Dave Walker
Fortune 50 CMO | Founder, B2SMB Institute | Building the Operating System for Enterprise→SMB Growth | Publisher, Between the Lines
December 17, 2025
Partnership Theater vs. Strategic Reality
Three press releases landed in my inbox over the last few weeks, each one breathless about “strategic partnerships” that would “transform” markets.
Here’s what none of them said: which company was desperate, which one was playing defense, and which one just figured out how to finally make money off the mid-market.
After 40 years watching companies announce partnerships (and sometimes being the person generating those announcements), I can tell you this: the gap between the lines of what they say and what they mean is where the real story lives.
So let’s take a little look…
Salesforce + OpenAI: When Your Competitor Forces Your Hand
What they announced: Expanded partnership bringing OpenAI’s AI into Salesforce Einstein. Better forecasting, smarter automation, personalized everything.
What they didn’t say: “Microsoft is eating our lunch with Copilot, and if we don’t move fast, enterprise customers are going to start wondering why they’re paying us this much for a CRM that feels increasingly… 2019.”
I spent 30+ years in Fortune 50 executive suites. I know what “expanded partnership” means. It means the first partnership wasn’t deep enough, wasn’t fast enough, or wasn’t scaring competitors enough.
Here’s what’s happening.
Salesforce had Einstein GPT, powered by their 2023 OpenAI partnership. It was fine. Respectable.
But then Microsoft went all-in on OpenAI, wiring GPT-4 into everything. Dynamics 365, Office 365, the works. Suddenly they’re not just selling enterprise software; they’re selling the future. And they’re doing it to Salesforce’s customers.
And Salesforce’s AI integration looked tentative, not transformative – sooo 2023.
So Salesforce went back to OpenAI. Not to partner (they were already partners). To partner harder. Deeper integration. More access. Better branding rights. The October announcement was effectively: “We’re still relevant, we promise.”
Industry analysts called it “necessary.” That’s analyst-speak for “they had no choice.”
What This Means If You’re Selling to SMBs
Two things are happening here that matter more than the press release admits.
First, the platform wars just went AI-native. Every B2SMB vendor is going to announce their AI partnership in the next 18 months. Most of them will be theater (a chatbot here, a recommendation engine there). Some will actually rearchitect their platforms. The difference will determine who wins the next decade.
Second, your SMB customers are soon going to expect AI-powered automation everywhere. Not just in their CRM. In their payroll system. In their inventory management software. In their HR. The Salesforce announcement just raised the bar for everyone, including those selling B2SMB.
If you’re running a B2SMB company and you don’t have an AI strategy that goes deeper than “we’re exploring ChatGPT integration,” you just got lapped.
Square + Grubhub: Playing Catch-Up by Skipping the Build
What they announced: Grubhub’s delivery network integrated into Square’s POS. One platform, all your channels, seamless operations.
What they didn’t say: “Square is toast in the restaurant vertical, thanks to Toast. We can’t build delivery infrastructure ourselves, and if we don’t move now, every restaurant is going to pick Toast by default.”
This one’s easier to decode because the competitive pressure is so obvious.
Toast built an all-in-one platform: hardware, software, payments, and integrated delivery. They own the whole stack.
Square owned payments and POS. Good, but incomplete. And in the restaurant world, incomplete means “we’ll look at you after we look at Toast.”
Square had two choices:
- Build their own delivery network (2-3 years, $$$hundreds-of-millions)
- Partner with someone who already has one (6 months, revenue share agreement)
They picked option 2. Pretty smart – but somewhat obvious – move.
Only one downside – and I’ve lived this one large: when you partner instead of build, you’re sharing the economics forever. Toast keeps all the margin. Square is now splitting it with Grubhub.
That’s fine if it holds the ramparts another day. It’s not fine if it becomes your permanent competitive position.
My second look? It’s Grubhub that needs this more than Square.
DoorDash and Uber Eats dominate delivery. Grubhub’s third place and fading. They needed distribution (access to a huge merchant base that wasn’t already using their competitors). Square gave them that.
This is a defensive partnership for both companies. Square defending against Toast. Grubhub defending against irrelevance.
When two companies team up because they’re both losing to someone else, that’s not innovation. That’s survival.
Not that there is anything wrong with survival.
At Toys R Us we bought an under-capitalized Baby Superstore chain because we absolutely sucked at our first few Babies R Us. We took defensive and made it offense.
What This Means If You’re Selling to SMBs
In B2SMB – and this is a forever thing – vertical-specific beats horizontal general-purpose. Every. Single. Time.
Square is a payments company trying to be a restaurant company. Toast is a restaurant company that happens to handle payments. See the difference?
If you’re selling horizontal infrastructure (payments, CRM, accounting), you’re going to lose to someone who built for a specific vertical unless you can assemble all the pieces they need faster than they can.
Square + Grubhub is what that assembly looks like when you’re playing from behind.
QuickBooks + Aprio & Rehmann: Superman to the Rescue
What they announced: Strategic partnerships with top accounting firms to implement Intuit Enterprise Suite in the mid-market. Accountants become implementation partners, advisory partners, growth partners.
