Partner Enablement Ops with Actionable Playbooks

Happy partners sell more; they needed enablement that actually breathes.

Context

As someone responsible for channel revenue, I quickly learned a critical truth: partners are an extension of your sales force, but they often operate in the dark without a shared operating manual. Our previous approach to partner enablement was fragmented and ineffective. We had a dizzying array of different onboarding decks for each region, outdated pricing PDFs scattered across various shared drives, and, most critically, zero visibility into what content partners were actually consuming or finding valuable.

This lack of structure created significant problems. When we inevitably missed revenue targets, it was impossible to diagnose the root cause. Was it a pipeline issue? A failure in enablement? Or simply a lack of motivation from our partners? The ambiguity was frustrating and hindered our ability to course-correct.

To solve this, I completely reimagined our partner enablement program, building it around a modular "partner OS." The core idea was to provide each partner with a lightweight, personalized portal. This portal houses living playbooks, delivers automated nudges based on their engagement, and tracks clear success metrics. The beauty of this system is its adaptability: it scales up or down depending on a partner's maturity level. New agencies receive foundational onboarding and clear deal registration guidance, while strategic partners gain access to advanced co-selling strategies and roadmap previews. This ensures that every partner receives the right level of support and information, preventing overwhelm for new agencies and providing the depth expected by our most valuable partners.

Stack I leaned on

• Notion + Super.so for the public portal: We use Notion as the backend for our partner portal, leveraging its flexibility for content management. Super.so then transforms our Notion pages into a fast, SEO-friendly public website, providing a seamless experience for our partners.
• Supabase + n8n to track usage: Supabase serves as our data layer, tracking all partner interactions within the portal, such as page views, module completions, and quiz scores. n8n automates the processing of this usage data, triggering events and updates based on partner activity.
• Resend for educational nurtures: Resend is our email platform for delivering personalized educational nurtures to partners. These automated email sequences are triggered by partner engagement (or lack thereof) and deliver relevant content to guide them through their enablement journey.
• Attio to score engagement: Attio, our CRM, is integrated to provide a comprehensive view of partner engagement. We use it to score partner activity, track deal registrations, and manage partner relationships, ensuring that our partner managers have all the context they need.

The Starting Mess

1. One-size content: a 60-slide deck tried to cover onboarding, pricing, compliance, and co-marketing. Nobody finished it.
2. Opaque engagement: we blasted quarterly newsletters but couldn’t see whether partners opened, clicked, or applied anything.
3. Support overload: the same “how do I register a deal?” question hit Slack every week because the answer lived in an ancient PDF.
4. No attribution: partner-sourced deals were tracked manually; we couldn’t tie enablement consumption to revenue.

Every fix I shipped had to eliminate one of these problems.

Program Architecture

| Layer | Purpose | Tools | |-------|---------|-------| | Portal | Single source of truth for playbooks, assets, FAQs | Notion DB published via Super.so with access tiers | | Learning tracks | Bite-sized modules with quizzes + certifications | Notion templates + Typeform assessments + n8n scoring | | Engagement engine | Automates nudges, flags disengagement | Supabase activity log + Attio engagement fields + Resend nurtures | | Revenue instrumentation | Tie actions to pipeline and ARR | Deal registration via Attio, shared dashboards in Metabase | | Feedback loop | Partners submit requests, vote on features | Notion forms feeding Jira + monthly partner councils |

Segmentation Framework

I defined three maturity bands:

• Launch partners (0–3 deals): focus on onboarding basics, sandbox access, and deal registration.
• Growth partners (3–15 deals): need co-selling plays, pricing scenarios, technical deep dives.
• Strategic partners (15+ deals): care about roadmap previews, joint marketing, and executive alignment.

Each band gets a tailored track: modules, certifications, and office hours tailored to their goals. Graduation is automated: when a partner logs the third deal, Supabase updates their tier and unlocks the next track plus congratulatory Resend email.

