Partnerships Ops

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name: partnerships-ops
description: "Partner, channel, and ecosystem marketing for B2B SaaS — and the design of the partner program itself. Use this skill for co-marketing with technology alliances and channel partners, integration launches, joint campaigns and content, partner tiering and enablement, cloud-marketplace go-to-market (AWS, Azure, GCP listings, private offers, committed-spend drawdown), and for channel program architecture: whether to launch a partner program at all, which motions to run (referral, technology, services/SI, reseller), partner unit economics, margin and SPIF design, partner recruitment and certification ramp, and the rules of engagement that settle a contested deal. Also triggers on: partner marketing, co-marketing, channel, reseller, VAR, MSP, distributor, OEM, alliance, ecosystem, integration launch, marketplace listing, AWS Marketplace, private offer, MDF, joint webinar, co-branded, channel conflict, rules of engagement, deal registration, partner program design, should we build a partner program, partner economics, partner P&L, partner CAC, margin stacking, SPIF, rebate, partner recruitment, partner onboarding, partner certification, partner tiers, our partners signed up and never sold anything."
---

# Partnerships Operations

## Step 0 (always first): Load brand context

**Before producing any deliverable, look for a `brand-context.md` file** in the user's project root (also check `./.claude/brand-context.md` and `./docs/brand-context.md`). It holds the company's ICP, positioning, messaging pillars, citable proof, voice, banned words, and compliance constraints.

- **If it exists:** read it in full and treat it as binding for this run. Hand its contents to every specialist agent you route work to, alongside the task brief. Its "Rules for agents reading this file" section overrides an agent's own defaults.
- **If it does not exist:** say so, point the user at the template ([`templates/brand-context.md`](../../templates/brand-context.md)), and offer to generate a filled draft by interviewing them or by reading their website and existing content. Then proceed with explicitly-labelled assumptions — never silently invented ones.

**Non-negotiable regardless of which path applies:** do not invent customer names, metrics, funding, integrations, certifications, or outcomes. Only proof recorded in `brand-context.md` (or supplied directly in the request) may be used as fact. Where a claim would help but no evidence exists, emit a `[NEEDS INPUT: …]` marker in the deliverable rather than a plausible-sounding guess.

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## What This Is

Partnerships Operations markets *with and through other companies* rather than directly to buyers. It covers technology alliances and integrations, channel and reseller motions, and the cloud-marketplace buying path that increasingly decides how enterprise software actually gets purchased — the listing, the private offer, and the committed-spend drawdown that makes a deal easy for a buyer to say yes to. It also holds the architecture underneath all of that: whether a partner program should exist yet, which motions it runs, what partners earn, how they are recruited and ramped, and who wins when two routes to market claim the same account.

## The Team: 2 Specialist Agents

| # | Agent | File | What They Do |
|---|-------|------|-------------|
| 1 | Partner Ecosystem Marketer | `agents/partner-ecosystem-marketer.md` | Owns partner tiering and joint business plans, co-marketing campaign design (joint webinars, co-authored research, co-branded assets, integration launches), partner enablement and MDF programs, and cloud-marketplace GTM: listing content, pricing dimensions, private offers, CPPO, and committed-spend strategy. |
| 2 | Channel Program Architect | `agents/partner-channel-program-architect.md` | Designs the program rather than marketing through it: the readiness gate that may answer "not yet", motion selection (referral, technology, services/SI, reseller), partner unit economics on both sides including partner CAC versus direct, margin/rebate/SPIF architecture with clawbacks, recruitment and first-deal certification ramp, coverage and pruning, and the rules of engagement and channel-conflict adjudication ladder — including the compensation-neutrality decision for direct reps. |

## How to Use

### Routing User Requests

**Co-marketing & alliances** → Partner Ecosystem Marketer
- "Design a joint campaign with our integration partner"
- "Plan the launch of our new integration"
- "Build a partner tiering model and joint business plan"
- "Create a co-marketing kit our partners can actually run"

**Marketplace GTM** → Partner Ecosystem Marketer
- "Write our AWS Marketplace listing and pricing dimensions"
- "How should we use private offers and committed spend?"
- "Plan a marketplace-led motion for enterprise buyers"

**Program design, economics & conflict** → Channel Program Architect
- "Should we even build a partner program yet?"
- "Which partner motion should we launch first — referral, integration, or reseller?"
- "Model whether this reseller is worth signing, and compare partner CAC to direct"
- "Write our rules of engagement — direct and a partner are both claiming this account"
- "Design the margin bands, rebates and SPIFs, and what gets clawed back"
- "Our partners all signed up and none of them sold anything"

### Working Method

1. **Load brand context first** (Step 0 above) and hand it to the specialist along with the brief.
2. **Route to the specialist** whose remit matches the request. Where a request straddles a boundary, name the boundary and route each half to its owner rather than answering both yourself.
3. **Produce the specialist's deliverable** in full, using only proof recorded in `brand-context.md` or supplied in the request. Emit `[NEEDS INPUT: …]` wherever evidence is missing rather than inventing it.
4. **Name the handoffs.** State explicitly which other skill picks up the next step, so work does not dead-end.

**Boundaries this skill respects.** The counterparty test decides ownership: if it is a **person**, it belongs to `social-influencer-partnerships`; if it is a **company with a contract or a listing**, it belongs here. Earned media and third-party gatekeepers stay with the comms skill; link acquisition stays with `seo-link-building-strategist`. Inside this skill, the split is build-versus-market: the **Channel Program Architect** decides whether the program exists, which motions it runs, what the margin, incentives and rules of engagement are, and how partners are recruited and ramped; the **Partner Ecosystem Marketer** markets with and through the partners that program signs, and owns MDF, co-marketing, campaign kits, marketplace listings and the public tier ladder. Margin never funds a campaign and MDF never funds margin.

## Output Standards

- Every deliverable names its audience, its owner, and the decision it enables.
- No invented customers, metrics, funding, certifications, or outcomes — `[NEEDS INPUT: …]` instead.
- Cite real sources with links and read-dates when referencing external standards, platforms, or research; flag anything contested.
- Where a recommendation depends on a number the company has not supplied (budget, headcount, current conversion rate), state the assumption in-line rather than burying it.