Building Strong Partnerships: Insights from ButterflyMX’s Partner Marketing Manager

The most successful businesses have a robust and collaborative foundation. And it’s because of over 30 partners across various domains, including property management systems, smart home technologies, smart locks, and resident experience platforms, that ButterflyMX has become the industry leader in access control and proptech. 

Partnerships play a crucial role in enhancing product offerings and ensuring seamless user experiences at ButterflyMX. In fact, we genuinely believe that without our partnerships, ButterflyMX wouldn’t be where we are today. Our integrations make our products more powerful while empowering us to give our clients a more holistic proptech experience.

And the employee who markets these partnerships is Rachel Huffman, Partner Marketing Manager. A member of the ButterflyMX family since February 2022, Rachel is pivotal in maintaining relationships with our partners and communicating about the partnerships to our stakeholders. 

Why we value partnerships

The primary goal of working with a partner is to simplify the user experience for our clients. Rachel elaborates, "Most of our integrations happen in the backend to make our user’s life easier. For example, property managers don’t have to enter data repeatedly, and tenants don’t have to deal with multiple apps for simple access control." Partnering with ButterflyMX also benefits our partners by enhancing their user experience and, in turn, increasing user retention.

Once a partner’s been set up with the ButterflyMX Product Team, Rachel meets with their marketing team to establish a plan to announce the integration. There, they craft “specific messaging, choose the best dates for the announcement, organize graphics and photos, and plan the announcement across various channels like social media and the ButterflyMX blog.”

In the long term, Rachel meets with each partner quarterly and plans promotional activities throughout the quarter. She explains, "Meeting consistently ensures that we’re not falling behind on their or our expectations for the partnership." ButterflyMX provides robust support to partners through regular meetings and open communication channels, such as joint Slack channels managed by our Product Team.

Essential skills for a partner marketing manager

Communication is the cornerstone of Rachel’s role. "As the Partner Marketing Manager, I’m always communicating with people I’ve never met before, establishing plans that need to be crystal clear. Any small miscommunication can throw off the whole process," she emphasizes. To facilitate clear communication, she relies on tools like Trello for project management, Google Sheets for organizing plans, and AI tools like ChatGPT for quick and reliable content creation.

Clear goal-setting and thorough documentation are Rachel’s top tips for effective communication with partners, "I like to reiterate any plans made during meetings in writing via email for ultimate clarity. It’s very helpful to have everything in writing and in a shared communication channel.”

Rachel’s daily schedule is dynamic and varies with ongoing collaborations and launches. However, she maintains a routine to stay organized. "I start my day by checking emails and seeing which partners need marketing support. I reach out to them early in the day to get the ball rolling. Then, I have several meetings with my in-house teams and partners to discuss launch and collaboration plans," Rachel describes.

What sets ButterflyMX apart

Rachel highlights the collaborative nature of the ButterflyMX team as a key differentiator from previous employers. "Our team is so collaborative, and I can always lean on someone for help, which is huge because we’re all still learning. It’s great knowing that I can lean on my coworkers for support and ideas," she says.

Explore our partnerships and check out your career opportunities at ButterflyMX on our Careers page.