The Do’s and Don’ts of Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs)
Before the do’s and don’ts, let us be clear – Quarterly business reviews are not for every client that an organization has. QBRs require effort from multiple members of the sales team to get a clear understanding of how the service helps customers take their business strategy forward. Quarterly business reviews show what can be acted upon based on this understanding, and can be fine-tuned with help from customers. They are a useful tool for B2B product companies to evaluate their performance and make strategic decisions. Company leaders can review key metrics such as revenue, customer retention, and product usage, and identify areas for improvement. They also allow for open communication between different departments and can help to identify any bottlenecks or roadblocks that may be affecting the company’s overall performance. For companies to stay on track with their goals and objectives, QBRs provide insights to make any necessary adjustments to their strategy in a timely manner and ensure the continued growth and success of the product. Read More: Essential QBR Metrics to Track For Account Growth What are Quarterly business reviews? Quarterly business reviews (QBRs) for key accounts are regular meetings between a company and its important customers to review the status of their relationship and identify opportunities for growth and improvement. During these meetings, the company typically presents data on key performance indicators, such as sales and revenue, and discusses any issues or concerns that have arisen. The customer also has the opportunity to provide feedback on their experience and suggest areas for improvement. QBRs are an important tool for maintaining and strengthening key business relationships. Learn more: QBR Playbook for Sales and Account Management Leaders Why are QBRs important? Quarterly business reviews provide a regular opportunity to review and assess the performance of the business and identify areas for improvement. QBRs can also help product organizations to better understand their customers’ needs and preferences, and make necessary adjustments to their products and services. QBRs can help product organizations to: Monitor progress regularly. The process of QBR helps product organizations identify any areas that are underperforming or not meeting their expectations. Inputs allow product organizations to make necessary adjustments to their products and services to better meet the needs of their customers. Identify opportunities for growth and expansion, like new markets, product lines, or services that the product organization can explore to increase revenue and profitability. Improve customer satisfaction by regularly checking in with their customers to understand their needs and preferences. Product organizations can better meet the needs of their customers and increase customer satisfaction. Increase efficiency by conducting regular QBRs, and identify areas where they can improve their internal processes. This can help product organizations to increase efficiency and productivity, ultimately leading to increased profitability. Quarterly business reviews are important for product organizations as they provide a regular opportunity to review and assess the performance of the business, identify areas for improvement, and make necessary adjustments to better meet the needs of their customers. How to gauge an effective QBR? Apart from measuring customer satisfaction through surveys and feedback forms, progress can be tracked against agreed-upon goals and other methods. The service provider and customer organization should have agreed-upon ways to track and report that can be examined during the quarterly review. Evaluate communication and collaboration: The effectiveness of the quarterly business review should be evaluated based on the level of communication and collaboration between the Sales teams and customer organization. Track incident and problem resolution: Taking into account the number and severity of incidents and problems that have been resolved during the quarter, gives an indication of how the product is developing. Monitor service level agreements (SLAs): Performance against agreed-upon SLAs need to be reviewed as market circumstances change, to highlight if any changes are necessary. Review financial metrics: Cost savings, revenue, profitability and other financial metrics show if there are any avenues that can be leveraged. Assess the use of technology: Using tools that simplify business reviews can give sales teams more time to actually engage with the client meaningfully. Seek feedback: The customer organization should be given the opportunity to provide feedback on the effectiveness of the quarterly business review and the Sales team’s overall performance. businesses often use tools like survey platforms, embedded forms, or QR codes to collect post-meeting feedback quickly and efficiently. Solutions such as the QR Code generator make it easy to create custom codes that link directly to feedback forms. 4 Common mistakes to avoid while doing a QBR Business reviews should always be conducted in a strategic mode, not a tactical one. That rules out support requests and other business-as-usual practices to save time. A clear agenda keeps the discussion pointed, and keeping the discussion time-bound creates necessary urgency. Here are some common follies that can derail quarterly business reviews: 1. Not setting effective goals Quarterly business reviews are meant to foster growth, and the goals should reflect this. The meeting should be about both parties (the customer and the vendor sales team) deciding on the steps to achieve their most important goals. Starting with what both teams want to achieve in the next few quarters can give a definitive direction. The goals can be as simple as presenting actionable ideas to clients and get their buy-in, to the complex facets involving finance and production. Usage statistics and event summaries should reflect this aim so that the topics are kept in the conversation for the entire quarter. 2. Assuming customer needs Customer input on the agenda is a crucial part of a quarterly business review. Once the agenda is set, sharing it with the customer team and asking if there’s anything else they want in the business review keeps them involved. This skin in the game leads to productive discussions, and reduces efforts of sales teams too – as they don’t have to pull stats for something that the customer is not interested in looking at, right now. 3. Treating all customers the same Customers can
