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Account Planning, Management & Development

September 10, 2008 in Sales Planning, Sales Relationships

As markets tighten and market competition increases, it becomes increasingly difficult for companies to achieve product differentiation in their market place. As such, businesses will find it harder and harder to optimise their profits unless they develop effective strategies to achieve differentiation. One way to accomplish this is through the enhancement of customer intimacy.

Account Planning, Management & Development is the process that organisations adopt in order to prioritise their customers in terms of value to the business. In most businesses, the 80/20 rule applies where 80% of current and/or potential revenue comes from 20% of the customer base. However, in recognising the value that these 20% of customers hold, it is important to adopt a strategy that is going to ensure that they are handled in such a way that maximum effort is focused on the activities that will yield the greatest potential for the company in a profitable fashion.

Successful Account Planning, Management & Development ensures that a company recognises the importance of certain customer relationships to the future of their organisation and treats these relationships as an asset to the company.

The process used to categorise customers in terms of potential as well as the process adopted to manage and develop these customers effectively are paramount to the success of any Account Planning, Management and Development strategy.

So what is a Key Account?
Essentially, it is a customer who can help to shape your company’s future. This may not necessarily be your largest customer nor the highest spending customer. In this way, the top 20 revenue, one-size-fits-all approach can be costly and risky.

Once you have completed your customer research, a number of factors should be assessed when deliberating your Account Planning, Management and Development strategy:

  • Current revenue profitability vs. potential revenue profitability
  • Complexity of needs
  • The industry in which they operate and its viability
  • Financial stability

Although the process of developing and managing Key Accounts more intimately yields greater customer penetration or share of wallet, the costs of maintaining an intimate relationship with clients can also be costly. It is for this reason that the ‘biggest’ clients do not always make the ‘best’ clients. It is a common mistake for organisations to simply segment their customer base into key accounts based on their revenue contribution, consider:

  • Larger companies often require more attention and expect not to pay for it
  • Larger companies tend to exert their power and negotiate lower prices, often exploiting suppliers by creating price wars (thus reducing profitability)
  • Larger companies employ the resources of smaller suppliers, only giving them small orders but getting the lowest prices so they can squeeze on their larger suppliers (again, affecting profitability)

It is often a hard lesson for salespeople to learn that many big companies rarely provide the return on investment proportionate to the amount of effort that’s required. In addition, these customers often compromise the company’s profitability significantly.

Analyse your accounts

So you need to analyse your accounts carefully. When analysing an account, your core focus is to interpret the customer data in such a way that will provide you with an understanding of how you can yield maximum potential from the client.

There are five key areas that need to be researched:
Strategic Information
This is the big picture information it explains why they are in business and where they are headed as an organisation. This information is critical to your basic understanding of the company.
Operational Information
The nuts and bolts of the organisation, the what, the when and the where.
Financial Information
This information is critical in assessing the ongoing viability of the customer.
Competitor Information
Recognise their strengths and minimise them. Recognise their weaknesses and exploit them. Understand what they are doing and know how to combat their activity.
Your Company History
Have a basic understanding of previous dealings with the customer but also know where to find more detailed records if or when required.

I hope this helps you plan and use your selling energy wisely.

Happy selling

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Elite athletes find key to corporate success

September 4, 2008 in Attitudes & Behaviours, Self Promotion

For Cathy Freeman and Ian Thorpe and now Stephanie Rice and Michael Phelps Olympic success has literally brought fame and fortune … but their high profile success is not just about the colour of their medals.

With the Olympics just over I can’t help but think of all the other athletes who won medals and wonder how many of them will end up with amazing sponsorship and media deals like Cathy, Ian, Stephanie and Michael. Not many I’ll bet. And with the Paralympics just begun, how many of these athletes will capitalise on their talent and success with lucrative sponsorship and media deals? Maybe even less.

These talented athletes do not have to fade away into sponsorship oblivion. There are plenty of sponsorship opportunities available for them. They need to get out there and prospect for them just like sales people do. And with something to show for it like an Olympic or Paralympic medal, the right attitude and approach, many more athletes can realise the benefits of sponsorship deals to help them extend their sporting career or find new career opportunities.

