Videoconferencing company StarLeaf launches new partner referral programme

Referral partners will receive an up to 20 per cent margin on transactions, firm announces

Videoconferencing company StarLeaf has launched a new partner referral programme which offers an up to 20 per cent margin for partners which refer customers that go on to adopt its paid services.

The UK-based Zoom and Teams competitor will provide bespoke links for partners to offer customers, with StarLeaf then managing all the onboarding, invoicing, support and renewals for new customers referred through the programme.

Speaking to CRN, chief sales officer Mike Tumalty said partners can receive an up to 20 per cent margin for any transaction which will recur for a limit of three years if the customer stays with StarLeaf, while discussions are also being held about extending it to a lifetime recurrence.

The original link will allow customers to sign up for free, with StarLeaf then hoping they will move onto a paid subscription which will allow the partners that referred them in the first place to gain the 20 per cent incentive.

"For referral partners working with us directly, they will get up to 20 per cent margin for any transaction and then they'll get that in year two and year three as well," he explained.

"And then we'll take those members on a journey to upgrade to our full solution, and then a referral fee will be passed back to that particular partner.

"For some of those regions where we don't have any direct sales force on the ground, like South Africa for example, then we'll have a two-tier system where we've got an existing partner that's working with us who have supplied 2000 referral or resell partners themselves within their ecosystem who will be provided with a 10 per cent margin, and then the referral partner would get 20 per cent there as well."

The bespoke referral links StarLeaf will provide to its partners through the programme can be shared on social media channels, through email marketing and on websites, the company says, with the aim of making it easy for "non-traditional resellers".

They will also have access to product and sales training through self-taught modules via the StarLeaf Academy, the platform's online training portal.

The programme is part of StarLeaf's overall strategy to bolster its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offering as the business aims to attract new partners and customers to its platform, including working with large tech resellers and government institutions.

"What we want to do is we want to open up and broaden our scope from a SaaS perspective of the different type of customers that we want to attract, and to do that, we need a different partner ecosystem to support us," Tumalty added.

"We're on this transition journey from pure hardware with a bit of software to a software organisation going forward."