's juststay on the technology side.
So um AWS.
Sophie Buonassisi (15:28):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (15:29):
Uh that's that's a city that we're all
building our own buildings inthat city.
So AWS is sort of thisplatform, tech partner that
we've leveraged quite well whereI am today at SciSense.
I can get into that.
But that's like a um, I wouldcall them like a technology
alliance.
Then you have like techpartners where your product
(15:53):
relies on, like they integratewith it.
So let's just say um youmention like a whole ecosystem.
Sophie Buonassisi (15:59):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (16:00):
Let's say your product does one thing in that
entire ecosystem.
Then you're going to want tointegrate technically with these
other products.
And to me, that's a bigpartnership, right?
Because you're you're sort ofall trying to work together on
this ecosystem and you're alltrying to get like a piece of
that ecosystem.
(16:20):
Yeah.
So the best way to do that isto actually not compete, but to
partner.
Um so that's the tech side.
And I'm sure I can even godeeper on that because there's
tons of integration, right?
Like if you have an integrationstrategy, um, should I give an
(16:41):
example?
Sophie Buonassisi (16:41):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (16:42):
Because financial planning and analysis
is in the center of manydifferent systems.
Sophie Buonassisi (16:48):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (16:48):
Because you have your financial system, your
accounting system, ERP.
Sophie Buonassisi (16:52):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (16:53):
You have your CRM system, and you have your HR
system.
FPA sits in the center of that.
So of course you need to feeddata from these other systems.
So that's a tech, that's anintegration partner strategy.
There are hundreds ofaccounting systems.
Sophie Buonassisi (17:09):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (17:10):
There are a few CRM systems, and there are a
lot of HR systems.
Sophie Buonassisi (17:15):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (17:16):
So what do I do?
Here's what you do.
You need to do one of each ofthese amazingly well.
And to me, it's a 90-dayprocess.
So, okay, let's say we takeERP1, so Net Suite.
Sophie Buonassisi (17:34):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (17:36):
30 days, we build out integration.
Our product is lockstep.
We got Salesforce on the CRMand we have workday on the HR
side.
Build these out 30 days, gomarket them for 30 days, and
then go sell them for 30 days.
You need to be disciplined.
I've companies try to do toomany things all at once.
(17:57):
Do one really, really well.
If you have to go to sixmonths, go to six months.
Then rinse and repeat.
Do it again.
So that's that's like more onthe tech partner side.
Sophie Buonassisi (18:10):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (18:10):
So that's a definition.
Um we've talked about delivery.
So delivery, uh, the names havechanged throughout the years.
Like I was a VAR, a value-addedreseller, which sounds like
it's so old school, but it'ssuch a like a mom and pop name.
Sophie Buonassisi (18:26):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (18:26):
But I loved it.
Um, but yeah, that's basicallya delivery partner became an SI.
And the reason it became an SI,I think because all the big
players came into the game.
Um, so if you read likeAccenture, right?
Like they're one of the biggestSIs in the world, and they have
every tech in the world intheir bag to deliver, and
they've made uh a huge businessout of it.
(18:48):
So SI was the other word fordelivery partners.
I also say delivery partners.
Sophie Buonassisi (18:52):
Right.
They're all synonymous.
Brian Weinberger (18:54):
Implementation partners, yeah.
So it's all synonymous, but umand then like then you the world
of reselling it opens up awhole other dictionary.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:06):
Yes.
Yes, I'm sure.
And and would you definereseller as a category enter
itself?
Obviously, there's a lot underit, but people are thinking
about aligning that spectrum.
Brian Weinberger (19:16):
Reseller, yes.
It that's we started there withthe whole mechanic.
Another example.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:24):
And what does it make sense for a company to
start experimenting with areseller team?
Because I know you've entered aSeries A company and started to
build out that motion.
Like at what stage does it makesense for companies?
Brian Weinberger (19:36):
Early and often.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:38):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (19:39):
Yeah.
I mean, if I you're, you know,early early days at software
companies, you're experimentingwith a lot of things.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:47):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (19:48):
In in all the go-to-market uh categories.
I mean, you're experimentingwith marketing.
Do you do, you know, do you doin-person events?
Do you do webinars, et cetera?
So I think it's very similar.
Um you you need a strong salesleader for sure to be able to
manage, you know, both thoseprocesses.
Yeah.
Another thing I think about ishow long will it take to get
(20:15):
this seller at your company tobe an expert at your product?
And it typically takes a lotlonger than you think.
It could take a year plus.
Sophie Buonassisi (20:24):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (20:25):
And then do you go to a firm that's been in
this space for 30 years and tryto get one of them to also
resell while you're trainingsome direct sellers?
So I think you do it early.
Finance people at your companywill love you if you can get a
reseller because your cost isgoing to be it may be more
(20:49):
upfront when you're recruitingand training, but over a long
period of time, you can actuallydrive your cost acquisition
down.
Sophie Buonassisi (20:56):
Considerable.
Yeah.
Which is why it's such a bigincentive for companies and why
they're they're certainlyinterested in it.
What does a upfrontexperimental investment look
like?
Brian Weinberger (21:08):
I think it's exciting.
Sophie Buonassisi (21:10):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (21:11):
Because you wake up one day in year four,
um, hopefully sooner, but youwake up and you're like, oh my
God, like I've built this entireecosystem that's basically
selling, marketing, selling,delivering, keeping my customers
for life.
I mean, that that's powerful.
Sophie Buonassisi (21:32):
Always play the long game.
And so if companies don't thinkabout building that early, who
is the right person to bring into help make sure that happens
as a sales leader?
What should companies belooking for, whether it's
founder or a different CSVexecutive who's looking to hire
and build that out?
Brian Weinberger (21:51):
It's a big question.
Sophie Buonassisi (21:53):
Brian, obviously.
Brian Weinberger (21:54):
Uh no, I I mean, it's so funny you said
that.
There's one person who's one ofthe best partner people I've
ever worked with.
Uh and so I hired her at thatSI um reseller, yeah, Infinity.
And I hired her right out ofcollege.
And then she, when I left to goto Salesforce, she left to go
(22:17):
to Exact Target.
Sophie Buonassisi (22:19):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (22:19):
Do you remember that company?
Sophie Buonassisi (22:21):
I sure do.
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (22:22):
Um, so and she built out their partner model
because basically Exact Targetwas email marketing.
So it's very uh agencymarketing create creative.
Yeah.
So she built out this entireecosystem of agency partners.
And when I think of buildingout a partner business, I think
(22:43):
of her.
Okay.
Her name's Nikki Bonacorsi.
Sophie Buonassisi (22:46):
Shout out to Nikki.
Brian Weinberger (22:47):
Shout out to Nikki.
Um, and so she is someone thatcould help sort of create the
structure.
And then you would needbusiness development people like
these Pams.
Um, PAMs are um similar tosales, uh, but like a little bit
more entrepreneurial.
