In partnering, you can look beyond other technicians for opportunities. Many times non-IT business providers like management consultants have the dilemma of needing to refer their clients to other professionals. This can either be done as a favor to a client, or set up as a form of revenue sharing.



Accountants

There are many good partnering opportunities with accountants. Because they are already trusted members of the community, they are in a great position to refer you to other small business owners. You eventually want to be put in a category with accountants, attorneys, management consultants and advertising consultants.

Accountants, for example do a lot of QuickBooks installations, and they probably get a lot of questions about them, such as questions about backup and virus protection. Because they probably don't want to get involved in that technical process, they might need you to support them as part of a partnering plan.

Your Value In Partnering

Partnering relationships you have with others can be used to compete with large companies like Dell, because they will help you move up in value as long as you continue to improve upon your services. Your personality, communication skills and relationships mean more than your size.

Have More Than One Partnering Option

There are many ways you can add on revenue to your business. For example, several years ago when DSL was first emerging, many people were setting themselves up as DSL agents for ILECs, CLECs and ISPs, which gave them an interesting new revenue stream. Some people choose to act as web-hosting resellers, buying a large chunk of space and bandwidth and selling shared hosting to their clients. There are many partnering options available to you, and you should take advantage of what comes your way - the more creative, the better!

Copyright MMI-MMVII, Computer Consulting 101. All Worldwide Rights Reserved. {Attention Publishers: Live hyperlink in author resource box required for copyright compliance}