Quick Look into Relationship Mapping in 2024
Relationship Mapping is a visual representation of an account or customer’s organizational chart. It gives an idea of the kind of connections and influences each entity has over another. Relationship mapping ensures that there is clear understanding into the complex relationships within an organization when it comes to B2B sales negotiations. This enables account managers and sales leaders to identify the purchasing process, stakeholders and the influence of these stakeholders within the organizational hierarchy of your customers. The Need for Relationship Mapping If we are unaware of the key stakeholders, decision-makers, or influencers within the target client’s organization, there is a possibility of losing the lead and the entire deal in the highly competitive B2B world. In order to ensure that the bargaining power of your sales and account management teams don’t fall short of expectations, there is a need to be equipped with the ability to sell your products and also to push out other products to your clients. Importance of Customer Relationship Mapping To Retain Your Customers To Win New Clients To Sell More to your existing Clients Relationship Mapping primarily serves the purpose of achieving 3 main goals Generate more revenue from the existing set of clients Win new clients Protect your existing clientele When equipped with the necessary tools, Key Account Managers can arrive at the best possible outcomes during negotiations and generate increased revenue. Relationship Mapping helps identify newer and fresher white space opportunities for revenue generation and simultaneously strengthens older streams of revenue. 6-Step Process to Create a Relationship Map 1) Clarify Interests Before you begin the task of creating your relationship map, it is important to firmly state what your interests are. Every client-side team will have various positions and demands made by certain individuals or parties. These positions could stem from their needs, concerns, hopes, desires, and fears in the short term(2-3 months) , mid-term (1-3 years) and long-term (3+ years). 2) Identify all the Relevant Stakeholders Ensure that no stakeholder is left out. Knowing the organizational hierarchy and internal pecking order throughout the changes in a client’s life cycle is useful to be in a better position and defining goals during negotiations. This is why updating the relationship map is important. 3)Identify the Interests of the Stakeholders within the Account Identify and analyze relevant players and the interests of the client. List out their needs, concerns and fears to better understand the stakeholders involved with the account. 4)Identify the Relationship between the Stakeholders in an Account This requires knowing who the relevant players are, and what each player wants from the agreement. You need to identify and analyze all existing relationships between the parties and the type of relationships. 5)Identify Coalitions Identifying coalitions within the client organization can help you in your agreement. This helps determine whom to include and exclude in your negotiations. 6)Attack the Stakeholder Relationship Map with Strategy and Tact After the map has been created, it is up to you to make a clear plan of action for you and your team. Checkout these 3 strategies to employ your relationship map in action for your key accounts. Strategies for Growing Key Accounts Using Relationship Mapping 1) Bootstrapping Move from ‘easier’ parties to ‘harder’ parties. Exploit your personal and professional relations to finally arrive at your desired outcome. Easier parties are natural allies and harder parties need more influence from within the organization to come to an agreement. 2) Backward Mapping Identify to whom the decision-maker defers. Then, identify the person to whom that player defers. Keep doing this till you identify a player with whom you can influence easily. Individual relationship patterns and joint value created from your coalition influence the final decision-making process. 3) Pyramiding This strategy is the opposite of bootstrapping. Begin with the players who are hardest to influence. Often these parties are the ones who exert the most influence within an organization. This strategy allows you to ally yourself with parties that have so much influential power over others that once you have them on your side, you are almost assured that you will have no opposition. 3 points to consider while creating a Stakeholder Relationship Map Key account managers need to be proactive communicators and share critical information to ensure the success of ongoing actions. The following are three important points to keep in mind while designing a solution to a relationship map that adds value to your products and services. 1) Accessibility for All Every member of your team can have critical information on your client’s performance, preference, need gaps, relation dynamics, and so many more intangibles. 