Um, and they have to play thelong game.
Sophie Buonassisi (23:07):
Always play the long game.
Okay, super helpful.
And then how do you know ifthis experiment is working?
Is there one metric, forexample, that should be
waterfalling down and you shouldnotice and know, okay, this is
working?
What are the early indicators?
Brian Weinberger (23:24):
Well, I mean, it's I think it's similar to a
direct selling model.
It's a tamin.
Sophie Buonassisi (23:28):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (23:29):
So you're gonna have you you'll have to
assign quota to this.
Um I think quota would be it'sso when you think of a direct
seller, you always think of OTEtimes whatever.
Um, let's say it's three, four,or five.
I think with a reseller, you'reprobably thinking smaller.
Um you have to figure outwhat's your average, what's the
(23:52):
average deal size?
Sophie Buonassisi (23:53):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (23:53):
And then basically like what's the
margin?
So what are they getting?
What are we getting?
Um, and then do some sort ofcalculation.
Like um I guess I should giveyou examples, but like let's
just say it's $25,000 ASP.
Um, how many deals are peopleinternally doing a month, or how
many do you expect them to do?
Uh it's a math equation times12.
(24:16):
And then basically I would do acrawl walk run.
So I would put like $300,000that a partner has to do in a
year, and then maybe double itthe next year, and then, you
know, just build out a modelthat slowly over time increases
it.
I don't I don't think there's asilver bullet.
Sophie Buonassisi (24:32):
Mm-hmm.
Got it.
Okay.
So really treat them like, ifI'm hearing this correctly,
treat them like a salesperson,give them the quota and then
measure it based on quotaattainment.
Brian Weinberger (24:44):
Yes.
I think I think a little bitmore lenient than a salesperson
because you're not you're notpaying their medical benefits.
Sophie Buonassisi (24:52):
Right.
Brian Weinberger (24:53):
You know, it's like a little bit different
model that way.
Sophie Buonassisi (24:56):
Yeah.
What are the other importantfactors when building out the
partner ecosystem for a company?
Are there core areas that wemissed?
Brian Weinberger (25:08):
Absolutely.
There's the whole marketingside of it, right?
Sophie Buonassisi (25:14):
Tell me more.
Brian Weinberger (25:15):
Yeah.
So when I was at Infinity, wehad a mindset.
There's the cultural aspect.
Sophie Buonassisi (25:25):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (25:26):
So when you have a strong software company
that bleeds their software, likethey're just rah-rah, all in,
running through a wall, thepartner model becomes
interesting because then you,you know, you want to you sort
of feel like, how do I fit in?
At Infinity, we almost had likethe opposite.
(25:49):
We were like, we always feltlike more confident and more
spirited and more positive thanthe actual software publisher.
So I think that's aninteresting mindset.
And we put a lot of investmentinto, we wanted to be
self-sustainable.
Sophie Buonassisi (26:07):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (26:08):
So I think what happened was back to
Salesforce, I think they drovethe market to be partner fed.
So comp people were justbuilding these partnerships,
like, come give me leads andwaiting.
So I think that if you can havea partner that's thinking about
marketing and getting their ownfood, that is an incredible
(26:33):
like dynamic.
So then everything the softwarepublisher gives is gravy
compared to like, I think wherethe world is like, hey, I'm
waiting for my next lead fromyou.
So I think marketing is a bigtopic.
So at Infinity, we invested alot in marketing.
We did a ton of events.
Sophie Buonassisi (26:50):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (26:51):
We did a ton of top-of-funnel uh demand gen
uh email marketing back in theday.
Uh, we did a lot of clientevents in person.
And I think it's unique.
Like you just don't see a lotof these SIs, especially the
boutique ones, doing a lot ofthat.
Sophie Buonassisi (27:07):
Interesting.
That's a great tip for anyone.
So you built out partnermotions at past companies and
you've been out partners.
How are you doing it atSciCenter?
Brian Weinberger (27:18):
Yeah.
Sophie Buonassisi (27:18):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (27:21):
Um and we're still we're still doing it.
Sophie Buonassisi (27:23):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (27:23):
Um, so where we are right now is uh we have a
direct sales team in the US, wehave a team in Europe, and
basically I have a reseller inAustralia.
So he's working with a handfulof resellers that understand our
category, which is uh analyticsplatform as a service,
(27:44):
basically embedded analytics,um, which is a technical
offering.
And so we have resellers thereand it's working out really
well.
So um I want to take that toother areas we don't have direct
sellers, like Southern Europe.
You know, they speak Italian,they speak Spanish, so that
(28:05):
helps too.
Because if you can findresellers that speak the
language, that helps.
I am thinking about it a littlebit in the US, and I can
explain how, but basically inthe US and in Europe, we
actually have delivery partners.
So we now sell everything onour paper, including onboarding,
and then we subcontract thesedelivery partners.
(28:26):
I think that's working reallywell.
Actually started.
Sophie Buonassisi (28:29):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (28:29):
The data warehouse market has
skyrocketed.
When Sciense started, there wasno concept of Snowflake.
Yeah.
Okay.
Snowflake, Redshift,Databricks, they've all like,
they're crushing it.
So when you have a dataanalytics platform, data is the
key, and data warehouse is hugebecause you basically are
(28:53):
connecting directly to thesedata warehouses.
Yeah.
And we build a data model.
Okay.
So about a couple weeks ago, Iwas like, how do we get the
attention of Snowflake?
Snowflake, like Salesforce,like Databricks, these are
amazing companies that have hugesales organizations that really
(29:14):
um I always think of them aslike the bulldog, and we're
like, you know, small softwarecompanies like a chihuahua.
Sophie Buonassisi (29:20):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (29:21):
You know, jumping over.
So I'm like, how do we get theattention of the bulldog?
Sophie Buonassisi (29:24):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (29:24):
And here's how.
Why reinvent the wheel?
We why not resell?
In this case, Snowflake.
So we actually have our ownflavor of our own data
warehouse.
We call it Elastic Cube.
And basically, Elasticube ispowered by Snowflake.
(29:45):
So every time we sell a newcustomer, we're also selling
Snowflake.
That's why label?
Yeah.
Sophie Buonassisi (29:54):
Interesting.
Brian Weinberger (29:55):
Yeah.
So so in my mind, let's just dothat for a long time.
time and show Snowflake that,hey, we're also reselling your
product.
Oh, that's cool.
That that gets the attention ofa lot of executives.
Yeah.
And now I also think it ties tomarketing.
So instead of just going tolike a snowflake event just to
(30:20):
have a booth there, let's go toa snowflake event that says uh a
SciSense client powered bySciSense, because we're a white,
we're white labeled by ourclients.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:30):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (30:30):
And we're white labeling Snowflake.
So why can't we just say clientpowered by powered by SciSense
or powered by Snowflake?
So that like when we're at aconference, a Snowflake
conference, it's we're, we'rebasically selling their
platform.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:45):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (30:46):
So that is where I am today with SciSense.
