Market Development Funds are often under-utilized or not used at all. There are many reasons for this, but one of the primary reasons is that many, if not most, partners do not have digital marketing experience, nor are they equipped with the appropriate tools and techniques to truly exploit digital marketing or even apply for the available market development funds. This is where understanding the value of co-branding can make a significant difference in how effective your MDF is for channel partners, especially for smaller partners.

“Co-branding is a strategic marketing, and advertising partnership between two brands wherein the success of one brand brings success to its partner brand, too. Co-branding can be an effective way to build business, boost awareness, and break into new markets, and for a partnership to truly work, it has to be a win-win for all players in the game. All partner audiences need to find value.”(Hubspot, 2020)

Co-branding has many elements in common with co-marketing, which is when two businesses promote each other’s achievements. Still, it differs in that co-branding always identifies the partners as sharing authorship of the materials, promotion, or offerings. It is important to understand that the sharing of the authorship does not have to be equal.

Co-branding opportunities are even more prevalent within B2B Marketing. Some types of co-branded marketing collateral include:

• Social Media promotions
• Podcasts and interview content
• Webinars
• Sales materials including brochures, business cards, pricing sheets, battle cards, and newsletters
• White papers
• Co-hosted events
• Press Releases
• Case Studies

When co-branding is done correctly and executed well, it can result in superior content and products to help everyone in the channel stay competitive. When the end product is better than anything you or one of your partners can do on their own, it builds confidence in the channel as well as in the product or promotion itself. That energy and those small wins need to be celebrated and held up because that is the power of co-branding to drive sales and success for all partners. When partners see a real benefit to what the channel provides and what MDF funds can do for them and other partners, the chances grow significantly that partners will find the resources and utilize the MDF funds more frequently and effectively.

Download our guide to learn more!