2) Real-Time Data Is Critical Make it a priority with your team to update the relationship map every time there is a tangible or intangible change within the client organization to stay up to date. 3) Regular Review of the Relationship Map It is necessary to conduct a monthly or quarterly review of it to ensure the credibility of data. What makes a good Relationship Mapping Tool? Creating a relationship map is only the first step of your journey. It is necessary to structure your thoughts and goals for a relationship map. A good stakeholder relationship map will help you answer the following questions:- What am I trying to achieve from this client partnership? Who among the clients and my organization would be affected by it? How can each one of the stakeholders from the client’s organization help or hurt my objectives? What can I do to leverage the entities that are helpful for my cause? What is the path I should take for any possible damage control in the future? Relationship Mapping for effective Key Account Management Key Account Management implies going above and beyond for building long-term relationships with a focus on the customers who make up the majority of the business’s revenue. A powerful solution that can assist Key Account Managers is the relationship mapping tool. A good relationship map is a tool that makes the best use of
Whitepaper: The Impact of Digital Key Account Management on Sales Enablement
Measure the Impact of Digital Key Account Management on Sales Enablement Key Account Management is undergoing a digital transformation and with it comes abundant opportunities for sales enablement professionals. Formerly slow and laborious manual processes where sales teams relied on traditional communication methods have now been replaced by digital technologies. Newer ways of managing accounts and driving growth have emerged. This whitepaper explores how the digital era of transformation is pushing for new growth in Key Account Management along with its impact on sales enablement. Download to learn how to unlock your growth with Key Account Management solutions and increase your success with sales enablement Key topics include: Challenges in account planning processes, account retention, upselling strategies and how to overcome them. Institutionalizing account intelligence & enhanced standardization through Digital Key Account Management. Applying the dos and don’ts of digital Key Account Management solutions to build successful sales enablement
Fly High Even During A Recession
Make your Key Account Management strategy work even during an economic downturn The recession is coming down on us faster than any of us expected. This unforeseen economic downturn is likely to have impacted your 2022 account plans. While post-covid ‘Land & Expand’ was the favorite approach to growing Key Accounts, the recession has resulted in additional dimensions being added to the Land & Expand strategy. This article takes you through on how to get back on track with your key accounts, lay the foundation for regaining stability and continuing growth. Based on our interactions with existing enterprise accounts and knowledge of the challenges faced by them, this article runs you through how you can recalibrate your account plans for 2023 in light of the recession. What’s Going on in the Market Right Now? Right now, the market looks a bit bleak. You might be experiencing the following situation 1) Stalled contracts: Customers you were pursuing might have stalled contracts in fear of the recession and due to lack of funds. 2) Losing your Champions: Employees are getting furloughed due to the economic condition. They might have been the champions in your organization and this can negatively impact you. 3) Lack of resources: As you lose a percentage of your workforce, there are fewer people to take care of your key accounts. This can diminish the attention that should be given to the customers who bring in the most revenue. 4) Lack of focus: Diverted resources, loss in workforce and uncertainties surrounding current economic conditions directly affect the status of your key accounts. The sales concentration that key accounts should get is negatively impacted in the chaos of the situation. When times get tight, it is more important than ever to focus on your existing customers, to invest in them and solidify relationships you already have. Impact of the Economic Downturn The IMF projects that world economic growth will slow to 3.2% this year, down from 6.1% in 2021 (Forrester Research Inc. 2022). An economic downturn comes with its own set of issues for both your organization and yourself. Budgets are now tighter and expenditures are highly restricted. High-risk of churn – you could lose a major customer at any time. Customers will be looking to cut – costs and might not want to purchase your service/ product. Existing customers might not want to renew. Money is often lost by spending it on attracting new customers. Proving ROI becomes complicated. However, in the 2022 Forrester Research Inc. report titled ‘2023 Planning Isn’t Business As Usual’, leaders do not want to slow down tech investments. 67% of leaders expected budget increases when it came to technology. Being mindful of the impact of a downturn on your organization requires embracing consequences while at the same time rethinking your strategies. Winning the CFOs approval: How to Present RoI of a Key Account Management Software Keep Calm and Weather the Storm How do you deal with such uncertain economic times both as an organization and as an individual? 