That'll be the next 12 to 18months.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:51):
Mm-hmm.
Sounds like you're reallyleading with value to build out
these relationships.
Brian Weinberger (30:56):
Absolutely.
Get the attention of the getthe attention of the got it.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:59):
See for Apple.
And you touched on before thatyou touched on you got folks
internationally and youmentioned where you don't have
direct sellers.
Yes.
How does reselling or any otherpartnership form come into the
go-to-market strategy when youthink about the geography
overall globally?
Brian Weinberger (31:19):
I mean uh simple enough hiring hiring is
not easy.
Sophie Buonassisi (31:24):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (31:25):
Hiring talent and then you have management you
need locally language barriers.
Yep.
Are you in office?
Are you remote?
You know, those are allfactors.
Sophie Buonassisi (31:36):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (31:38):
And I go back to we have a partner in
Australia that imagine yourcompany taking a great marketer,
an amazing seller, an amazingsort of technical consultant,
um, an amazing CSM and puttingit into one entity.
(32:03):
That's what my partner inAustralia does for me.
Like so I get all of that.
Yes, I'm paying them marginwhen they sell it, but I'm
basically getting I'm it it'snot even about the margin
really, it's uh it's aboutmaking a stickier experience.
So the customer sticks aroundand I have uh a better approach,
(32:26):
better reach extension overthere.
So that's why it's amazing.
Sophie Buonassisi (32:30):
Got it.
Build a customer for life, asyou said.
Yeah.
It sounds like you can usedifferent geographies
strategically and partnerstrategically where you don't
necessarily have coverage or ifit just creates a better
customer experience.
So you mentioned it's not toodifferent from building out a
direct selling motion, buildingout a partner motion in terms of
the investment up front, youare going to get the long tail
(32:51):
effect from the partner program,but what did the actual margins
look like?
Or how should people bethinking about forecasting those
mergeries?
Brian Weinberger (33:00):
So first step is definitely partner with your
finance game.
Get really aligned with FPA ifyou have that or your CFO,
director of finance, whateversize company you have I think
the first question for that costand margin is the contribution
margin.
That's usually the first marginthat you want to think about is
(33:24):
what does it take to run yoursoftware on AWS?
And do you want to make 80%margin?
Do you want to make 70, 60?
That's a big decision for a CROor head of sales because it
kind of talks to how you'regoing to discount your software.
(33:44):
And then you can apply that tothe partner model.
So margin and then figure out Itend to be a little bit more
generous.
Of course I'm a revenue leaderbut I would be more generous.
If you're bullish on having areseller model, then why be
(34:10):
chintzy on how much marginyou're going to give them so
Infinity we were making from dayone we made 50% on the dollar.
Wow then we had a chance tomake 57 points I don't think we
went above 57 but we would sella $100,000 deal to Panasonic.
(34:31):
We made $57,000 so that's hugefor the culture it's it was huge
for our company and it allowedus to be we were the top
reseller five years in a row forSage software which so and and
a lot of that was margin.
So like if you're going to goall in, go all in.
It's kind of similar to findingsellers you know how many
(34:56):
startups want the founderseller, the founding seller
that's a really important spot.
So you're going to have to payfor that person.
That's how I think aboutpartners don't go go all in or
don't and if you're going to goall in then you know maybe it
(35:17):
will take a little bit away fromyour margin but you're going to
build a very thrivingecosystem.
Sophie Buonassisi (35:22):
That's fantastic.
Brian Weinberger (35:23):
And there's like three books in that jump
out in my career.
So one book changed me um whileI was managing at Salesforce.
So I basically just gotpromoted I'm uh running a team
that uh we're going upmarket.
So I came from like SMB toupmarket.
Yeah.
And I was like, oh my God, likethis is a little overwhelming.
(35:46):
What am I going to do?
And I came across this book andit's called What Great
Salespeople do.
And that changed everything Ithought about.
So it really dissected why do20% of your sellers do 80% of
your sales?
Sophie Buonassisi (36:01):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (36:02):
And that was like a whole thing where um you
had a lot of out uhunderperformers and and
basically they dissected these20% and what it came down to was
the ability to to actually tellstories.
Uh stories have been thehistory of life.
People sit around a campfire,they listen and basically like
(36:26):
stories beget other stories.
So I tell a story, then you'relike, oh, that reminds me of a
story.
So the art of selling is thatgetting people to open up right
because if you're trying tosolve a problem, you want to
really know what the problem is.
So anyway, that was a gamechanger for me and we ended up
bringing in the author of thebook we ended up bringing him
(36:48):
in.
We did 200 workshops atSalesforce.
Wow yeah it went so it startedin like my world and went all
the way up to like the largestenterprise teams and I became a
facilitator of this it was itwas phenomenal.
So I was a game changer.
This other book it's everythingI smile when I think of it it's
called the power of nice.
Sophie Buonassisi (37:08):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (37:10):
It's another famous business book.
Yeah.
And it's really actually to tieit to the partner it's about
being nice to people in businesslike how that just is a more
sustainable long term um beingfriendly and it talks about like
being friendly with like thedoormen in buildings because in
New York when you you know whenwe used to sell in New York we
(37:31):
it was vertical.
So you had to get into abuilding and then go knock on
every door.
So to do that you had to befriends with like everybody in
the building.
Yeah.
So the power of nice is anotherone that I just take with me.
Sophie Buonassisi (37:44):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (37:44):
And then the third Yes.
Uh I think it's someone I tryto be, but I'm not even close
but Sacred Hoops.
So I'm a big basketball fan,but uh it's Phil Jackson's book.
And it's, you know, basicallydissecting when he had to coach
the greatest player to ever playJordan and get him get Jordan
(38:06):
to basically buy in to theentire system and the program.
So like there's a lot ofpsychology behind it and that is
like the coaching side for me.
Sophie Buonassisi (38:16):
Yeah.
Super super interesting okay Ilove it.
I love it.
I was just listening to uh I'mtrying to remember his name
right now.
It's the it's the it was themanager of a basketball he's
pretty new on the block.
Anyways he was his like anagent yes I'm gonna find the
(38:40):
name for you later before dinnertonight.
How do you know what player?
I'm drawing blank on his namebecause he was somebody new but
he's got a couple I was gonnafind his name anyways I looked
into it and it's cool I was likeah I think you'd love it but a
size point.
Those are fantastic bookrecommendations.
Thank you.
Brian Weinberger (38:57):
And where can people find you if they want to
follow along I'm you know I kindof wish I was more visible.
Actually I was just talking toum the woman who runs social at
SciSense.
Yeah and she she just told methat everywhere I am to start
recording myself.
(39:18):
You should and basically sendit to her yeah and then like so
you know I'm I'm quasi active onLinkedIn.
Sophie Buonassisi (39:25):
Yeah.
