Fusion marketing. How to set up a fusion marketing alliance?

I will talk some more about this topic, since I found it very interesting. '
I will explain how to set up such an alliance.
First of all, you need to define who could be your partner(s). Be sure to look for companies that do not engage in the same business as you, since this would make the alliance cannibalistic. Entrepreneur.com offers examples of competitors that are not direct competitors, but nevertheless aim for the same market: landscaper/builder, realtor/mortgage broker, network marketer/entrepreneur, massage therapist/chiropractor
Next you need to agree with your partners how much is each willing to sacrifice in order to convince the customer to go with this alliance, but without making one company suffer more than the other. The sacrifices made by the companies should be more of less of equal value or proportional with the amount of revenue each store would receive from the redirected customer, depending on the type of business and profit margin of each.
Binding the agreement is also important, since it should be clearly defined the tasks of each partner, in order to avoid future possible issues.
Next you must transform the idea into reality. You need to exchange information and create a common advertising material that will be distributed by all the companies involved. Try to make this offer as easy as possible. Don’t make it hard for the customer to benefit from the alliance: for example (related to the pizza store example in the previous blog) don’t make the customer buy a certain number of pizzas in order for the coupon to be valid.
Try to make this network work as fluent as possible. Also be sure to constantly search for new partners that want to join in. The more you find, the more advantages your clientele will have and thus more likely to choose you than a direct competitor that does not posses such bundle of offers.

Source: www.entrepreneur.com