We spoke with Co-Founders Tim Demetriou and Greg Armstrong to explore how working with Hockey Stick Advisory helped them sharpen their partner strategy, deliver more value to partners, and build a high-performing acquisition channel.
PencilPay was founded to solve a persistent pain point in the wholesale supply chain: taking payments should be simple, predictable, and automated. As the platform grew, it became clear that their strongest customers were coming through trusted technology partners and cloud integrators, not traditional direct sales.
Yet despite early traction, PencilPay lacked a scalable, repeatable way to find, engage, and enable the right partners. The team knew partnerships could transform their growth model, they just needed the right framework to make it happen.
We spoke with Co-Founders Tim Demetriou and Greg Armstrong to explore how working with Hockey Stick Advisory helped them sharpen their partner strategy, deliver more value to partners, and build a high-performing acquisition channel.
PencilPay found that customers acquired through partners were the right size, better qualified, and far more likely to stay. Direct leads converted but churned quickly - while partner-led leads converted at 60–65% and delivered stronger lifetime value.
The biggest mindset shift was learning to provide value before expecting anything in return. By being easy to work with, offering hands-on support, and taking pressure off partners, PencilPay became the trusted go-to vendor in its ecosystem.
Before Hockey Stick Advisory, partnerships happened by chance. After adopting a clear framework - ICP definition, partner value proposition, repeatable enablement - PencilPay created a predictable, scalable, and efficient partner acquisition engine.
Instead of hiring multiple sales reps, PencilPay scaled through partners. The channel allowed them to grow reach, improve pipeline quality, and stay efficient - showing that partnerships can deliver outsized impact without expanding headcount.
Partners consistently reported that PencilPay made their job easier - fast onboarding, great service, no friction. This reliability strengthened trust and encouraged more referrals, creating a flywheel effect that competitors couldn’t match.
Prior to working with Hockey Stick Advisory, PencilPay relied heavily on inbound leads and referrals. But the team quickly learned that direct acquisition wasn’t the most efficient path to growth.
As Greg Armstrong shared, “Direct leads might convert, but the cancellation rate is through the roof. Partner-led customers stick - they’re already vetted, they’re the right size, and they trust the recommendation.”
The team saw a clear opportunity: if they could build a strong partner ecosystem, they could scale efficiently without hiring a large sales team.
“We’re a lean team-we didn’t want five salespeople on phones all day,” Tim added. “Partnerships let us grow smarter.”
Before working with Hockey Stick, PencilPay’s approach to partnerships was opportunistic rather than strategic. Partners existed - but systems, processes, and value propositions weren’t formalised.
Greg put it plainly:
“We historically hadn’t been very big in bringing partnerships into a deal. Our partners brought us in but we didn’t have a structured way to build or manage those relationships.”
The team lacked:
And most importantly, they weren’t yet confident in how to articulate the value they could bring.
Tim and Greg were introduced to Hockey Stick Advisory early in their journey and the impact was felt from the very first session.
“It was the value-first mindset that hit me - don’t expect anything, just provide value and it slowly comes,” Tim added.
PencilPay quickly realised they needed more than ad-hoc partnerships; they needed clarity, structure, and a proven framework.
“You must provide value first,” Tim recalled. “That stuck in my brain. If we can’t give referrals back, we needed to find other ways to provide value - and that changed everything.”
The combination of clear deliverables, partner strategy fundamentals, and practical frameworks shifted PencilPay from reactive to strategic, giving them the confidence and direction to build a scalable partner engine.
Throughout the engagement, the PencilPay team found the experience transformational-not just in outcomes, but in how they thought.
“It really shaped our thinking,” Tim said. “We’ve been able to manage a smaller group of partners really well, and get a decent amount of referrals from them.”
The frameworks Hockey Stick introduced were simple, scalable, and repeatable. And because the team could apply them immediately, the impact was felt quickly.
One standout shift: redefining the Partner Value Proposition.
Partners consistently told the PencilPay team,
“We love working with you because you take everything off our plate. You deliver great service-we don’t have to worry.”
Hockey Stick helped PencilPay turn this feedback into a core differentiator they could scale across their ecosystem.
The numbers speak for themselves.
Partner-led customers:
The shift has also enabled PencilPay to stay lean while still scaling efficiently.
“We haven’t needed a big sales team-partnerships became our engine.” - Tim
The PencilPay team has fully embraced the partnership strategy, with partners and customers feeling the difference.
“Our partners love us because we make their job easier,” Greg shared. “Customers tell partners they love working with Pencil because the onboarding and service is so good.”
Since the engaging with Hockey Stick, PencilPay now has:
“It’s night and day. We get the right customers faster, and partners trust us because we deliver,” Greg said.
This mindset shift has been just as impactful.
“Provide value first. Do a good job. And when the opportunity comes, take it - just like Tom Brady,” Tim said.
With this foundation, PencilPay is set up for sustainable, scalable growth.
“It’s a sustainable channel now. We’ve built the engine. We know what works.”
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