There are three ways to grow your startup. Build. Buy. Partner. At first, you usually build. At scale, it may make sense to buy. Somewhere in between, you may begin to partner to scale your startup.

When it is time to get started, what do you do? Here’s how I think about getting started:

Select Segment

What is your goal? For example, if you are focused on customer acquisition find bigger companies with more customers who match the profile of your customer.

Define Solution

What do you offer them? Well, perhaps your product can make theirs more sticky and help them better retain a subset of your customers.

Set Filters

Of the companies in your target segment, which ones are most attractive and why? Will they also found your value prop interesting?

Prioritize Partners

Based on your solution and filters, stack rank a list of target companies. From there, determine the right decision marker (often executive, business development leader, or for tech product manager).

Pitch Partners

Outreach directly or via introduction from mutual contact to begin a conversation about partnering.