1) Become trusted advisors With a recession ahead, customers might be looking for ways to cut costs. To avoid being part of external vendors who could get cut, you should make yourself invaluable. The first step in making yourself invaluable is to become more than a vendor. You need to become a trusted advisor by becoming a strategic partner. Knowing the customer as much as possible is vital to this. 2) Know your client In order to become a trusted advisor and a beneficial partner, you should know all details about your client including how they work, their likes and dislikes. Analyzing what strategies have worked in the past for them, what hasn’t and what are their goals for the future also ensures you understand your client completely. Knowing both their short-term and long-term goals is important for providing strategic solutions. Proactively following up with clients is also necessary to help them reach their goals. 3) Build on Strategic Relationships A trusted key account manager should work on contingency plans and long-term strategies with their customers. So when the recession begins to hit, the customer is well-prepared to face the economic downturn. The question remains how do you build such strategic relationships with your customers? The answer lies in key account management. Seven Sure-fire Ways to Recession Proof your Key Account Management strategy 1) Build stronger processes Build a strong plan of action for your top strategic accounts or key accounts. Assess your client portfolio and prioritize based on current revenue and growth potential to develop a well-defined strategy moving forward. When tighter budgets and higher scrutiny becomes the norm, don’t lose out on defending and growing your key accounts by building a strong foundational framework of key account management. A few aspects of your KAM model ought to be equipped with: Ability to get a complete view of stakeholders in your key accounts Facility to manage relationships within them at scale Ability to track all activities between your company and the customer 2) Strengthen governance Ensure that there is real-time performance data and trend analysis to strengthen governance. Ideally, executive dashboards and reports with intuitive drill-downs are essential for enhanced governance in your key accounts. 3) Increase Collaboration Increasing collaboration among the sales teams and account teams helps build a strong support system both internally and externally. This can help engage with your customer in a meaningful manner across the board. This will also make certain you dig deeper into existing customer relationships so that you can stay on top of their needs and relevant to their long-term goals. 4) Relationships are even more important Nobody wants to receive bad news, and that can hold you back from being realistic with your customers. It is definitely easier to speak with clients and stakeholders when you are delivering good news. But, as trusted advisors, key customers rely on you for recommendations and solutions to the challenges they are currently facing.
4 Ways To Optimize Your Global Key Account Management
Previously published under the Council Post for the Forbes’ Business Development Council In the last few decades, with the spread of globalization, many companies expanded their businesses to operate globally at either the supply side or demand side—or both. Take the example of Jane, an account manager, who used to wine and dine her customers. She once relied upon personal interactions with local stakeholders to run the business smoothly. Today, she faces the challenge of stakeholders dispersed across the globe. As a leader, Jane must now be able to keep track of multiple transactions and leverage what works in each region. Knowing just when and where to follow up is critical. How does Jane’s business survive in this global, digital world? Effective global account management is only complicated further amid a looming recession. Yet while they may seem scary, recessions don’t change the basics of how to interact with customers—they only raise the stakes. Read More: How to make your Key Account Management strategy work even during an economic downturn Existing customers have always contributed the most to revenue. According to an article from Harvard Business Review, within a few years of first introducing a global account management program, companies can expect existing customer satisfaction to go up by 20%—in addition to increases in profits. As key accounts are rendered even more important in a recession, retaining them during an economic downturn becomes of utmost importance. With the expansion of organizational growth targets, it’s important for sales leaders to initiate a clear account management process and establish global account management systems which not only bolster retention rates but also help in identifying and leveraging opportunities for growth. What is global account management? Global account management programs treat a customer’s worldwide operations as one integrated account. This involves clear and logical terms for pricing as well as specifications of products and services provided. An effective system will promote the cultivation of long-term relationships with key customers. It should also be capable of coordinating globally, with a variety of international resources and cultural diversity as well as a global account team that is catered to customers. A customer relationship management (CRM) tool’s key role is to help establish a long-term relationship with a global account. This can help a company learn more about the real needs of its customer and better determine its decisions by providing a clear view of the customers in one place. How can we move beyond the CRM? Global accounts are managed at multiple levels: Headquarters, regional, national and local. The biggest challenge in global