Playbook

1. Build the data spine: instrument every portal page with Supabase row-level analytics (views, completion, quiz scores). Tie partner IDs to Attio orgs so we can enrich pipelines.
2. Design modular content: each module is a 5-minute briefing plus a “Do this now” checklist. Examples: “Register a Deal in 3 steps,” “How to scope integrations,” “Pricing playbook by segment.”
3. Create certification loops: after each track, partners take a short assessment; passing triggers badges in the portal and updates their Attio notes so AEs know who’s certified.
4. Automate nudges: an n8n flow watches for inactivity (no portal visit in 14 days, no registered deals). It sends a Resend email with relevant modules and pings the partner manager in Slack.
5. Host live reinforcement: bi-weekly office hours follow a fixed agenda: highlight wins, demo a playbook, tackle open questions. Sessions get summarized and embedded back into the portal.
6. Measure attributed revenue: deals registered via the portal automatically tag which modules the partner completed beforehand. Our Metabase dashboard slices ARR by “modules consumed” so we see correlation.
7. Close the loop: partners can suggest content or flag confusing steps via an inline form. Requests land in Jira with partner metadata; we review them during the monthly partner council.

Automations That Made the Program Feel Alive

• Welcome journey: as soon as a partner signs, Resend drips a three-email series (portal tour, first module, deal registration). Each email includes dynamic stats (“partners who finish Module 1 close 2.3x more deals”).
• Deal-based triggers: when a partner registers a deal but stalls, Attio triggers a playbook email (“Need a security reviewer? Here’s the 4-step checklist”) and invites them to office hours.
• Certification badges: n8n updates the partner’s portal profile and Slack channel topic when they earn a badge; peers see it and ask how to level up.
• Executive digests: every Monday, partner managers get a Resend summary showing active partners, modules completed, open asks, and pipeline size.

Operating Reviews

Each quarter we run a Partner Enablement QBR with this agenda:

1. Review segment-level adoption (portal MAU, module completion).
2. Compare pipeline and win rates between certified vs. non-certified partners.
3. Surface top support issues pulled from the question log.
4. Decide which modules to retire, refresh, or create.
5. Align on co-marketing calendar and shared KPIs.

Decisions and owners go straight into Notion tasks so nothing gets lost.

Sample Module Structure

Module: Demo-to-Close Blueprint
Duration: 7 minutes video + checklist
Audience: Growth partners

Sections:
1. Context (when to use this play)
2. Assets (demo script, ROI calculator, security FAQ)
3. Checklist (3 steps before the call, 3 steps after)
4. Assessment (3-question Typeform; pass = 80%)
5. Success stories (two short clips from top partners)

All assets link back to version-controlled docs, so updates propagate instantly.

Metrics & telemetry

• Monthly active partners: +41% (we track log-ins + module completions).
• Onboarding time: 4 weeks → 9 days thanks to self-serve tracks and certification gating.
• Average deal size via partners: +18% after adding pricing scenarios.
• Deal registration accuracy: 96% (up from 62%) because the portal validates submissions before they hit Attio.
• Content freshness: 92% of modules updated within the last quarter (tracked via Notion property + reminders).

Partner Health Scoring

We built a simple but effective health model combining:

1. Engagement (portal visits last 14 days, module completion %, office hours attendance).
2. Pipeline (registered deals value, conversion rate, average sales cycle).
3. Advocacy (NPS responses, testimonial participation, referrals).

n8n recalculates the score weekly and writes it to Attio. Anything below 60 triggers a playbook for the partner manager: review notes, schedule a call, recommend a new module. High-scoring partners get fast-tracked for co-marketing funds.

Cost & Tooling Considerations

• Notion + Super.so: $24/seat + $12/site → cheaper than custom portals, and the marketing team already knew Notion.
• Supabase: free tier handled analytics; we upgraded to Pro ($25/mo) once we stored more than 500k events.
• n8n: self-hosted on Fly.io (~$7/mo) so we could version workflows in Git.
• Resend: pay-as-you-go, averaged $38/mo for ~35k nurture emails.
• Attio: central CRM, so incremental cost was zero; we just added custom objects for partner health.

All-in cost stayed < $100/mo, far below partner portal SaaS options, and we own the roadmap.

What stuck with me

• Enablement has to be bite-sized and actionable; no endless PDFs.
• Measuring real usage tells you which modules to tweak without guessing.
• Partners behave like product users—ship releases, changelogs, and support just like you would for customers.

What I'm building next

I'm packaging these modules as a ready-to-clone portal with starter automations, plus experimenting with partner health scoring that blends portal behavior, pipeline, and NPS. Want early access? let me know.

Want me to help you replicate this module? Drop me a note and we’ll build it together.