Many companies discover their largest accounts are transactional. They generate high revenues; however, place minimal value on the relationship and minimal value on your company's products and services. They are not interested in developing a strategic relationship with your executive team and if they do it is only to discuss getting reduced prices.
So, how should you best handle these accounts?
Read MoreYou’re looking to create the perfect customer experience, so you already have a customer survey, what company doesn’t these days? It may even be a regular annual customer survey, because you understand the importance of knowing what your customers think in this highly competitive, turbulent business world.
A recent article by McKinsey Quarterly delved into the importance of a customer feeling as though the service has been personalised for their needs alone.
Read MoreProblem: Need to improve business results. and have already identified that your people do not have the required skills.
Solution: Find appropriate course and send people on the appropriate course.
Will just sending your people on a course be enough to improve your business results?
Read MoreProcurement departments are perceived as only being focused on reducing prices, so many suppliers will avoid procurement where they can. Instead focusing their energy on building relationships and providing value for business unit contacts. So, suppliers only deal with procurement when they are forced to.
But is this too big a risk, how much influence do procurement have in your industry and how quickly is this influence growing?
Read MoreThis blog follows on from previous blogs on organisations that are too good to change. In this link to a 13 minute TED video, Alison Sanders discusses the art and science of tracking trends. Apart from some fascinating trends, she discusses the importance of timing your action. Most organisations are too late because they do not prepare soon enough for the dramatic impact.
Read MoreWith fewer customers generating more of our revenue, we need to get better at managing our strategic relationships. Whether we call this Strategic Account Management or Key Account Management, we must get better at managing the customers we can’t afford to lose.
There is good news and bad news about managing these strategic relationships.
Read MoreOver the last couple of years, we have seen several organisations that are too good to change. But, how can organisations possibly be too good to change?
The answer is simple: they can deliver better profits this year doing almost exactly what they have always done.
Before you get too confident consider that a company's fall from grace can frequently be traced back to its time of greatest achievement!
Read MoreRecently in China we delivered a three-day workshop in Strategic Account Management. Many things were different. China has 33 provinces or states. Account Managers can be responsible for one or more province? So what? The ten biggest provinces have populations between 54 million and 104 million. So an account manager can be responsible for a region with a population of between 2 and 4 times the population of Australia. How's that for a challenge in managing your time?
Read MoreAs more companies move from sales management to account management, we regularly get asked "how can we measure improved strategic relationships?" In sales management, we are focused on the short term so typically we measure sales results and sales prospects in dollars. Yet if we are serious about developing strategic relationships, then the results will typically being to appear between 18 and 24 months after we start behaving strategically.
Read MoreIn a world of information overload and so many different points of view, it can be hard to cut through the noise and figure out what's useful. For salespeople and account managers, an emerging theme recently is the concept of the challenger approach.
Read MoreIf you’re considering implementing SAM but aren’t sure if it’s right for your business, then here is a real example of how SAM has increased results and transformed an already successful company.
Read MoreIn most companies, when you ask an Account Manager to contact a C-Level Executive that they’ve never met at one of their accounts, they squirm...
Read MoreFollowing on from our earlier blog – Why bother with Strategic Account Management (SAM)? - if you are considering implementing SAM in your business then this case study recently published in Velocity magazine will give you some practical help. A successful Strategic Account Management process needs transformational change in your business...
Read MoreHow can you engage a customer in a value discussion? Todd Snelgrove from SKF Global is a world leader in value and total cost of ownership (TCO). We asked him what common mistakes companies make and ...
Read MoreOne of the biggest weaknesses of Account Managers is their lack of skills and confidence to ...
Read MoreTo create and sustain strategic customer relationships you and your account team must focus on ...
Read MorePost-Election 2013 – are you match-fit for the opportunities ahead?
Heading into the election, the economy was by far the most important issue for voters ...
Read MoreAre your account plans a strategic as you think? Because key accounts drive both short and long-term revenue and profit, one litmus test of how well senior executives are directing the business to achieve the right balance is ...
Read MoreAre you serious about creating an account team that can think and act strategically? Or are you doing the same things as your competitors each year ...
Read MoreIs your company facing increasing pressure to compete on price? Are your competitors cutting prices to secure volume, and are you being forced to respond? Are revenues and profits in steady decline? Do you feel helpless to stem the flow?
The long-term implications of price discounting are catastrophic; it creates ...
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