Leveraging a Partner Marketplace for Sales: My Experience at Salesloft

Hello, I'm Chris Sheehan, a former Account Executive at Salesloft and currently a member of the team at Partner Fleet.

When I worked at Salesloft, I often used their marketplace, built by Partner Fleet, to help me educate prospects about our integrations and solutions partners. I don’t think I could have written a single follow-up email without it.

Detailing specific integrations

One of the common scenarios during a demo was when a prospect or existing customer would ask about specific integrations. "Do you integrate with HubSpot?" they might ask. In response, I would immediately pull up the marketplace to display the HubSpot listing. The live demonstration of our platform's integration capabilities didn't just provide immediate answers—it also built trust. The customers could see firsthand that we had the integration they needed, and how it worked.

Technology recommendations

Another frequent situation was when customers were on the hunt for tech recommendations. "Do you have any dialers you recommend?" they would inquire. The marketplace wasn't just an integration display—it was also a recommendation engine. I could quickly navigate to the relevant category and share a link with the customer, showing them the tools that we knew integrated well with our platform. This approach led to happier, more satisfied customers and enhanced the stickiness of our product.

Solutions partners

But the marketplace was more than a catalog of tech tools—it also provided solutions to implementation and training challenges. When a customer needed help with these tasks, or wanted to learn more about our platform, I would guide them to the services section of the marketplace. Here, we listed recommended service partners that could provide the help they needed. This led to a win-win-win situation: the customer got their problem solved, the service provider gained a client, and I took on a consultative role in the sales process which helped increase my credibility.

Why a partner marketplace is essential to your sales team

I trusted Salesloft's marketplace because it was up-to-date and thorough. Listings were almost always created with the active involvement of both Salesloft and the respective partner, using our partner portal. This gave me the confidence to use it as a key resource during my sales calls.

Before the marketplace, things were more complicated. I would have to search an internal CMS for content, ask colleagues on Slack,  visit the partner's page directly, or sometimes even just search Google. The marketplace streamlined these tasks, saving me time and ensuring I could answer questions for prospects live on a call.

The marketplace wasn't just a tool—it was a sales enabler that helped me better serve our customers and succeed in my role. If your organization isn't leveraging a marketplace like this, you're potentially missing out on a powerful tool for sales enablement.

Want to see how Partner Fleet's marketplace platform works?

Click here to book a demo.

Learn more about Partner Fleet

At Partner Fleet, we're dedicated to helping companies unlock the potential of their marketplace. If you're interested in enhancing your marketplace or want to learn more about how it could help your sales team, please book a consultation with me.

Until next time, stay connected and keep selling smart!