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A few weeks ago, we were excited to announce our new partnership with online-auction powerhouse eBay. Since then, I've done numerous interviews on what it took to put together such a fantastic business relationship. The key was patience and professionalism. Here's a quick overview of the process.

The idea for this partnership came about in early January at our monthly board meeting. The topic was how to increase traffic to our site, and the board started debating the merits hooking up with top e-commerce sites as a solution. We believed there could be an opportunity if one of the major sites was interested in enhancing its real estate section, since we could give its customers our online real estate brokerage service. We knew that as a relatively new player, we would have to make a convincing argument that we were national and could scale up to handle the increased traffic that such a partnership could bring.

After a month of analyzing each of the top five e-commerce sites, we decided that eBay would be the ideal partner because of its profitability, transaction customer base, and underused real estate section. Now we needed to continue our rapid national expansion and get a good introduction to the company.

STRATEGY SHIFT. Fortunately, our board had very good relationships with key people at eBay, and we got the appropriate introductions. Proving that sometimes it's better to be lucky than good, at the same time we made overtures, eBay decided to enhance its real estate services and hired someone to spearhead this new shift. It was his job to research the entire real estate space and determine the best strategy for eBay.

We first met with him in early March. He started working with Lane Hornung, our vice-president for business development, discussing the merits of an eBay/zipRealty.com partnership. Over the next two months, we were required to give eBay mountains of documentation and analysis. At each step we ensured our staff did whatever it took to get eBay the info it needed as soon as possible. We gave the company detailed financial results and projections, forwarded customer testimonials, and created HTML mock-ups on what a joint offering might look like. We had eBay members test our system as customers. There were a few bumps in the road, but we just kept expanding into more cities and improving our service.

In May, eBay indicated that it would be interested in working with us -- finally. As a small company, we were used to getting deals done in days, and this process taught us that timelines are longer for larger, publicly traded companies.

JUST BEGINNING. At this juncture we thought we had it made. Little did we know the real work was about to begin. First came a month of discussions on what the partnership would look like. Then, it took another month to finalize the details and get them in writing. There were numerous lengthy conference calls to go over the language of each term. Although these things can get combative, credit goes out to the team at eBay, which was very professional and responsive during all negotiations.

Finally, in July, after all points were agreed to and approved by each side's lawyers, boards, and companies, the final deal was struck. What a major relief. Although it took almost half a year, it was worth the effort because we knew this partnership signaled a new era for the company. See you in two weeks.


Scott Kucirek is president and co-founder of zipRealty.com, an online real estate brokerage. The company's Internet site and online real estate agents let people complete the entire purchase or sale of a house via the Web. The company's Web site is www.zipRealty.com, and you can E-mail Scott at Scott@zipRealty.com.