But if people want to followyour journey at SciSense
building or get in touchLinkedIn is the best place.
Brian Weinberger (39:30):
Yeah absolutely absolutely yeah well
that will be in the show notes.
Sophie Buonassisi (39:34):
Ryan thank you for the been fantastic
really appreciate the breakdownof Parker selling 101 in a way I
feel like this has been acomprehensive maybe a 101 plus
102 lesson for everybody.
Brian Weinberger (39:45):
I mean look it's therapeutic for me because
now I'm like always thinkingabout building.
Yeah.
And so like there's a lot ofoptions and it's exciting time.
Sophie Buonassisi (39:55):
Very cool.
Well thank you.
Brian Weinberger (39:57):
Thank you
You wake up one day in year four and you're
like, oh my god, like I've builtthis entire ecosystem that's
basically selling, marketing,delivering, keeping my customers
for life.
Sophie Buonassisi (00:11):
Most teams never get to that moment because
partner selling isn't ashortcut, it's a system, a
system built quietly over yearsthrough delivery, enablement,
and trust.
And when you design it right,it becomes part of your
go-to-market engine thatcompounds faster than your
direct team ever could on itsown.
Few people understand thatsystem better than Brianberger,
zero of science and a leader whospent 30 years building partner
(00:33):
ecosystems across VARs, size,and cloud marketplaces.
In this episode, we break downhow to build a partner selling
system.
All right, let's get into it.
Brian, welcome to the podcast.
Brian Weinberger (00:56):
I'm excited to be here.
Sophie Buonassisi (00:57):
It is great to have you here.
And we're gonna dive into allthings partner selling.
But first for the listeners,give a little bit of context to
your background and why we'resitting here today talking about
partner selling.
Brian Weinberger (01:07):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So I've worked in this city,New York City, for 30 years.
Um, and it's been an incrediblejourney.
I think uh partners have been apart of every organization I've
worked at.
I mean, it's it's kind of beenthreading throughout everything
I've done in sales leadership.
In fact, I was like thinkingback.
(01:29):
So I started at One Penn Plaza,ADP, uh, great place to start
my career.
And I actually got my secondjob.
It was referred to me by at thetime was a partner.
Uh, we used to partner withaccounting firms that basically
would take us to their clientsfor payroll.
So this firm was WinnixSanders, uh, amazing firm.
(01:53):
They basically introduced me toInfinity Info Systems.
About a year later, I went togo run sales at Infinity.
Um, so yeah, partner andInfinity was a partner.
So you we were a value-addedreseller.
So back in the day, it wascalled a VAR.
Sophie Buonassisi (02:08):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (02:08):
Um, and so yeah, partners are a part of
like my entire fabric forselling.
Sophie Buonassisi (02:14):
That is incredible.
Yeah, deep rooted.
And partner is such amisunderstood, nuanced word.
How do you think about actuallydefining partner in the context
of partner sales?
Brian Weinberger (02:25):
Yeah.
Well, we were talking about, Imean, it's complex.
Sophie Buonassisi (02:30):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (02:31):
So, I mean, you can have a tech partner,
right?
So there's partners that youintegrate your product with.
Um, and that's like your entirevalue proposition is this
integration.
You could also have partnersthat deliver your solution, so
implement it.
And then the decision is do youwant partners to co-sell with
(02:54):
you or do you want them toresell?
So there's a lot of um options.
So I think that's exciting.
And I hope to help people likewalk through like how you make
decisions on determining likehow to go to market with
partners.
Sophie Buonassisi (03:10):
And there are a lot of if then what decisions
to be made around partnerselling.
How does it fit into thegreater go-to-market kind of
context for anyone listing?
Brian Weinberger (03:22):
So I I like the first thing I think about is
your product.
Like how technical is yourproduct?
And it's okay.
Like it doesn't have to betechnical or not or uh or not
technical.
But the reason I think aboutthat is like really the
delivery.
Because at the end of the day,you can build the greatest sales
(03:44):
organization.
But if your product doesn'tstick and you don't have
customers for life, which iswhat um we always say, uh I said
since Salesforce.
Uh but basically if theimplementation is super
technical, then who's gonnadeliver it?
Is it are you gonna hireprofessional services, which it
(04:05):
turns a lot of companies offthat you have to hire a whole
staff to deliver it, or do youwant to find um these
implementation partners, youknow, SIs, system integrators,
subject matter experts, I don'tknow, consultancies to actually
help you deliver.
I think that's the firstquestion.
Sophie Buonassisi (04:24):
Delivery.
Yes.
Brian Weinberger (04:26):
What's your delivery model?
And then you can work backwardsfrom there.
Sophie Buonassisi (04:31):
Got it.
Got it.
And then what are the greenflags that partner selling is a
good motion for me?
And what are the red flags thatmaybe I should not build a
partner motion on?
Brian Weinberger (04:45):
The the word that comes to mind is
enablement.
Okay.
So I always think about um, asI think about delivery, how
technical it is, then you goback to how easy is it for um,
I'll say this, an average personto do like sort of an ordinary
person to do extraordinarythings, which is kind of what
(05:07):
selling is about.
And so how easy it is, how easyis it for a person to pick up
this category?
I mean, so let me give youexamples, right?
I spent time in the FPA space,financial planning and analysis.
And we're asking people earlyin their career to basically get
(05:28):
on the same side of the tableas like a 20-plus year financial
like guru, veteran.
So that's the question like,how quickly can you enable sort
of a seller to be an expert atthat category and your product?
So, and their industry.
(05:49):
So there's a lot of factorsthere.
So I tend to think about maybeum why not do both?
Why not um build a direct salesteam?
Yeah, think about how yourproduct's gonna be delivered,
but then de-risk by finding acouple of consultant
(06:12):
consultants, consulting firmsthat actually are almost like a
one-stop shop.
Sophie Buonassisi (06:19):
Yeah, and they can kind of do it
end-to-end.
Almost to to back up a littlebit, like why should somebody
consider a partner sellingmotion?
What's the value in buildingthat?
Brian Weinberger (06:32):
There's a ton.
Um There's a ton.
I mean, look, you take yourcar, your car breaks down, you
take it to an auto mechanic.
Sophie Buonassisi (06:40):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (06:41):
Typically, you want to go to an auto mechanic
that actually knows more aboutyour car than you ever would
imagine.
That's how I think about these.
Are they better at your fieldthan you'll ever be?
Um, so that's valuable.
Yeah.
Right.
Because you want, um, I alwaysknow that you, when you meet
with a prospect or a client, youshould know more about your
(07:03):
product than they do.
So that's the goal.
Sophie Buonassisi (07:07):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (07:08):
These consultants' partners may know
more about your product than youdo and the customer.
So that's valuable.
They can help you.
Um, you always want to bring inlike an SMA, a subject matter
expert.
They can help you win deals forsure.
They can help you keep clientsforever.
Um, and that's also the goal.
