Fresh from Florida

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By Stephen Kozicki

Last week, Peter Browne from Gordian Business was presenting in Florida at the Strategic Account Management Association’s 50th Anniversary Conference. Peter was presenting a case study of a successful client who in a mature market grew profit ahead of their 5 year plans.

“SAM has had the biggest impact of any initiative
we have undertaken in the last five years.
The business is almost unrecognisable.”

Case study, The Managing Director

The Strategic Account management Association (SAMA) have published the case study in their latest ‘Velocity’ magazine released at the SAMA conference. Also at the SAMA conference was the global launch of the practical business-to-business book on Strategic Account Management by Peter Browne and Gary Peacock.

Image: Peter Browne (Gordian Business) & Todd Snelgrove (SKF Global)

“In this book Gary and Peter provide some very practical and fresh ways of how to identify, build and grow relationships with individual and corporate customers.  Critically important, for corporate customers, they explain why some relationships work and why some do not work.  But they don’t stop there; they also offer simple tools and thinking models for how you can enable your team to plan how you can work with your key customers from a strategic perspective.”

Lynette Nixon, Industry Fellow, Innovation and Design Thinking at University of Technology, Sydney

So, if you are considering starting a SAM program in your organisation or are already on the journey and need practical advice to maintain your momentum, then pick up a book. The book is available from www.matrixplustraining.com.au or your airport bookshop, or soon download a copy of the ebook from www.amazon.com. 

What stops you successfully selling using Value?

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By Peter Browne

The price of greatness is responsibility.

Sir Winston Churchill.

How 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 what are the critical success factors when selling on value. He explains the need to be clear on the value you can create for your customers.

http://youtu.be/3P2vf7R6xSc

From this video you can see how important it is that a company is fully committed, from the CEO down, before they can successfully sell using a value proposition.  For help to improve your profits and reduce your costs over the long term take a look at our workshop http://www.gordianbusiness.com.au/strategic-account-management/ or contact us on +61 (2) 9450 1040 or email peter@gordianbusiness.com.au.

We would love to hear your views so please comment below and subscribe at the top right of the page.

Are your Account Managers scared of your customer’s CEO?

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By Peter Browne

One of the biggest weaknesses of Account Managers is their lack of skills and confidence to build and sustain business relationships with senior executives at their major accounts.

We fear things in proportion to our ignorance of them.

Christian Nestell Bovee

Don’t just take it from us. A 2013 survey by Executive Conversation revealed that the highest priorities for training of salespeople were:

1. Training on financial acumen and ROI
2. Training on selling to customer executives

When you start to manage your major accounts more strategically, this issue often emerges. To manage their major accounts more strategically, Account Managers need to develop new relationships. These new relationships include C-Level leaders such as the CEO, CIO, CFO and even Board Members.

However Account Managers are used to dealing at the operational and mid-management level. So for many Account Managers, building relationships with executives is unfamiliar territory. So they lack the confidence and knowledge to initiate and develop C-Level relationships.

Typically, once Account Managers are in roles where they must meet with a senior executive they have three questions:

1. How do I get a meeting?
2. What questions should I ask?
3. How will I know if the meeting was successful?

 To be effective, Account Managers need to overcome their anxiety. They believe there are some special skills that they need that they don’t have. However in our experience, if they are used to dealing with management, they have the required relationship building and question asking skills; they need to change their perspectives: 

From	To
Your company’s products & services	Your strategic accounts business issues
Only creating value for your company	Also creating value for your strategic account
Operations	Strategy

However changing perspectives isn’t easy. Most Account Managers have spent their career focusing on short-term revenue and results. So changing their focus to understanding the senior executive’s key business issues, creating value for the strategic account and discussing strategy for future financial years requires some investment. They need help to transform their thinking. That is why sales training in this area has become the No.1 priority for many companies.

For companies who want to develop and sustain strategic account relationships, establishing and sustaining relationships with your customer’s senior executives is a critical capability.

So if this is an area your Account Managers struggle with we hope this blog gives you some ideas. Of course if you need more ideas or help look at our workshop; http://www.gordianbusiness.com.au/executive-interviews-workshop or contact us to discuss ways to improve the skills and confidence of your team to more effectively manage senior executive relationships. Contact us on +61 (02) 9450 1040 or email peter@gordianbusiness.com.au. We welcome your contribution so please comment below and subscribe to our blog at the top right of the page.