How do I know this? Well I have had the pleasure of being personally associated with the Victorian Institute of Sport (VIS) since 1991 and my company has been a major sponsor of the VIS ACE (Athlete Career & Education Program) since 1998. We have been training elite athletes, like Tae Kwon Do Gold Medallist Lauren Burns, Judo Bronze Medallist Maria Pekli, Paralympian Pentathlon Bronze Medallist Don Elgin and Hockey Gold Medallist Louise Dobson on prospecting, self promotion, selling and sales planning since 1998.

Research shows very few people have the luxury of waiting around to be courted.

The world of corporate sponsorship is very different from elite training, and although they take to it quickly, the athletes have to learn how to effectively self promote, access corporations and negotiate with a strong sense of their own value. Like sales people we have taught the athletes to learn how to identify opportunities and promote themselves on a consistent daily basis. The results have been outstanding, with several of the athletes gaining large corporate sponsorship deals over recent years, even for lower profile sports.

Don Elgin, who raised his public profile during the Sydney Paralympics with appearances on national television and radio says,

“At the time I did the Barrett program I was a VIS scholarship holder and no one knew about Paralympic athletes and there was certainly no sponsorship for them. The Barrett process educated and empowered me to take action to get out there and educate the market and secure sponsorships. The best thing I learnt was that the worst people could say to me was ‘NO’ and that was a revelation because it meant that everything was possible. I was able to tap into the potential I already had and this helped me have the confidence to get out there and give it a go. Not only am I better equipped to source and negotiate sponsorships, but the course has had a positive impact on my confidence and this has assisted the promotional work at my place of employment.

When I started the Barrett program I was a Postie. Using what I learnt I was able to move through Customer Service and Business Account Management roles to National Marketing Coordinator for the Philatelic division of Australia Post. I have also adapted what I have learned at Barrett to all parts of my life including my work with the Juvenile Justice System and my family where I help my young daughters to develop their public speaking skills and their ability to see the good in people. Whilst I have achieved a number TWO ranking in the world for my sport and success in my career, I have come to realise that having children is the greatest honour and challenge of all. I now know that I need to make sure I leave a legacy that helps them unlock and achieve their potential whatever that may be.”

While many of the athletes come with no professional sales experience they adapt quickly and apply themselves. They are refreshing in their outlook and great to work with as they have the drive, determination, work ethic and commitment to succeed.

It continues to remind me that Attitude is the key and you make your own success.

Happy selling.

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The Dark Side

September 3, 2008 in Attitudes & Behaviours, Emotional Intelligence, Self Development, Uncategorized

How well can we manage ourselves, our teams and businesses in a crisis or tough times?

Are our actions and behaviours putting us, our people and our businesses at risk?

As leaders and managers we are on show and our actions often speak louder than our words. In challenging times this is even more evident. Under pressure cracks may appear and our leadership is put to the test.

How do we cope under pressure? What happens to us when we crack? When placed under high levels of pressure, most people will rely on coping mechanisms or their strengths that help them manage in day to day activities, but due to the pressure they can actually become counterproductive tendencies. We refer to these as “risk factors” and they can emerge as our dark side. These coping mechanisms can become detrimental to our ability to build trust based relationships and impact on our leadership and sales style.

As each leader is an individual, they must find their own way to manage and lead. However, when we are assessing and understanding our own and others’ behaviours, we often refer to personality style as a key reference point. While certain personality assessments can provide accurate and reliable predictors of performance, there is more to a person’s capability and satisfaction or a team’s interactions than meets the eye.

As a starting point we can take a look at three key areas when taking into account an individual’s potential contribution to a role and workplace performance.

  1. Out in the open: Personality
  2. Beneath the surface: Motives and values
  3. Under pressure: Coping strategies, derailers and the dark side

This does not exclude other important factors such as technical competence, experience, knowledge or cognitive ability. These play a critical part in a role or team, however given technical competence, experience, knowledge and appropriate levels of intelligence are sound for the task at hand, what else can impact the performance of you, your team and the business?