You don't want to just build asales motion that's
(07:30):
transactional.
And, you know, a year later,you got to go find more
customers because these areleaving.
So, you know, you have to thinkabout the entire I c I kind of
talk about the entire cycle fromtop of the funnel all the way
to customer for life.
Sophie Buonassisi (07:45):
Let's say it makes sense and someone's bought
into the the concept of partnerselling.
I think a lot of people aspireto build a partner selling
notion because from a firstprinciples approach, it makes a
lot of sense.
But like you said, it's notalways the correct path for
certain companies.
And that question of what isyour delivery is that North Star
(08:05):
in terms of directing someone,whether it's the right path for
them.
But let's say it makes senseand someone wants to explore it.
We've hit the kind of areasthat we'd want to hit on the
delivery question.
It sounds like if you were tosummarize what those things are,
almost like a checkbox on thedelivery side.
What would the core parts ofthat be?
(08:26):
Technical?
Brian Weinberger (08:28):
Well, I mean, delivery is a big word, but
there's usually like call itfive, six different steps that
need to happen with delivery.
Sophie Buonassisi (08:37):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (08:37):
So that's the question.
Like, how many steps in yourdelivery?
Like, do you have to do like akickoff that has a deep analysis
of what you're trying toaccomplish?
Then you have to basically sortof architect it, spec it out.
Then you have to go, you know,build it.
Yeah.
And you have to go sort of testit, deploy it, et cetera.
(09:00):
Uh, beta test, qualityassurance, all these things.
Um you got to figure out whatare those steps.
I mean, right?
Because the and and it's notone size fits all because the
world, if you're a startup,you're also like, I'm gonna be
PLG, I'm gonna be product-ledgrowth.
And so if you're product-ledgrowth, you're trying to
(09:22):
eliminate all of that delivery.
You want it to be self-service.
Sophie Buonassisi (09:25):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (09:25):
So that in itself probably lends itself to
a direct sort of motion.
But if you're not, and you'rein a category like uh data,
yeah, which is a big category,right?
Data can mean a lot ofdifferent things, but like that
in itself is an entire sort ofecosystem.
And so you you may want toconsider having a co-selling
(09:49):
motion or a reselling motion ora delivery motion.
I've spent a lot of time.
Well, I've sp my my 30 yearshas been at all different size
companies.
Sophie Buonassisi (09:58):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (09:59):
Um, which is interesting.
And what I think about isbuilding an incredible scalable
software company.
And I think about the two mostprominent software companies in
my time, which is Microsoft andSalesforce.
Interesting, because they'recompletely different from top to
(10:22):
bottom.
Yeah.
Microsoft basically has acomplete reselling distribution
model.
And Salesforce had a directselling model.
And so I'm like sitting here,I'm trying to build the next
Salesforce or the nextMicrosoft.
What do I do?
Sophie Buonassisi (10:36):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (10:37):
So I think a lot of companies tried to copy,
like they went all in on eitherone, and I think the world now
is a hybrid.
That's kind of where I'velanded.
And so I like, so I'm at thehelm, CRO, we got to figure out
how to scale the business.
So scaling the business is tokeep it simple, you want to have
(11:04):
a repeatable process.
So I'm not even talking aboutthe marketing aspect, but when
it comes to selling, you want tohave a repeatable model and
delivery is also part of that.
So I think a good balance is beable to get your product off
(11:27):
the shelf quickly.
If that's a direct seller,great.
If you want to experiment withresellers, I like going to areas
where I may not have coverage.
So, like, let's just say youbuild out a North American team
and then you want to go uhinternationally.
Yeah.
You may consider a reseller.
(11:47):
But then at the end of the day,too, I go back to how technical
is your product?
Do you have your own deliverypeople, or do you want to
actually leverage the world ofSIs, system integrators,
partners?
And here's here's like anuance.
Sophie Buonassisi (12:05):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (12:07):
So I was talking about Salesforce.
A lot of companies try to copySalesforce.
Sophie Buonassisi (12:12):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (12:13):
Myself included.
So me.
Yeah.
So I I've learned thatSalesforce would, we sold direct
and then we would bring inamazing partners and they would
sell on their paper.
So we had Salesforce paper, wehad the partner paper.
That in itself is prettycomplex.
So I'm for startups out there,I actually like the idea of if
(12:38):
you're going to have a deliverymodel that's not your company,
like Salesforce did, then whydon't you sell the delivery on
your paper?
So you sell the software, yousell the delivery, and then you
subcontract the partner.
And the reason why is whenyou're a startup, it's hard
enough.
Prospects don't even know whoyou are necessarily.
(12:59):
And now they're going to meetyou and another company they've
never heard of.
I think that makes it evenharder.
So I like the idea of, hey,let's just sell our product on
our paper and we'll sell theimplementation.
Because you cannot sell productagain, depending on how
difficult your implementationis.
You can't sell it withoutonboarding services and then sub
(13:22):
it to these people and they'llbe happy because you're feeding
them.
Sophie Buonassisi (13:26):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (13:26):
And it's not even about making money,
top-line revenue for yourcompany.
It's about actually keeping thecustomer for life.
Sophie Buonassisi (13:34):
That's the North Star.
Brian Weinberger (13:36):
Yes.
Absolutely.
I mean, uh churn is like it'severywhere now because we're on
the backside of the softwarerevolution.
We all enjoyed the softwarerevolution.
Um, and now it's like morevalue, right?
Stickier, more value, keep themfor life.
(13:57):
And so a lot of that is youcan't have software sitting on
the shelf that wasn't deliveredcorrectly.
So that's where it's comingfrom.
Sophie Buonassisi (14:05):
Yeah, we've kind of seen the pendulum swing
over to reduction in churn,customer success, really leaning
into that in the past fewyears.
Yeah.
And that undoubtedly has shinea light on that part of partner
selling.
Yes.
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And you mentioned SIs,resellers, you know, there's so
many different types ofpartners.
What are the core ones and whatdo they mean for anyone kind of
(15:10):
wondering what those acronymstruly mean?
Brian Weinberger (15:14):
So let me try to break it down and not confuse
people.
But basically, like let's juststay on the technology side.
So um AWS.
Sophie Buonassisi (15:28):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (15:29):
Uh that's that's a city that we're all
building our own buildings inthat city.
So AWS is sort of thisplatform, tech partner that
we've leveraged quite well whereI am today at SciSense.
I can get into that.
But that's like a um, I wouldcall them like a technology
alliance.
Then you have like techpartners where your product
(15:53):
relies on, like they integratewith it.
So let's just say um youmention like a whole ecosystem.
Sophie Buonassisi (15:59):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (16:00):
Let's say your product does one thing in that
entire ecosystem.
Then you're going to want tointegrate technically with these
other products.
And to me, that's a bigpartnership, right?
Because you're you're sort ofall trying to work together on
this ecosystem and you're alltrying to get like a piece of
that ecosystem.
