True partnerships in the world of social marketing

When you have a personal emergency, you have  to place a great deal of trust in your partners.  As I’m writing this I’m on my way to Florida as my dad’s health seems to be taking another questionable turn in what has been a serious of such turns.

There’s a lot of time to think while you’re listening to sports talk and Springsteen (thank goodness for satellite radio) and I found myself thinking how important the word “partnership” is in my life.  Josh and I decided on the word “Partnership” as part of The Hodges Partnership primarily because the word “Group” was taken.   But it is through true partnerships that we have built our business.

Partnerships with our wives, with each other, with our employees who are truly partners in our business and partners with allied marketing agencies and entities who bring us to the table for projects and who we try to send business as well.

We have been very fortunate to have found great partners.   Folks like John Siddall, Susan McFadden, Joe Slay, John Sarvey, Sonali Shetty to name just a few.  Though these partnerships we form tremendous teams of marketers with all the key disciplines available to our collective clients that are available at other largers agencies.  I like to think these partnerships make us more nimble that our larger counterparts but you would have to ask our clients how true that is.

As the miles passed by I also though how the key tenants of social marketing, transparency, timeliness, truth, consistency, etc. are also critical in these relationships.  You need to be able to share your concerns and kudos with your partners.  It is critical that you can trust them, especially when times are bad, and be able to rely on them to get things done when it is impossible for you to do that yourself.

So this is my way of thanking these folks publicly.  I only hope that you have partners like these in your life.

Please share some thoughts and your great partnerships with a comment.  Thanks.