Although the personality or ‘out in the open’ component is a crucial one, increasingly businesses leader are also wanting to look at people’s ability to cope under pressure. They want to know about your coping strategies, derailers and the dark side.

I find people are fascinated with the “Dark Side” so I thought I would provide you with some insight into this topic and share with you some of the work we do.

The Dark Side: Derailers & Coping Strategies

Sales leadership or any people management role involves building and maintaining a high-performing team. Anything that detracts from our ability to build a sales team also detracts from our performance as a sales leader.

Coping strategies are the behaviours that we have developed over time (even from childhood) to cope with increased levels of pressure. This pressure can be due to change, high stress, boredom, multi-tasking, work overload, unhappy environment, or finding ourselves outside our comfort zone.

When placed under such pressure, most people will display certain counterproductive tendencies. We usually refer to these as “derailers” or our potential “dark side.” Under normal conditions these characteristics may actually be strengths, but when the demands increase, our reliance on these mechanisms can impede our effectiveness and erode the quality of our relationships with customers, colleagues, and direct reports.

When confidence turns into arrogance
A specific example of when a strength can become a derailer is when confidence turns into arrogance. It is a fair assumption that confidence can be one important contributor to a successful career in business and sales. To be ‘confident’ means to have courage, to be bold, to be self-assured, and people are more likely to follow or believe in a confident leader. However, this strength can become a derailer when we are under pressure as our self-assured nature goes too far and we stop listening to other people, become condescending, egotistical and make ineffective decisions.

This is not to suggest that all confident sales leaders will demonstrate arrogance, but this is one of several potential dark sides that could have an impact on our careers.

The other potential derailers are: Excitable, Skeptical, Cautious, Reserved, Leisurely, Mischievous, Colourful, Imaginative, Diligent and Dutiful.

It is very important to note that these characteristics can have highly positive implications and which we can master and turn onto our strengths. By identifying and being made aware of our leadership coping strategies or potential dark sides we can take the ‘right’ action that allows us to develop further as leaders.

Gaining insights (by whatever trusted and validated means) into and applying corrective strategies about behaviours that could potentially undermine or inhibit your performance and ability to effectively build trust based relationships will assist you to lead people and your business more effectively and help you avoid putting you, your people and your businesses at unnecessary risk.

The research consistently shows that elite sales professionals engage in self appraisal and continuous learning. They are always looking for ways to be better. So in your quest for high performance don’t forget to look at the Dark Side.

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Do Not Call

August 21, 2008 in Call Reluctance, Prospecting

Last week www.smartcompany.com.au ran a story saying that the Federal Government may include business numbers in the Do Not Call register. What are they talking about?

Prospecting for new business via the telephone (referred to as unsolicited phone calls) is still a legitimate and critical business activity necessary for anyone in sales and in business, especially in business to business sales where consumer marketing and advertising strategies do not work effectively. It is a vital activity any business or sales person worth their salt should be doing on a regular basis. Therefore I do not believe that the government should include business numbers in the DO NOT CALL register.

Good sales people have done their homework on who they want to call and are prepared to approach the prospecting phone call with a clear client centred purpose and professional manner. They don’t just pick up the phone willy nilly and dial anyone. Many businesses have won loyal clients and large projects by prospecting to new businesses. How do you think we did if before the internet? How do you think we still do it? Whilst the internet and SEO is helpful it has not replaced prospecting as a key source of new business development. Prospecting it still a key strategy to grow sales for any business.

Unless someone can come up with alternative, cost effective sales prospecting / new business development strategies that can bypass using the telephone as a prospecting tool and are fair for all concerned (meaning it doesn’t leave small businesses at a disadvantage to bigger players who can afford others means more easily) we need to be able to prospect via the phone to continue to find new viable customers and grow our businesses.