(16:20):
Yeah.
So the best way to do that isto actually not compete, but to
partner.
Um so that's the tech side.
And I'm sure I can even godeeper on that because there's
tons of integration, right?
Like if you have an integrationstrategy, um, should I give an
(16:41):
example?
Sophie Buonassisi (16:41):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (16:42):
Because financial planning and analysis
is in the center of manydifferent systems.
Sophie Buonassisi (16:48):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (16:48):
Because you have your financial system, your
accounting system, ERP.
Sophie Buonassisi (16:52):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (16:53):
You have your CRM system, and you have your HR
system.
FPA sits in the center of that.
So of course you need to feeddata from these other systems.
So that's a tech, that's anintegration partner strategy.
There are hundreds ofaccounting systems.
Sophie Buonassisi (17:09):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (17:10):
There are a few CRM systems, and there are a
lot of HR systems.
Sophie Buonassisi (17:15):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (17:16):
So what do I do?
Here's what you do.
You need to do one of each ofthese amazingly well.
And to me, it's a 90-dayprocess.
So, okay, let's say we takeERP1, so Net Suite.
Sophie Buonassisi (17:34):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (17:36):
30 days, we build out integration.
Our product is lockstep.
We got Salesforce on the CRMand we have workday on the HR
side.
Build these out 30 days, gomarket them for 30 days, and
then go sell them for 30 days.
You need to be disciplined.
I've companies try to do toomany things all at once.
(17:57):
Do one really, really well.
If you have to go to sixmonths, go to six months.
Then rinse and repeat.
Do it again.
So that's that's like more onthe tech partner side.
Sophie Buonassisi (18:10):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (18:10):
So that's a definition.
Um we've talked about delivery.
So delivery, uh, the names havechanged throughout the years.
Like I was a VAR, a value-addedreseller, which sounds like
it's so old school, but it'ssuch a like a mom and pop name.
Sophie Buonassisi (18:26):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (18:26):
But I loved it.
Um, but yeah, that's basicallya delivery partner became an SI.
And the reason it became an SI,I think because all the big
players came into the game.
Um, so if you read likeAccenture, right?
Like they're one of the biggestSIs in the world, and they have
every tech in the world intheir bag to deliver, and
they've made uh a huge businessout of it.
(18:48):
So SI was the other word fordelivery partners.
I also say delivery partners.
Sophie Buonassisi (18:52):
Right.
They're all synonymous.
Brian Weinberger (18:54):
Implementation partners, yeah.
So it's all synonymous, but umand then like then you the world
of reselling it opens up awhole other dictionary.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:06):
Yes.
Yes, I'm sure.
And and would you definereseller as a category enter
itself?
Obviously, there's a lot underit, but people are thinking
about aligning that spectrum.
Brian Weinberger (19:16):
Reseller, yes.
It that's we started there withthe whole mechanic.
Another example.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:24):
And what does it make sense for a company to
start experimenting with areseller team?
Because I know you've entered aSeries A company and started to
build out that motion.
Like at what stage does it makesense for companies?
Brian Weinberger (19:36):
Early and often.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:38):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (19:39):
Yeah.
I mean, if I you're, you know,early early days at software
companies, you're experimentingwith a lot of things.
Sophie Buonassisi (19:47):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (19:48):
In in all the go-to-market uh categories.
I mean, you're experimentingwith marketing.
Do you do, you know, do you doin-person events?
Do you do webinars, et cetera?
So I think it's very similar.
Um you you need a strong salesleader for sure to be able to
manage, you know, both thoseprocesses.
Yeah.
Another thing I think about ishow long will it take to get
(20:15):
this seller at your company tobe an expert at your product?
And it typically takes a lotlonger than you think.
It could take a year plus.
Sophie Buonassisi (20:24):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (20:25):
And then do you go to a firm that's been in
this space for 30 years and tryto get one of them to also
resell while you're trainingsome direct sellers?
So I think you do it early.
Finance people at your companywill love you if you can get a
reseller because your cost isgoing to be it may be more
(20:49):
upfront when you're recruitingand training, but over a long
period of time, you can actuallydrive your cost acquisition
down.
Sophie Buonassisi (20:56):
Considerable.
Yeah.
Which is why it's such a bigincentive for companies and why
they're they're certainlyinterested in it.
What does a upfrontexperimental investment look
like?
Brian Weinberger (21:08):
I think it's exciting.
Sophie Buonassisi (21:10):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (21:11):
Because you wake up one day in year four,
um, hopefully sooner, but youwake up and you're like, oh my
God, like I've built this entireecosystem that's basically
selling, marketing, selling,delivering, keeping my customers
for life.
I mean, that that's powerful.
Sophie Buonassisi (21:32):
Always play the long game.
And so if companies don't thinkabout building that early, who
is the right person to bring into help make sure that happens
as a sales leader?
What should companies belooking for, whether it's
founder or a different CSVexecutive who's looking to hire
and build that out?
Brian Weinberger (21:51):
It's a big question.
Sophie Buonassisi (21:53):
Brian, obviously.
Brian Weinberger (21:54):
Uh no, I I mean, it's so funny you said
that.
There's one person who's one ofthe best partner people I've
ever worked with.
Uh and so I hired her at thatSI um reseller, yeah, Infinity.
And I hired her right out ofcollege.
And then she, when I left to goto Salesforce, she left to go
(22:17):
to Exact Target.
Sophie Buonassisi (22:19):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (22:19):
Do you remember that company?
Sophie Buonassisi (22:21):
I sure do.
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (22:22):
Um, so and she built out their partner model
because basically Exact Targetwas email marketing.
So it's very uh agencymarketing create creative.
Yeah.
So she built out this entireecosystem of agency partners.
And when I think of buildingout a partner business, I think
(22:43):
of her.
Okay.
Her name's Nikki Bonacorsi.
Sophie Buonassisi (22:46):
Shout out to Nikki.
Brian Weinberger (22:47):
Shout out to Nikki.
Um, and so she is someone thatcould help sort of create the
structure.
And then you would needbusiness development people like
these Pams.
Um, PAMs are um similar tosales, uh, but like a little bit
more entrepreneurial.
Um, and they have to play thelong game.
Sophie Buonassisi (23:07):
Always play the long game.
Okay, super helpful.
And then how do you know ifthis experiment is working?
Is there one metric, forexample, that should be
waterfalling down and you shouldnotice and know, okay, this is
working?
What are the early indicators?
Brian Weinberger (23:24):
Well, I mean, it's I think it's similar to a
direct selling model.
It's a tamin.
Sophie Buonassisi (23:28):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (23:29):
So you're gonna have you you'll have to
assign quota to this.
Um I think quota would be it'sso when you think of a direct
seller, you always think of OTEtimes whatever.
Um, let's say it's three, four,or five.
I think with a reseller, you'reprobably thinking smaller.
Um you have to figure outwhat's your average, what's the
(23:52):
average deal size?
