If you're an executive or a membership director with an association or trade group and you're considering offering an affinity "shipping services" program to your members, here are six (6) questions you should ask your potential partners:

1. What is your company background and experience? Ask your prospective partner to tell you the history of their company, how many years of experience they have, how did they get into the business, and what makes them different than their competitors. In the case of PartnerShip, we were founded by an association to provide shipping services to members - something we've been doing for 25 years.
2. Describe your sales and customer service approach? Will your partner have a dedicated account manager for your program? Does your partner have a dedicated customer service department and what is their process for handling member inquiries and resolving issues? PartnerShip, as an example, provides a dedicated "program manager" to every one of our association programs. Additionally, we have a dedicated customer service team to support members.
3. What marketing communications strategies do you use? What marketing strategies will your partner adopt to maximize program participation? What has been their track record with other associations? What is the process for bringing members into the program? PartnerShip uses a turnkey outbound and inbound marketing approach that includes a variety of high-quality co-branded marketing materials, including a custom website.
4. How much program implementation support do you provide? How will your partner implement the program for your members? Will they share in the cost of the implementation? Will they provide communications and digital assets to your association for placement across your channels? Do they provide any live webinar support or will they support your trade show? PartnerShip does all of this and more.
5. Do you have detailed reporting and tracking tools? This is an important one and an area where many partners fall short. Will your partner be able to provide both aggregate and member-level participation information broken out in sufficient detail? Will members be notified of the savings they enjoyed through the program? PartnerShip association clients enjoy a high level of detailed reporting on both a quarterly and annual basis.
6. What does your compensation model look like? What methodology do you use to establish a mutually beneficial compensation model that will provide long-term success to the program? What process do you use to allow for full-disclosure and transparency of compensation reporting? PartnerShip non-dues compensation models are flexible and very transparent for each association client that we work with.

I hope this blog post helped give you some ideas about how you might approach the RFP process of implementing this type of an affinity program. If you're still interested in learning more about how best to implement a shipping services affinity program for your members, we invite you to download a FREE copy of "Shipping Services as a Valuable Member Benefit" electronic white paper.

By Scott Frederick

PartnerShip helps thousands of customers save on their ground delivery small package shipments (i.e., generally those under 200 pounds). Through our unique alliance with FedEx^®, we help ensure our customers get access to fast and reliable small package shipping services, while maximizing their savings.

Last week we talked about the various small package shipping options for U.S. Express and International Express services. This week, we'd like to point out the discounted ground delivery small package shipping options that are available through one of our association shipping programs:

• FedEx Ground^® Choose this service for economical ground delivery to U.S. businesses. You get day-definite delivery in 1—5 business days (3—7 business days to and from Alaska and Hawaii) based on the distance to your destination. Delivery is by the end of the business day. Available to every business address throughout all 50 states (service for remote Alaskan locations and the Hawaiian islands of Lanai and Molokai is inbound only). For more information, go to fedex.com/ground.
• FedEx Home Delivery^® Get residential day-definite delivery in 1—5 business days (3—7 business days to and from Alaska and Hawaii) based on the distance to your destination. Delivery is between 9 a.m. and 8 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday. Available to every U.S. residential address, for packages up to 70 lbs. Convenient delivery
  options are available for recipients with appointment and evening requirements. For more information, go to fedex.com/homedelivery.
• FedEx International Ground^® Get economical day-definite ground delivery to Canada typically in 2—7 business days, based on the distance to your destination. Delivery is by the end of the business day. Customs clearance is included through this brokerage inclusive service (a fee applies).

Small Package Solutions

Our discounted small package shipping services are completely free to eligible businesses participating in one of our association shipping programs. If you are currently a member of a professional association or trade group, ask them if they have a discounted small package shipping program through PartnerShip. You can also give us a call at 800-599-2902, or send an email to sales@PartnerShip.com, and we'll find out for you. If not, we'd love to talk to your association leadership team to see if we can build a program for you and your fellow members.

To learn more about our other services, click the button below.