Services
Relationship Management
Mission-driven organizations never work in a vacuum. Successful ones find and maintain mutually beneficial relationships with like-minded organizations and corporate partners to move the mission, vision and goals of an organization forward. These external relationships find commonalities, share goals and tactics and actions plans that work in the best interest of all involved. While strength in numbers is vital in any organization, developing an external reputation of trust, confidence and follow-through ensures the relationship is long-lasting and branded. Strong external relationships are mutually beneficial because it results in an opportunity for your organization share resources, consume valued funds, gain access to new markets, and increase your member. Your growth will come from the non-member, and they are typically individuals not currently within your normal realm of operation.
For optimum growth in this area, organizations must take part in the necessary research to ensure the relationships they create are strategic in nature. It can begin in the process of strategic planning by examining any and all individuals, groups, past and current partnering organizations and corporations that work toward the same goals, reinforce and strengthen your organizations, whose initiatives match some or all of your own or tactics.
- Analyze the market of current and prospective partners; examine what they can bring to your organization and their relevance to members and partners.
- Identify how partners can contribute both in dollars and cents as well as in-kind services.
- What are the trends/barriers in building the relationships? Have prospective partners brought success with similar organizations or created barriers to possible expansion. Should current partners be removed as the mission evolves?
- How can external relationships help in areas of where resources are low (i.e. communications or Public and Media Relations). Are there bartering opportunities? What strengths does your organization bring to the table which are valuable to creating mutually beneficial relationships?
No matter the industry, executive leadership and boards often arrive to the table of strategic change with a limited scope. Past history and on diverged focus on internal pitfalls can make the importance of building external relationships analogous to board responsibilities. This can result in placing blinders on the resources that can and should be utilized.
Organizations can ask some of the following questions regarding how well they are managing their relationships.
- Am I connected to the players in my industry?
- If so, have I fully examined how I can partner and utilize their services?
- As I look at build my organization, where can I best seek and develop outside resources?
- What is the professional reputation of my organization? What are the perceptions and misconceptions about what we do and who we are?
VMG Service Offerings
Relationship Management
VMG is committed to working with organizations to develop a relationship management program that:
- Reviews current strategic business plan
- Assesses long-term commitment level of partnerships and sponsor support
- Conducts a Market Analysis to define the Business Eco-System (including Key Players, Market Drivers, Keys and barriers to success, Competitors, and Customers)
- Defines the realms of influence your organization has within the market
- Audits and collect feedback from partners, vendors, and customers
- Develops a plan to approach new sponsors and partners regarding Shared Resource, Increased Exposure, Monetary Support, and establishing an Advisory Relationship
- Develops a sponsorship development/fundraising plan
- Sets Sponsorship levels and benefits for each sponsor opportunity (either by program or for the full organization)
- Outlines list of current and potential sponsorship partners
- Determines the best individuals and method to approach and secure support
- Builds database to manage Customers, Partners, Members
- Develops a plan to better engage volunteers by assessing the following areas: primary professional goals, personal interests, key skill set and area of expertise, availability and capacity to donate time, and network of applicable relationships and resources
