05 Lifecycle
Every partner moves through eight stages, from first contact to a customer live and growing. Each stage has one owner, a clear way in and out, a clock, and one number. The north star at the end of the line is customers live through partners. (Decisions 34 to 59)
All of this is synthetic. Cloud Cruz and its partners are invented.
The eight stages at a glance
| # | Stage | Owner | Enters when | Exits when | Clock | One metric |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Develop | Partner development rep (PDR) | A lead is created, inbound or outbound | A meeting with a director or above, or a deal-in-hand handoff | Handoff within 1 business day; hot same day | Qualified meetings held |
| 1 | Acquire | PDR | A qualified meeting or deal in hand | The partner is accepted and clicks through terms | Decision within 5 business days of the meeting | Fit score of accepted partners |
| 2 | Onboard | Partner manager (managed) or automation (long tail) | Terms accepted | All onboarding items done | Builder 14 days, Specialist 30, Scale and Anchor 45 | Days to onboarded |
| 3 | Activate | Partner account manager (managed); head of partner ecosystem, with partner managers by exception (long tail) | Onboarded | First live joint customer | 90 days from signing | Share activated within 90 days |
| 4 | Enable | Enablement lead | Onboarded (runs beside Activate) | Level 2 on a real deal | Credentials valid 12 months | Active certified people |
| 5 | Hand off / Co-sell | Partner account manager with the AE | Select tier or above, on a registered deal | Closed won, or closed lost with a reason | Deal registration answered in 2 business days | Win rate on co-sold deals |
| 6 | Maintain | Partner account manager (managed); head of partner ecosystem, with partner managers by exception (long tail) | First live joint customer | Ongoing | Touch cadence by segment | Partners with no red on health |
| 7 | Optimize | Head of partner ecosystem | Every Jan 1 and Jul 1 program review | Changes announced 90 days ahead | Rules hold 12 months | Customers live through partners |
Stage 0: Develop
The PDR builds pipeline before anyone signs (decision 34).
- Outbound goes to directors and above at agencies in the four segments. Every account gets three contacts or more (executive sponsor, delivery lead, sales lead), each with a tailored message (decision 36).
- No collisions: before any outreach, the PDR checks Salesforce and Crossbeam and routes through the existing owner if one exists (decision 36).
- Who to call today: fit times intent sets the temperature: nurture, warm, hot (same day) or urgent. Each rep gets the top 8 leads a day (decisions 35, 70).
- Deal in hand is the urgent fast lane: a Slack thread alerts everyone who needs to know, a partner manager and the AE join, and the deal registration goes in during onboarding (decision 35).
- End state: an agentic PDR drafts warm outreach and runs nurture. It comes only after the team has run the motion by hand, and a person approves every send in Year 1 (decisions 34, 71).
Stage 1: Acquire
Qualify against the two gates and the fit score, then sign (decisions 37 to 39). The PDR who opened the lead owns it through signing, so the partner never starts over with someone new. The partner manager supports: joining the meeting, making the admission call in the 50 to 69 band and building the Anchor plan.
- Fit 70 or higher: approved automatically. 50 to 69: a partner manager decides and logs the reason. Under 50: nurture.
- Agreement: apply, get accepted, then click through terms on first portal login in introw.
- Procurement path: partners who can't click through get a $0 invoice with the agreement, sent through their procurement. The same path opens sandbox accounts, so no one needs a personal credit card to get hands-on.
- Anchors are invited. They sign an addendum, then build a joint business plan, and name executive sponsors on both sides, all within 30 days. They get a Slack Connect channel when they reach Premier (decision 84).
Stage 2: Onboard
Onboarded means all of these are done (decision 40):
- Three named contacts: executive sponsor, technical lead, sales lead
- Tipalti KYC and payout details
- Slack connected (the community workspace; a Slack Connect channel for beta design partners, and for Premier and Elite)
- A partner sandbox account live
- Sales and Technical Accreditation badges issued
- A kickoff held
Managed partners start with the kickoff. It walks through a standard 30-day plan and an accelerated one. The long tail gets an automated orientation, the introw checklist with nudges, and a weekly live cohort session (decisions 40 to 42).