account management is determining how to manage the flow of strategies, plans, information and execution in both directions across multiple levels. This requires a cohesive account plan, as it’s essential to build and maintain relations with both global customers and internal stakeholders. When business is spread across various places, available data is often isolated, which can make communication with stakeholders difficult. Frameworks for institutionalizing and viewing all data in a single place often do not exist. This impedes the ability of global account managers to collaborate with their account teams—which makes building an effective account plan all the more challenging. In order to implement a successful global account management, a series of complex measures are required. These include: • Analyzing customer requirements. • Solving complex problems and developing solutions. • Ensuring support for a range of services and products. • Developing global sales strategies in order to hit growth and profit targets. • Designing and implementing roadmaps that align across regions. • Developing global sales projects to continuously improve market performance. Why the shift to digital global account management? In today’s digitally interconnected world, it’s grown difficult to coordinate strategic account managers locally when managing global accounts. That’s why many companies choose to leverage a consolidated digitized space capable of handling global accounts. As a disclosure, my company DemandFarm is one provider of such digital global account management solutions. An effective digital account planning system should help in global account management, productivity and more. It should be able to help your team focus on relationships throughout the organization’s life cycle by providing support. It should also increase your ability to form long-term relationships with customers by setting an expectation of consistent, exceptional performance even during unstable times. Recent innovations in AI-backed digital account planning tools can provide essential intelligent insights. When considering such solutions, you want to make sure a tool will allow for trends in all your global accounts to be tracked progressively and provide guided solutions to empower your team. How can companies get the most out of their global key account management? An effective digital account management tool should track all your deals, providing a holistic view and prioritizing action items based on proximity to closing dates and urgency. A solid solution will keep track of your expected revenue and whether your revenue goals are met as well as provide insights into growth and depreciation. Here are four results you should seek out when considering a digital global account management tool. 1. It should boost your account manager’s experience. An effective tool will optimize your key account manager’s experience by connecting various verticals to provide a comprehensive look into your biggest accounts. 2. It should enhance your decision making. A strong digital account planning system should improve productivity and decision-making by providing smarter and faster knowledge bases and customer portals. 3. It should provide AI-backed insights AI can help address data overload and reduces the time it takes to complete administrative tasks. This can be a valuable feature for teams due to its ability to groom leads constantly, helping lead to strong relations with clients. It can also help ensure future targets are met. 4. It should bolster retention. An effective and customer-oriented tool should provide a better experience for your business and drive retention as much as products and services offered. Is your global account management leveraging the right tools? Increasing globalization and multiplying sales goals have compelled many
When Sellers Become Trusted Advisors!
Frederick Reichheld of Bain & Company researched on prescription for cutting costs and discovered that increasing customer retention rates by as little as 5% can reflect an increase in profits by 25% to 95%. Traditional sales enablement involved ‘enabling’ sales teams with the right information at the right time to make the right selling decisions to important prospects. In the post-pandemic era, Sales Enablement when it comes to Key Account Management is a continuous process stretching from discovery to customer retention. With a large number of buyer interactions happening digitally and taking place much before they reach out to salespeople, how does one ensure customer retention? Within Key Account Management practice, what does sales enablement look like? Michael McCarthy, Senior Business & Technology Consultant, Sales Enablement Duke Energy, had a lot to share on this topic in ‘The Changing Role of Technology in Key Account Management’ webinar featuring Forrester. Don’t Build a Long-term Relationship on Short-term Thinking The separation of Opportunity Management and Account Management is now more delineated than it used to be. For account management to successfully work, the team has to become a trusted advisor to the buyer within that organization. If that sort of interconnected relationship is not built between the sales team and the buyer organization, then a “won and done” relationship forms. There is only ‘short-term thinking’ when it comes to opportunity management. However, customer retention requires long-term planning which forms the basis of account management. From a Sales Enablement perspective in Key Account Management practice, Michael McCarthy had the following to say. “Sales enablement is being pulled and pushed more and more to deliver influence for the sellers that they can use to become that trusted advisor. And in order for us to be