Sophie Buonassisi (23:53):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (23:53):
And then basically like what's the
margin?
So what are they getting?
What are we getting?
Um, and then do some sort ofcalculation.
Like um I guess I should giveyou examples, but like let's
just say it's $25,000 ASP.
Um, how many deals are peopleinternally doing a month, or how
many do you expect them to do?
Uh it's a math equation times12.
(24:16):
And then basically I would do acrawl walk run.
So I would put like $300,000that a partner has to do in a
year, and then maybe double itthe next year, and then, you
know, just build out a modelthat slowly over time increases
it.
I don't I don't think there's asilver bullet.
Sophie Buonassisi (24:32):
Mm-hmm.
Got it.
Okay.
So really treat them like, ifI'm hearing this correctly,
treat them like a salesperson,give them the quota and then
measure it based on quotaattainment.
Brian Weinberger (24:44):
Yes.
I think I think a little bitmore lenient than a salesperson
because you're not you're notpaying their medical benefits.
Sophie Buonassisi (24:52):
Right.
Brian Weinberger (24:53):
You know, it's like a little bit different
model that way.
Sophie Buonassisi (24:56):
Yeah.
What are the other importantfactors when building out the
partner ecosystem for a company?
Are there core areas that wemissed?
Brian Weinberger (25:08):
Absolutely.
There's the whole marketingside of it, right?
Sophie Buonassisi (25:14):
Tell me more.
Brian Weinberger (25:15):
Yeah.
So when I was at Infinity, wehad a mindset.
There's the cultural aspect.
Sophie Buonassisi (25:25):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (25:26):
So when you have a strong software company
that bleeds their software, likethey're just rah-rah, all in,
running through a wall, thepartner model becomes
interesting because then you,you know, you want to you sort
of feel like, how do I fit in?
At Infinity, we almost had likethe opposite.
(25:49):
We were like, we always feltlike more confident and more
spirited and more positive thanthe actual software publisher.
So I think that's aninteresting mindset.
And we put a lot of investmentinto, we wanted to be
self-sustainable.
Sophie Buonassisi (26:07):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (26:08):
So I think what happened was back to
Salesforce, I think they drovethe market to be partner fed.
So comp people were justbuilding these partnerships,
like, come give me leads andwaiting.
So I think that if you can havea partner that's thinking about
marketing and getting their ownfood, that is an incredible
(26:33):
like dynamic.
So then everything the softwarepublisher gives is gravy
compared to like, I think wherethe world is like, hey, I'm
waiting for my next lead fromyou.
So I think marketing is a bigtopic.
So at Infinity, we invested alot in marketing.
We did a ton of events.
Sophie Buonassisi (26:50):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (26:51):
We did a ton of top-of-funnel uh demand gen
uh email marketing back in theday.
Uh, we did a lot of clientevents in person.
And I think it's unique.
Like you just don't see a lotof these SIs, especially the
boutique ones, doing a lot ofthat.
Sophie Buonassisi (27:07):
Interesting.
That's a great tip for anyone.
So you built out partnermotions at past companies and
you've been out partners.
How are you doing it atSciCenter?
Brian Weinberger (27:18):
Yeah.
Sophie Buonassisi (27:18):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (27:21):
Um and we're still we're still doing it.
Sophie Buonassisi (27:23):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (27:23):
Um, so where we are right now is uh we have a
direct sales team in the US, wehave a team in Europe, and
basically I have a reseller inAustralia.
So he's working with a handfulof resellers that understand our
category, which is uh analyticsplatform as a service,
(27:44):
basically embedded analytics,um, which is a technical
offering.
And so we have resellers thereand it's working out really
well.
So um I want to take that toother areas we don't have direct
sellers, like Southern Europe.
You know, they speak Italian,they speak Spanish, so that
(28:05):
helps too.
Because if you can findresellers that speak the
language, that helps.
I am thinking about it a littlebit in the US, and I can
explain how, but basically inthe US and in Europe, we
actually have delivery partners.
So we now sell everything onour paper, including onboarding,
and then we subcontract thesedelivery partners.
(28:26):
I think that's working reallywell.
Actually started.
Sophie Buonassisi (28:29):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (28:29):
The data warehouse market has
skyrocketed.
When Sciense started, there wasno concept of Snowflake.
Yeah.
Okay.
Snowflake, Redshift,Databricks, they've all like,
they're crushing it.
So when you have a dataanalytics platform, data is the
key, and data warehouse is hugebecause you basically are
(28:53):
connecting directly to thesedata warehouses.
Yeah.
And we build a data model.
Okay.
So about a couple weeks ago, Iwas like, how do we get the
attention of Snowflake?
Snowflake, like Salesforce,like Databricks, these are
amazing companies that have hugesales organizations that really
(29:14):
um I always think of them aslike the bulldog, and we're
like, you know, small softwarecompanies like a chihuahua.
Sophie Buonassisi (29:20):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (29:21):
You know, jumping over.
So I'm like, how do we get theattention of the bulldog?
Sophie Buonassisi (29:24):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (29:24):
And here's how.
Why reinvent the wheel?
We why not resell?
In this case, Snowflake.
So we actually have our ownflavor of our own data
warehouse.
We call it Elastic Cube.
And basically, Elasticube ispowered by Snowflake.
(29:45):
So every time we sell a newcustomer, we're also selling
Snowflake.
That's why label?
Yeah.
Sophie Buonassisi (29:54):
Interesting.
Brian Weinberger (29:55):
Yeah.
So so in my mind, let's just dothat for a long time.
time and show Snowflake that,hey, we're also reselling your
product.
Oh, that's cool.
That that gets the attention ofa lot of executives.
Yeah.
And now I also think it ties tomarketing.
So instead of just going tolike a snowflake event just to
(30:20):
have a booth there, let's go toa snowflake event that says uh a
SciSense client powered bySciSense, because we're a white,
we're white labeled by ourclients.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:30):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (30:30):
And we're white labeling Snowflake.
So why can't we just say clientpowered by powered by SciSense
or powered by Snowflake?
So that like when we're at aconference, a Snowflake
conference, it's we're, we'rebasically selling their
platform.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:45):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (30:46):
So that is where I am today with SciSense.
That'll be the next 12 to 18months.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:51):
Mm-hmm.
Sounds like you're reallyleading with value to build out
these relationships.
Brian Weinberger (30:56):
Absolutely.
Get the attention of the getthe attention of the got it.
Sophie Buonassisi (30:59):
See for Apple.
And you touched on before thatyou touched on you got folks
internationally and youmentioned where you don't have
direct sellers.
Yes.
How does reselling or any otherpartnership form come into the
go-to-market strategy when youthink about the geography
overall globally?
Brian Weinberger (31:19):
I mean uh simple enough hiring hiring is
not easy.
Sophie Buonassisi (31:24):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (31:25):
Hiring talent and then you have management you
need locally language barriers.
