Partner Marketing That Accelerates Revenue

This case study was created from an episode of the Product Marketing Adventures Podcast. It has been adapted into Dusted's case study format to preserve and showcase the guest's real-world experience. Written to preserve the voice of the true author, Sharon Markowitz.

As product marketers at Zoom, we were expanding quickly beyond meetings into a full platform that included Zoom Phone, contact center, team chat, and over 2,000 apps in the Zoom App Marketplace. I led the go-to-market strategy for the Marketplace, building programs that helped customers—from small businesses to enterprises—do more inside Zoom. Native functionality often lagged customer needs; for example, Zoom Phone lacked fax support, which remained essential in highly regulated industries like healthcare because it is one of the most secure and compliant ways to transmit sensitive documents.

The gap was not a demand-gen problem—it was a conversion blocker for high-intent pipeline. Switching to Zoom Phone simply was not compelling for many organizations that still required fax. At the same time the company was heavily focused on AI, so I needed a way to earn mindshare from the sales team and unblock stalled deals without waiting on the product roadmap. I realized I had to step outside the traditional product-marketing swim lane.

I started by listening to customers and internal teams—sales calls, support feedback, win-loss data—to confirm that high-intent deals were stalling over missing capabilities. I secured the right ISD partner that filled the fax gap, then designed a scalable go-to-market motion around it. Because reps had told me in informal conversations that they wanted company swag rather than more decks, I funded a simple sales-incentive program from the marketing budget. I embedded myself with the field: joined sales calls across North America, Europe, and Asia, created a Zoom Team Chat channel with the partner so reps had direct access to subject-matter experts, and built the program together with account executives and customer-success managers so it fit their existing workflow. Once early participants began receiving swag, I asked them to promote the program to peers, turning organic excitement into social proof.

We used an account-based approach focused on high-intent accounts, a Zoom Team Chat channel that gave sales direct access to the partner, the company store for fulfillment (already a sunk cost), and basic win-loss and pipeline data to identify conversion blockers. The incentive itself was Zoom-branded swag rather than gift cards to avoid tax complications and reinforce the brand.

We saw more than 60% sales participation in a single quarter. The overall go-to-market program drove millions in net-new customer account value, accelerated stalled deals, and gave customers a clear path to say yes. The biggest lesson was that it is okay—and often necessary—to step outside the classic PMM swim lane when doing so directly impacts the customer and the business.