successful at that, we need to be able to very quickly create Insight that the seller can provide at the account level that the the buyers within the account can then use to make decisions.” If accurate, good, intelligent Insight is not provided for Key Account Management activities, then one cannot become a trusted advisor. Subsequently, teams also miss out on the ability to grow revenue substantially within a Key Account Management practice. What are some of the factors that go into having good insight? Leadership-Driven Change Management Salespeople often rely on being agile and it might feel a bit restrictive to have the concept of a ‘process’. Thus a transition to automated, data-driven sales processes will have a pushback from salespeople. Standardizing sales enablement processes within key account management requires change management. Within sales enablement teams, salespeople need to grow to become more data savvy to be able to provide data-driven sales processes. Data is not useful merely because of its availability, but in how the data is being used to position the team as a trusted advisor to the buyer. “They need to be able to push through data and pick data. That is going to help them in the customer’s eyes and not get overwhelmed by too much data,” says Michael McCarthy. Penny for Your Thoughts: Is Your Data Conversational? Another issue facing sales enablement is that the data needs to be conversational. An issue with the data available now is that it is centered around reporting, and it is not necessarily conversational. Sellers are often faced with this issue where if they go in with data to the buyer it looks like a piece of reporting numbers. Making sure that data presented can drive conversation is something that needs to be accomplished. CRMs are Just a Starting Point When data is automated, the ability to consolidate data into one of the very few places becomes important. This will prevent the formation of information silos and salespeople will have ready, easy access to consolidated data to support them. While CRMs are a good starting point for it, some data providers don’t integrate very well into your CRM. Besides, while CRMs provide a space for data aggregation, to ensure your sales is data-driven you have to extend further. Don’t Let Your Data Go To Waste A major issue is that a lot of times, sales leaders use PowerPoint presentations or they allow sellers to bring PowerPoint Presentations into a business review. They never open the CRM or piece together data that is put into an Insight-driven dashboard. To fully utilize the abundance of data available these days, sales leaders need to upgrade how they present in business reviews. Every Michael Jordan Needs a Scottie Pippen A point to note in existing sales processes is that often there is no data that is customer journey or buyer journey focused. In the middle of a customer journey, the seller is instinctively in a defensive mode. Getting the seller to move off of defense and bringing back a conversation should be on the agenda. A pivotal focus of Sales Enablement within the Key Account Management space is that the sellers need an assist in making that data conversational. This is difficult to achieve and requires years of practice. However, with advancing digital tools and technology, the gap reduces. For Michael McCarthy, we are moving in the right direction for this through digital transition in Key Account Management and over time with more prototyping, it can become more successful.
From Sales Methodologies to Sales Insights – New Perspectives
Global sales expert Matt Dixon has one important thought to share with all of us. There is an evolution in sales happening right now and it begins with insight selling. Traditionally, Sales Methodologies have dictated how companies approached customers. A set of guiding principles on how to behave during and in-between different sales stages have been the go-to strategy for closing deals. Such conventional methodologies focus on hitting a set number of targets. A more useful approach perhaps focuses on increasing sales ‘effectiveness’. This involves understanding roadblocks and leveraging opportunities in order to accurately forecast based on information. Capturing key, intelligent insights is essential to translating raw data into something actionable/ functional. Time for a Mind Shift In ‘The Changing Role of Technology in Key Account Management’ webinar featuring Forrester, Joshua Gregg, Vice President Strategic Accounts from the Qt Company, spoke about this transition from Sales methodologies to Sales Insights. “I really remember not using any CRM and doing account planning on Excel spreadsheets. And then we kind of got really fancy and started using PowerPoint and Word Documents. We went from the bar napkin to PowerPoint pretty quickly. And, we just became faster and more effective.” With advancing technology, even faster insights are possible. You only need to grow beyond making your Account Planning on PowerPoints and Excel Sheets. As much information as you can get from your CRM, using that data effectively should be the priority. If one is to lean on the data, it also needs to be accurate. While tribal knowledge forms a big part of selling and account management, its digitization has opened new doors now. An insights-based sales approach with newer technology has led to an increase in opportunities. “It took maybe 15 to 20 years of selling and different roles within an organization to get into the sweet spot of strategic account management. Now, I think you can do that much faster,” says Joshua Gregg. Challenges of Traditional Sales Methodologies It takes people a long time to be coached into developing specific skills. Resistance to adopting newer technologies. Reliance