Using the phone to source new business is a cost effective sales tool that gives parity to anyone from a start up business to a large corporate. Placing businesses on the DO NO CALL register would discriminate against smaller businesses and start ups. It would further kill off diversity in this already over-corporatised country. So using the phone to prospect should be here to stay. If not for fairness and the ease and cost of doing business but for the environmental factors as well. I mean who wants more junk mail? (Which would probably replace the phone calls). I would rather field a few calls (many of which are legitimate) than get copious amounts of emails or mail to deal with everyday.

As you know I spend my much of my business life demystifying what good sales and prospecting practices are versus unethical and incompetent practices. While there are those people and businesses who give sales and prospecting a bad name, fortunately they are in the minority. This type of proposal is at risk of basing its findings on the minority of ‘bad’ operators at the expense of the majority who do the right thing.

Let’s make sure we do not kill off initiative, common sense and the entrepreneurial spirit by denying us the opportunity to use a legitimate business tool in a legitimate business tool box.

My only hope is that whatever happens on this proposal the government has the common sense and foresight to put business people and competent sales people onto its task force to ensure the ‘real world’ view is heard and acted upon. So I am putting my hand up and am happy to contribute to the debate if the government wants my point of view.

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Desperate Times Don’t Call for Desperate or Deceptive Measures

August 15, 2008 in Ethics & Values

As markets tighten and people’s sentiment can tend towards the negative it is critical that we don’t get spooked. As mentioned before in the article about “Watch who you let near your mind” we need to examine all the evidence at hand, make informed decisions about our market and continue to ensure that our prospecting and sales efforts are targeted and at the forefront of our business activities. We also need to make sure that we continue to conduct ourselves in an ethical and professional manner working with our clients not against them.However in desperate times (and maybe it is all the time for some) some people stoop to new lows to try and get a sale. Here are a few examples of unethical and fraudulent behavior masquerading as sales activities. So beware.

For instance, last week, Carla, our Client Services Admin Manager, took a phone call from a man who said:

”Your fax machine is up for a maintenance review and I am wanting to organise a time to come in.”

There had been no mention in our business about a fax machine review. We are small enough for most things to be in our public domain so Carla knew something wasn’t right. She passed the call onto our Business Manager, Jobst who deals with all our office equipment. The man tried the same line on Jobst who, of course, was having none of it. The long and the short of it was this man was trying to get an appointment to see us to sell in new equipment but did so by deceptive means.

As Carla mentioned to me later what if you were new or not very experienced or were not kept in the loop you could have inadvertently let a person into your business who had not earned the right to be there in the first place. Why couldn’t that person have been upfront and told us what they wanted? Because sure as anything if they had got in our front door we would have kicked them straight back out again for trying to trick us.

I call this ‘Hit and miss – spot the victim’. They try and find a ‘victim’ who they can trick into seeing them and then try and bully them into buying something. While these types of stories do not make the news they are at one end of an ugly spectrum of lying and deception. At the other end of this spectrum are the tragic stories we hear and read about in the press of the elderly and vulnerable letting people into their homes for some sort of maintenance work only to be robbed or worse, badly injured or killed.

It’s bad enough that these people try getting in your front door by deceptive means but some companies don’t even call you and still try and get your money.

One of our clients informed me recently that some companies don’t even bother trying to see you instead, they just send you a bogus invoice hoping no one will notice and that you will pay it along with all your other accounts.

He mentioned two specific examples he had happen to him:

  1. An industry magazine in his market send his business an invoice with a fictitious order number for a $600 advertisement he never ordered.
  2. In applying for a trademark through his lawyer (who always invoiced all work done via his law firm) our client received a separate invoice for $1,200 from a company claiming to be a trademark firm. The official looking invoice arrived on his desk ready for payment having been approved by his accounts department. Knowing that he received all invoicing via his lawyer he rang his lawyer and found that this ‘trademark’ company was probably tapping into the trademark office data base somehow and sending out fraudulent invoices to people applying for trademarks hoping that the people were not vigilant and their invoice as well.

It made me wonder how many of us have paid an ‘invoice’ for work we never authorised and received. How many have slipped through the net?

These types of examples just remind us of the importance of being vigilant and to properly assess the credentials of anyone or any invoice claiming to do business with us.

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