Stage 3: Activate
Three milestones, each rewarded (decision 43):
- First deal registration. Shows intent and opens funding and implementation support.
- First closed-won deal.
- First live joint customer. "Activated" means this one.
The time between milestones gives each partner a cold, warm or hot activation rating.
Catch stalls in days, not at day 45 (decisions 44, 46). A daily health check compares each partner against its own plan:
| Signal | Rule |
|---|---|
| No first login by day 3 | The PDR or partner manager reaches out |
| 25% behind plan | An automated nudge |
| 40% behind plan | Cold: a person acts |
| No sandbox build by day 10 | Partner solutions architect office hours |
| A deal registration, or ahead of plan | Hot: fast track to co-sell and an implementation package review |
The rules are visible in the beta, and the weights get tuned on Year-1 data.
Stage 4: Enable
Credentials prove outcomes, not attendance (decisions 47, 48, 52, 53, 64, 80, 81). The full ladder is in 06 Credentials.
- Level 1 is an exam, a sandbox lab and a Problem Statement Canvas for a real target customer. Technical people take the business Level 1 too, because they co-sell.
- Level 2 means two customer go-lives, or two signed business cases. At least one Level 2 technical person is required for an implementation package; in the beta, Cloud Cruz's partner solutions architect stands in (decision 91).
- Level 3 runs the Readiness Review on four pillars: Trust, AI quality, Cost, Adoption.
- Counts only when active: credentials last 12 months, and a person counts only with hands-on product use in the last 90 days.
- Courses and labs are free. Level exams cost $100 to $150, and each tier gets 5 to 15 free exams a year (decision 81).
Stage 5: Hand off / Co-sell
- Who co-sells: Select and above, because the tier is earned. Members can still register their own deals (decision 49).
- Rules of engagement: the AE owns the customer relationship; the partner account manager owns the partner relationship. The AE gets full quota credit on partner deals in their territory. Partner commission is a program cost, never taken from the AE (decision 50).
- Routing: customers get matched to partners by fit and capacity, with round-robin among equals. Every customer inbound asks, "Are you working with a partner? Can we recommend one?" (decision 51)
- The directory: each partner's profile is an agency Business Model Canvas, filled in call by call. Contribution points raise a partner's rank (decisions 51, 78).
Stage 6: Maintain
Health is four plain questions, each green, yellow or red. Healthy means no red (decision 54).
| Question | Measured by |
|---|---|
| Are they selling? | Sold, influenced or supported a deal in the last 90 days |
| Are their customers winning? | Live, expanding, not churning |
| Are their people skilled? | Active credentials |
| Is their delivery clean? | Support tickets on their customers, CSAT, Readiness Review results |
Touch cadence (decision 55): Anchor gets a monthly business review plus a quarterly executive review. Scale and Specialist get a quarterly business review. Builder gets an automated monthly scorecard digest. Every review uses the same live scorecard.
Inactivity path (decision 56):
- 90 days: marked at risk internally, with automated re-engagement.
- 180 days: a re-activation offer: fresh Crossbeam targets and a cohort seat.
- 365 days: moved to the alumni list, with earned commissions always paid.
Every message a partner sees is encouraging and honest.
Stage 7: Optimize
- North star: customers live through partners, with time to live beside it. Revenue, ROI and activation are supporting metrics (decision 57).
- Program reviews happen Jan 1 and Jul 1. Rules hold 12 months, and changes are announced 90 days ahead (decision 58). Tier promotions don't wait for them: they're checked monthly (decision 92).
- The partner advisory board has 8 to 12 partners across the four segments. It meets before each review, and there's a standing feedback channel in Slack (decision 59).
- What gets reviewed: admissions logged in the 50 to 69 band, where deals stalled, the health-check weights, and the numbers still to be set.
Why this saves time and money
One owner per stage means no lead or partner waits on a meeting to decide who acts. Automation carries the long tail, so a flat team of 9 spends its hours on the partners and deals that move the north star. Stalls surface in days, while there's still time to fix them.