on sales ‘superheroes’ who manage the best accounts. Depending on individuals, which leaves the company lost if that person quits. How Insights & Data-Driven Account Planning Changes the Game The challenge is in coaching people to develop skills that would previously take multiple years to learn, and to adopt technology that is more powerful and more effective. Joshua Gregg refers to it as ‘embracing the assist’. Technology that is data-driven and insights based is an assist that will help the sales team be more effective. The goal these days is to not just be service providers to customers, but become their trusted advisors with more data and information. Customer Insights enables understanding their business better than the customers themselves do a lot of times. Sharing Account Plans and having mutual growth conversations with customers with compelling data to back it up ensures that a strong, long-term relationship is built. Shifting to an insights-based selling approach, reduces dependence on sales superheroes. Technology bridges the gap between rookies and sales heroes, and makes everyone collaborate. The challenge of replacing a sales superhero, the tribal knowledge they possessed is no longer a debilitating concern. Tribal knowledge can become enterprise memory with digital Key Account Management and tell a story of the client’s needs. This will enable the Account Management team to also find new ways to meet those customer needs. Performance and ability take over to help customers move forward. Sales teams, in hand with advancing technology, also innovate better. Teams can now function across different verticals and manage different accounts with more fluidity. For Sales Leaders, this gives an opportunity to leverage resources effectively across the business. Insights-based selling and Account Planning also helps you discover blind-spots in your strategy with which you can further create value. DemandFarm’s Account Planner is designed to help enterprises create an annual plan for each key account with clear goals and objectives using both qualitative and quantitative insights. Find out more about it here.
Digitalization of B2B Sales Interactions: Technological Changes in Key Account Management Processes
B2B interactions today are primarily taking place in digital channels. In a recent Forrester Sales Enablement Report, the report indicates that the average number of buying interactions has surged since the pandemic; from 17 pre-pandemic to 27 post-pandemic. Hybrid and virtual selling environments (partially forced by the pandemic) have made buyers innately digital these days. These ‘new buyers’ have needs and expectations that do not necessarily line up with traditional B2B sales and selling methods. B2B interactions typically happen these days without even meeting the salespersons directly on digital channels. The question of the hour is, at a time of such huge shifts to digital ecosystems, what does Key Account Management entail in terms of sales organization? How does one adapt to this new condition of data-driven B2B sales? Shift to a world of ‘Click and Transact’ In the DemandFarm webinar ‘The Changing Role of Technology in Key Account Management’ featuring Forrester, Rick Bradberry, Principal Analyst & Executive Advisor B2B Sales at Forrester reaffirmed that what we do in terms of sales or account management and interactions with customers has changed a lot, “I would say that COVID actually drove the trend that had existed before the pandemic. And that was a preference that buyers had for self-service experiences.” Consumers have become accustomed to what Rick refers to as the world of “click and transact”. This consumer experience started in the B2B space of e-commerce for consumers. It went from physical products to digital products and these experiences have come into B2B. The SaaS field has amplified this further. What We Want, When We Want It! This mindset of shifting to self-service is accompanied by a second aspect in the B2B field. These new experiences and preferences created are produced by enabling capabilities. “Why do we need to still architect these experiences with customers the way we did it 20 years ago?” asks Rick. Consumers, i.e. B2B companies or buyers, or even users of those B2B products, not only prefer to do it themselves, but they are also able to do it because an enabling technology or experience exists that allows them to do so. Great Expectations! (No, not the novel) The shift to this era of ‘self-service’, in a sense has changed expectations on leaders to deliver experiences with customers as well. For company boards and CEOs, the focus has been retargeted on how to deliver the type of expected self-service experience using technology that customers truly prefer and want to use. For Rick Bradberry, “That’s where Insights becomes a new mantra for leaders!” In order to be able to deliver customization to customers, one needs an insight-driven approach to how to think about people, processes, talent, and the way the business is run. Generational Variances… Each generation brings in a completely different perspective within the workforce when it comes to digital compatibility in the sales process. This pertains to both the buyers and the sellers. What sort of culture is sought out also differs as a result. Rick Bradberry shared a few interesting data points in the webinar. According to him, when it comes to self-service in internal app stores, external marketplaces or within any product, “An average Gen X buyer would look to do that 37% of the time. But in Gen Z (the younger generation), this goes up by 10% furthermore to 47%.” Of course, we can’t forget the millennials who stick to about 43%. So, companies have to shift their understanding of the ‘sweet spot’ in B2B digital interactions. What does this mean for you? What do these trends say about Key Account Management in a digitally expanding B2B era? Things that have traditionally been done in Key Account Management have now become digitized and improved at the same time. Functions that were done tediously and manually before, are now enabled as capabilities within the technology and tools used by consumers. Such technologies facilitate improved quantitative and qualitative usage to understand your customers better and course-correct how you serve them. This will inevitably lead to better long-term value, bigger deal sizes, better forecasting and accuracy. Check out these 6 key takeaways for a successful digital key account management transformation. What used to be a struggle when managing accounts before, for example – whitespace, becomes a metric that is easier to improve upon. These capabilities are now quickly being embedded in technology if they haven’t already. Additionally, with the advancement of Artificial Intelligence of AI, analytical tools are also progressively built to improve. Insights, the future of faster functionality, and assisted account planning awaits account management. Built-in analytical tools do more than what humans are capable of doing in terms of number crunching. What the future holds is perhaps such intelligent tools giving a perspective that might otherwise go unnoticed to human eyes. This might boost functioning in Key Account Management in unparalleled ways! Check out DemandFarm’s Insights-driven Account Planner to aid your key account management process!
Account Manager Skills 101
Who is an account manager and what do they do? An account manager does the overall management of sales and relationships with the various customers of the company. The main roles of an account manager are the following:- Maintaining and developing relationships with customers by addressing their concerns Building strong strategic relationships with clients Explore white spaces with clients to retain business and crack opportunities Enhance business prospects with long-term relationships While all account managers need hands-on experience managing customer relationships, there are wide ranges of other (equally important) account management skills that are critical for the role. Find out 3 unique ways how John grows his key accounts as a strategic account manager. 5 Must-Have Skills for Account Managers! 1. Good listening and understanding capacity The key to effective working relationships with clients is good listening. This enables building trust and reduces conflict to build objectives and find opportunities in every client interaction. This helps account managers anticipate the needs and exceed expectations of the client. Guide: Comprehensive Career Path for a Key Account Manager 2. Collaborative and Customization ability In the current world of business where customers are situated globally, companies don’t compete on pricing or product alone but also have to show that the customer experience they offer is the best. Account management is never a solo game but a collaborative effort. Collaborating with customers to make them fully participate in the process can help build strong relationships, in turn, drive sales forward. Additionally, an account manager has to ensure that internal teams are in coordination with each other. 3. Leadership and Ownership capability Account Managers who are leaders should inspire and challenge clients to take brave decisions. This can help build strategic account planning for disruptive transformations. Only by embracing changes in every process can you yield better and larger results. Account managers should have the foresight to focus time and attention on the development of key accounts. 4. Dynamic Business Analytical knowledge Being able to analytically think about the process and dealing with the load of information from various sources is part of the critical actions that an account manager does everyday. The ability to identify the cause and effect relationships quickly is vital to being a good account manager. 5. Excellent communication skills To build strategic relationships with clients and retain them, an account manager will need to have excellent communication skills. They need to keep each team informed and maintain coordination. An Account Manager needs to be highly skilled, clear and concise in his communication to ensure that long – term client relationships are maintained. Key Account Management is a continuous process that keeps evolving. Not only does it require a highly skilled account manager, but it also requires account managers to be equipped with the right key account management tools and account planning tools that can assist them through their journey (Fun Tip: Check out this cheatsheet on choosing the right sales account planning tool). DemandFarm’s Account Planner makes account planning ridiculously easy. Perform whitespace analysis, relationship analysis and financial analysis to forecast growth potential. Gain enhanced visibility in order to analyze your key accounts.
7 Key Takeaways for a Successful Key Account Management Transformation Journey
7 Secrets to Successful Key Account Management Transformation Journey Digitalizing your key account management practice is like a journey rather than a milestone. Our team has been a part of several successful digital account management transformation journeys. So what did we learn? In this ebook, you will find 7 key takeaways for a successful Key Account Management Transformation Journey. This includes executive-level buy-in, change management, going modular and much more. Learn more vital Digital Key Account Management tips in order to have a successful transformation.