A model for managing co -marketing alliances

In a competitive, resource-constrained business environment companies experience pressure to increase sales while reducing marketing costs and shortening sales cycles. Small closely-held businesses that want to remain independent, rather than sell to a consolidator, are building strategic marketing alliances to survive and compete with larger companies. The problem is that many joint marketing relationships between independent businesses fail to produce the desired results. In part, these relationships are often unsuccessful because the marketing professionals lacked an effective methodology, or they did not have the discipline or relational capabilities, to leverage the capabilities of their alliance partners. This study provides a structured method for evaluating and managing cooperative marketing relationships to ensure greater success. A cooperative marketing alliance (co-marketing) refers to a joint promotional effort between two or more independent companies that are not competitors to achieve mutually beneficial goals. Co-marketing provides a way for businesses to generate leads and increase sales by leveraging personal relationships and technology developments. This study focuses on engineering and construction settings, but the insights and methodology are transferable to co-marketing relationships in other industries. Through data received from 622 respondents to a marketing questionnaire and evaluation of 34 construction industry co-marketing cases, this study illustrates how co-marketing alliances under certain conditions increase sales productivity and effectiveness. This study explores the management of the co-marketing process and identifies factors that are the most important for effective alliances. It provides insights into what co-marketing alliances are, why co-marketing alliances are formed, conveys ideas for effective co-marketing relationships, suggests criteria for selecting co-marketing partners, explores issues affecting co-marketing relationships and examines successful and unsuccessful relationship cases, costs and payoffs associated with selected co-marketing arrangements. The work effort concludes with a model for leveraging personal relationships and technology developments, staff and other scarce and costly resources to generate qualified leads, close more sales, and increase profits.