Yep.
Are you in office?
Are you remote?
You know, those are allfactors.
Sophie Buonassisi (31:36):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (31:38):
And I go back to we have a partner in
Australia that imagine yourcompany taking a great marketer,
an amazing seller, an amazingsort of technical consultant,
um, an amazing CSM and puttingit into one entity.
(32:03):
That's what my partner inAustralia does for me.
Like so I get all of that.
Yes, I'm paying them marginwhen they sell it, but I'm
basically getting I'm it it'snot even about the margin
really, it's uh it's aboutmaking a stickier experience.
So the customer sticks aroundand I have uh a better approach,
(32:26):
better reach extension overthere.
So that's why it's amazing.
Sophie Buonassisi (32:30):
Got it.
Build a customer for life, asyou said.
Yeah.
It sounds like you can usedifferent geographies
strategically and partnerstrategically where you don't
necessarily have coverage or ifit just creates a better
customer experience.
So you mentioned it's not toodifferent from building out a
direct selling motion, buildingout a partner motion in terms of
the investment up front, youare going to get the long tail
(32:51):
effect from the partner program,but what did the actual margins
look like?
Or how should people bethinking about forecasting those
mergeries?
Brian Weinberger (33:00):
So first step is definitely partner with your
finance game.
Get really aligned with FPA ifyou have that or your CFO,
director of finance, whateversize company you have I think
the first question for that costand margin is the contribution
margin.
That's usually the first marginthat you want to think about is
(33:24):
what does it take to run yoursoftware on AWS?
And do you want to make 80%margin?
Do you want to make 70, 60?
That's a big decision for a CROor head of sales because it
kind of talks to how you'regoing to discount your software.
(33:44):
And then you can apply that tothe partner model.
So margin and then figure out Itend to be a little bit more
generous.
Of course I'm a revenue leaderbut I would be more generous.
If you're bullish on having areseller model, then why be
(34:10):
chintzy on how much marginyou're going to give them so
Infinity we were making from dayone we made 50% on the dollar.
Wow then we had a chance tomake 57 points I don't think we
went above 57 but we would sella $100,000 deal to Panasonic.
(34:31):
We made $57,000 so that's hugefor the culture it's it was huge
for our company and it allowedus to be we were the top
reseller five years in a row forSage software which so and and
a lot of that was margin.
So like if you're going to goall in, go all in.
It's kind of similar to findingsellers you know how many
(34:56):
startups want the founderseller, the founding seller
that's a really important spot.
So you're going to have to payfor that person.
That's how I think aboutpartners don't go go all in or
don't and if you're going to goall in then you know maybe it
(35:17):
will take a little bit away fromyour margin but you're going to
build a very thrivingecosystem.
Sophie Buonassisi (35:22):
That's fantastic.
Brian Weinberger (35:23):
And there's like three books in that jump
out in my career.
So one book changed me um whileI was managing at Salesforce.
So I basically just gotpromoted I'm uh running a team
that uh we're going upmarket.
So I came from like SMB toupmarket.
Yeah.
And I was like, oh my God, likethis is a little overwhelming.
(35:46):
What am I going to do?
And I came across this book andit's called What Great
Salespeople do.
And that changed everything Ithought about.
So it really dissected why do20% of your sellers do 80% of
your sales?
Sophie Buonassisi (36:01):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (36:02):
And that was like a whole thing where um you
had a lot of out uhunderperformers and and
basically they dissected these20% and what it came down to was
the ability to to actually tellstories.
Uh stories have been thehistory of life.
People sit around a campfire,they listen and basically like
(36:26):
stories beget other stories.
So I tell a story, then you'relike, oh, that reminds me of a
story.
So the art of selling is thatgetting people to open up right
because if you're trying tosolve a problem, you want to
really know what the problem is.
So anyway, that was a gamechanger for me and we ended up
bringing in the author of thebook we ended up bringing him
(36:48):
in.
We did 200 workshops atSalesforce.
Wow yeah it went so it startedin like my world and went all
the way up to like the largestenterprise teams and I became a
facilitator of this it was itwas phenomenal.
So I was a game changer.
This other book it's everythingI smile when I think of it it's
called the power of nice.
Sophie Buonassisi (37:08):
Okay.
Brian Weinberger (37:10):
It's another famous business book.
Yeah.
And it's really actually to tieit to the partner it's about
being nice to people in businesslike how that just is a more
sustainable long term um beingfriendly and it talks about like
being friendly with like thedoormen in buildings because in
New York when you you know whenwe used to sell in New York we
(37:31):
it was vertical.
So you had to get into abuilding and then go knock on
every door.
So to do that you had to befriends with like everybody in
the building.
Yeah.
So the power of nice is anotherone that I just take with me.
Sophie Buonassisi (37:44):
Yeah.
Brian Weinberger (37:44):
And then the third Yes.
Uh I think it's someone I tryto be, but I'm not even close
but Sacred Hoops.
So I'm a big basketball fan,but uh it's Phil Jackson's book.
And it's, you know, basicallydissecting when he had to coach
the greatest player to ever playJordan and get him get Jordan
(38:06):
to basically buy in to theentire system and the program.
So like there's a lot ofpsychology behind it and that is
like the coaching side for me.
Sophie Buonassisi (38:16):
Yeah.
Super super interesting okay Ilove it.
I love it.
I was just listening to uh I'mtrying to remember his name
right now.
It's the it's the it was themanager of a basketball he's
pretty new on the block.
Anyways he was his like anagent yes I'm gonna find the
(38:40):
name for you later before dinnertonight.
How do you know what player?
I'm drawing blank on his namebecause he was somebody new but
he's got a couple I was gonnafind his name anyways I looked
into it and it's cool I was likeah I think you'd love it but a
size point.
Those are fantastic bookrecommendations.
Thank you.
Brian Weinberger (38:57):
And where can people find you if they want to
follow along I'm you know I kindof wish I was more visible.
Actually I was just talking toum the woman who runs social at
SciSense.
Yeah and she she just told methat everywhere I am to start
recording myself.
(39:18):
You should and basically sendit to her yeah and then like so
you know I'm I'm quasi active onLinkedIn.
Sophie Buonassisi (39:25):
Yeah.
But if people want to followyour journey at SciSense
building or get in touchLinkedIn is the best place.
Brian Weinberger (39:30):
Yeah absolutely absolutely yeah well
that will be in the show notes.
Sophie Buonassisi (39:34):
Ryan thank you for the been fantastic
really appreciate the breakdownof Parker selling 101 in a way I
feel like this has been acomprehensive maybe a 101 plus
102 lesson for everybody.
Brian Weinberger (39:45):
I mean look it's therapeutic for me because
now I'm like always thinkingabout building.
Yeah.
And so like there's a lot ofoptions and it's exciting time.
Sophie Buonassisi (39:55):
Very cool.
Well thank you.
Brian Weinberger (39:57):
Thank you
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