What they didn’t say: “Intuit’s been losing mid-market customers to NetSuite for years, so we finally built an ERP that doesn’t suck, and we just figured out how to sell it without hiring 500 enterprise sales reps.”
Of the three partnerships, this is the only one that’s genuinely strategic.
It’s no secret, sort of a truism: Small businesses start on QuickBooks. They grow. And grow. And eventually after growing into mid-size businesses, QuickBooks can’t handle the complexity. So they switch to NetSuite, Sage Intacct, or Microsoft Dynamics.
Intuit loses them. It’s been happening for 20+ years.
But hang on: Intuit finally built an ERP that can compete: Intuit Enterprise Suite. Only one problem: mid-market buyers don’t trust software-platform companies to implement complex financial systems. They trust their accountants.
So Intuit did something most software companies don’t think of: they made SMEs in implementation (in this case accounting firms) the sales channel and the delivery channel.
This actually works because Accounting firms have three GTM problems:
- Compliance revenue is commoditizing (everyone’s going cloud, it’s getting cheaper).
- They need higher-margin advisory work.
- Their clients keep asking them what system to switch to when they outgrow QuickBooks.
Intuit just solved all three.
Now when a client outgrows QuickBooks, the accounting firm doesn’t send them to NetSuite. They say: “Let me show you the Intuit Enterprise Suite. And we’ll implement it. And we’ll train your team. And we’ll help you redesign your workflows. And we’ll charge you for all of that.”
Accounting firms get advisory revenue. Intuit keeps the customer. The customer gets a trusted partner guiding them through the transition.
That’s not partnership theater. That’s structural GTM change.
What This Means If You Sell to the “M” in “SMB”
Not to be insulting, but for almost every SaaS player I’ve known, the best sales channel isn’t created by your own sales team. It’s someone your customer already trusts.
Intuit didn’t hire enterprise AEs. They didn’t build an inside sales team. They didn’t buy Super Bowl ads. They partnered with the people who already sit in the CFO’s office once a week/month/quarter.
If you’re trying to break upwards to mid-market or enterprise, ask yourself: who does your buyer already trust? And how can you turn them into your channel?
This is the partnership model everyone else should be copying.
So What’s Happening Between the Lines Here?
Three partnerships. Three different strategic rationales:
- Salesforce + OpenAI: Defensive move. Microsoft forced their hand. They had to match or lose.
- Square + Grubhub: Catch-up play. Toast was winning. This closes the gap but doesn’t win the war.
- QuickBooks + Accounting Firms: Offensive move. This creates a structural advantage that competitors will struggle to replicate.
Here’s the pattern I see in our little $2.5Tril slice of heaven called B2SMB: partnerships announced as “strategic” are usually one of three things:
- Integration Theater – API connection dressed up as transformation
- Tactical Defense – Plugging a hole so customers stop leaving
- Channel Innovation – Actually rethinking how you go to market
Which one do you think matters long-term?
If you’re selling to or serving SMBs, here’s my point: don’t read these Partnership press releases as if they’re honest. They’re not lying, exactly. But they’re not telling you what’s really happening. The real question is always: did a competitor force this move?
Watch who’s partnering because they have to vs. who’s partnering because they saw something first. The first group is playing defense. The second group is playing offense. Bet on offense.
If you’re thinking about partnerships, ask the Intuit question: who does my customer already trust? That’s your channel.
And if you’re a services firm serving the B2SMB space (accounting, legal, payroll – whatever), pay attention to what Intuit just did. They turned their biggest churn problem into their biggest competitive advantage by integrating the trusted advisor into the sales channel.
That’s replicable. You should be thinking about how to replicate it.
What I’m Watching Next in Partnerships
Salesforce will need to announce something else in Q1. The OpenAI integration won’t be enough. They’re going to acquire or partner with someone in the vertical space (probably construction, healthcare, or professional services). They’ve learned from Toast that vertical focus wins.
Square will either announce another vertical partnership (I’m guessing contractors or professional services), or Block will spin Square out and let it actually become a restaurant company. They can’t keep playing horizontal against vertical players.
Intuit will sign 3-5 more large-network accounting firms by March. This model prints money once you prove it works. Every top-50 firm will want in.
You already know this: when one company figures out a better GTM model, everyone else copies it within 18 months.
So watch the Partnership announcements like you watch Knives Out. Read between the lines. Always something.
Next Between The Lines Newsletter Drop on 12/30: I’m tracking layoffs in B2SMB. Not the human story – which sucks – but the market signal story.
When three payroll companies cut headcount in the same quarter, they’re telling you something about where the SaaS payroll market is going. I’ll tell you what I’m seeing.
Meanwhile, what are you seeing between the lines? Where’s the competitive pressure forcing partnerships in your world?
I want to know, and the comments, like Kwik Stop, are always open.
PS – Watch for our Between the Lines “Year in Review” dropping January 7 in the big two-six.