Don’t waste your 2014 off-site: 3 differences between success and failure

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By Peter Browne

With Christmas fast approaching, many companies are planning their New Year Leadership or Sales off-site. Having facilitated numerous company off-sites, and attended many during our corporate careers, we thought it timely to share our thoughts on critical success factors for a successful off-site: an off-site that delivers results.

Few senior leaders would describe their off-sites as complete failures, however rarely do they look back 12 months later and confidently say the event changed the way they do business.

“Would you tell me where to go from here?”

“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.

“I don’t much care where-“said Alice

“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat

Alice in Wonderland

When planning your off-site we have observed that there are 3 things that most companies don’t do. By including these things in your planning you increase the probability the next off-site will deliver lasting outcomes.

1. Have a clear scope: Often companies have an offsite because they have one every year. There isn’t much difference between them. In today’s fast changing environment companies need to take a step back and consider their market and the current issues and opportunities. Is the market changing quickly or is it relatively stable? Is now the time to explore broad strategies, or is it time to hone in on specific urgent priorities for the next 6- 12 months? A clear scope leads to clear objectives and outcomes.
2. Incorporate pre-reading. To get results from your off-site the attendees must turn up ready for the issues to be tackled. Often the first morning of an off-site is wasted as attendees settle in and figure out why they are there. Providing them with relevant pre-reading and issues to consider leading into the off-site means they can hit the ground running. The available time is used more effectively and you’ll make faster progress. However they are time-poor executives, so limit pre-work to the relevant and essential. Be clear that you expect preparation to be completed beforehand.
3. Be ruthless on actions and embed follow up into the program. A long laundry list of “nice to have” actions means no strategic course of action. Have a maximum of 4-10 key initiatives. Plan for follow up within a month of the off-site. This allows time for attendees to better understand what they have committed to and explore the issues with their teams. Importantly it creates a stronger sense of accountability for action.

For more ideas the HBR article “Off-Sites That Work” covers the points we have raised in more detail, and adds a few more for you to consider. http://hbr.org/2006/06/off-sites-that-work/ar/1

A successful off-site can align the senior team, galvanise the group to act and create a sense of purpose. Effective follow up builds organisational self-confidence, momentum and strengthens a company’s competitive position.

So if you are planning your strategy or sales off-site for 2014 and want to make it a success, we hope some of these ideas help. Of course if you need more ideas or help contact us to discuss your business challenges, and how we can help design, facilitate and support the execution of your next offsite. Contact us on +61 (02) 9450 1040 or email peter@gordianbusiness.com.au and look at http://www.gordianbusiness.com.as/customised-strategy-workshop/. We welcome your contribution so please comment below and subscribe to our blog at the top right of the page.

Are you fostering the 6 kinds of trust in your strategic relationships?

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By Peter Browne

The 1991 movie “Proof” - starring Hugo Weaving and Russell Crowe had a simple message: whether or not you love someone is based not on what you say but on what you do. It’s the same in business relationships. Over time your business partners and customers evaluate you and your company by your actions. 

To create and sustain strategic customer relationships you and your account team must focus on continually learning from relationships, and how to foster all of the six kinds of trust:

Honesty - to be free of deceit; truthful and sincere. If you are found being dishonest with an account the relationship won’t recover. Ever. Be honest even if it may cause short-term issues.

Fairness – treating people equally without favouritism or discrimination. Increasingly companies work with others who share the same values. Make sure you walk the talk.     

Openness – not concealing one’s thoughts or feelings; frank and communicative. You are an important source of knowledge and insights for your strategic accounts. They value what you think, so be proactive and speak up.

Credibility – able to be believed; convincing. People work with you and your company because you are experts. Credibility grows as your knowledge and ideas create better results for your account.

Reliability – consistently good in quality or performance. Do what you say you will do and deliver on your promise. Keep working hard to earn the right to stay a key partner.      

Confidentiality – able to keep a secret. Strategic customers will tell you critical information. Information about their business, the industry and your competitors. Treat such information as it was intended and never take the passing on of confidential information for granted.

Trust is not something you can conjure up – it must be earned. Also trust is like the share market. It increases gradually over a long period. However it only takes one event that creates a loss of confidence for trust to crash. But unlike the share market trust often doesn’t recover. For strategic business relationships this means losing a major contributor to revenue and profit, and your reputation.

To learn how to build trust in your strategic relationships click here: http://www.gordianbusiness.com.au/strategic-account-management/ or contact us on +61 (02) 9450 1040 or email peter@gordianbusiness.com.au. We would love to hear your views so please add your comments below and subscribe to our blog at the top right of the page.