Partnify stands for simplicity in finding, creating, and managing business partnerships. We talked to Jens Visser, the company’s CEO and Founder, about the benefits of Partnify, their growth potential, and their go-to-market strategy. Learn more about them in our interview and check out their live round on Leapfunder.

1. Hi Jens. Thank you for agreeing to do the interview. You recently rebranded from Grow-ID to Partnify. How come?

Ron Lohuis and I started with Grow-ID in 2018. This was a freelancing partnership where we, as students, did consulting jobs in digital transformation and online marketing/sales. Over the years, it transformed into a small business where we helped companies identify their core challenges and helped them set up projects with freelancers and agencies. This was mainly a service-driven business where we used many digital tools. 

At the beginning of 2022, we decided to move towards a tech-driven business by building a platform that connects businesses to freelancers and agencies on a project base. At the end of 2022, we got two new Co-Founders, Daniël and Jonatan. After we started working with them on developing the platform, we saw a lot of positive feedback from our users, but this wasn’t really about matchmaking. The matchmaking was important, but our way of working was helping them partner up with external companies much easier and with companies they knew already and had been working with. Companies weren’t looking for a platform to only matchmake but to manage their partnerships. 

This resulted in a slight pivot. Our focus went from matchmaking to building a digital infrastructure for finding, creating, and managing partnerships. For us, this felt a little bit like a new beginning. Partnify stands for simplicity in finding, creating, and managing your business partnerships.

2. What are the benefits of Partnify, and why is it a product-market fit?

The business world is evolving, innovating, and changing rapidly. Why do companies need external partners? To innovate, enter new markets, have the right people on board, and grow their business. 

Where companies used to mainly focus on building these solutions internally, the shift towards working with external partners is growing. This explains the rise in the gig economy and the platform economy. Partnify will be part of this shift. We help companies find, establish, and manage partnerships dynamically and interactively, centralized and on a project base.

Partnify will be an end-to-end solution where everything can be arranged through one platform. This solves two main problems many companies face: streamlining inefficient, repetitive manual processes and working with too many different decentralized systems.

Our vision is to support real-life connections and the workflows that accompany them. Partnify will be the digital bridge between internal teams and external partners, finding the right balance between real-life connections and digital solutions.

3. You have a live round on Leapfunder. And it’s not the first one. What makes it the right tool for your startup, and what do you expect from the round?

Through Leapfunder, we can onboard new investors smoothly and provide them with a secure legal structure for their investment. That way, we can focus on working with them on the business, instead of worrying about complicated legal matters.

Furthermore, we’ve received some interest from potential investors through Leapfunder. They’ve significantly contributed by providing us with insights and tips.

4. How much growth potential do you see for Partnify, and what type of investors are you looking to attract in this round?

Currently, we’re raising €400K. €150K has already been raised. The funds are mainly used to increase the development capacity at Partnify so we can launch new features and integrate new business models like high ticket subscriptions and advertising. Funds will also be used to launch a go-to-market campaign in the Netherlands. 

The investors that we work with don’t have a specific profile. We have a successful startup founder, a CMO/shareholder at an online casino, a real estate entrepreneur, and an international businessman in SMEs. What we mainly look for in an investor is a connection that goes beyond Partnify, a two-way street of providing value to one another in the long term.

5. What are your plans for the upcoming months? Tell us about your go-to-market strategy and the plan to acquire customers.

In the upcoming months, we’ll mainly work on developing the Partnify platform, onboarding new users & gaining user feedback, and launching a go-to-market campaign. 

Our growth strategy consists of two parts. One is the efficiency tool that Partnify provides businesses to set up new projects with partners quickly and straightforwardly. There’s a direct return on investment by saved hours. This proposition is easy to understand and resonates with many businesses. 

Companies must refer a partner to the platform to set up a partnership. A significant network effect will occur as more companies and professionals join the platform.

Partners within the platform can also give each other reviews based on their experience working together. This results in meaningful reviews and emphasizes one of Partnify’s goals – to provide a platform where the strength and beauty of meaningful partnerships rise again.

Thank you for sharing the story of Partnify, Jens. We wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors.

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