Almost every professional B2B sales person comes to grips with one of the challenges of penetrating key accounts. Key accounts are different than the ordinary, and require some more sophisticated skills and strategies. Here are four fundamentals for effectively penetrating key accounts.
1. Recognize that key accounts are different.
First of all, they are larger, but that’s only
the beginning. Their decision-making
processes will be much more complex, and in some cases, highly structured. A product that may, in a smaller account,
only need one person’s approval to purchase can require dozens of people to
sign off on it in a key account.
The people have widely different specialty
skill sets, perspectives, and motivations.
In smaller accounts, you may only have to deal effectively with an owner
or executive. In key accounts, the same
product may require skillful communications with an engineer, a purchasing
agent, a project manager and a foreman. Each
of these specialties is likely to have a different personality type,
challenging the sales person to adapt.
Because of the size and complexity,
there are a variety of motivations and agendas inside a key account. A naive sales person can be constantly
frustrated because they all don’t think the way he/she thinks.
I can go on for pages on ways
in which key accounts are different, but this is sufficient to make the point.
If you don’t adjust your strategies and tactics to the unique dynamics of a key
account, you will be wasting your time.
2. Approach the organization of your time within a key account like you would your entire territory.
When
you look at your territory, you see lots of independent units we call
accounts. You understand that each has a
unique set of needs, budgets and personal dynamics, and that each offers its
own set of opportunities.
When you approach a key account, think of it as a territory on its own, with
lots of units that act like accounts.
These units can be departments, or branches, or plants, or whatever
organization exists within that account.
Each one of them may conceivably have the ability to purchase or move
forward the purchase of your products and services. Each unit, whatever it may be, has its own
unique set of needs, budgets and personal dynamics.
And, in many cases, the purchasing power of one of those units can far outstrip
the purchasing power of one of your smaller accounts.
Just as you would begin your work in your sales
territory by first identifying all the potential accounts, so too, you begin
your work in a key account by identifying all the individual units, and then
understanding the relationships among them.
Just as you would take six months or a year to
come to know the accounts in your territory, so too, expect that it will take a
like period of time to identify and come to know all of the units within your
key accounts.
Just as you would attempt to ascertain what
opportunities there were in each of your other accounts, so too, you should
attempt to uncover the opportunities in each of the key account units.
While key accounts are more complex and require
some more sophisticated strategies and skills on your part, the perspective
that you take to managing your time in a key account should mimic the
perspective you take in coming to know the accounts in your territory.
3. Understand that you gain traction in key accounts through relationships, leverage, and organization.
If
you are going to have influence in a key account, you must have relationships
with the influential people. Because of
the size of a key account, and the natural movement of people within it, that
means that coming to know the influential people is not an event which has an
ending, but is rather a constant process that never ends. Make a list of the people who should know
you, and update it after every sales call.
Who are the department heads in each
of those units? Who are
influencers? The decision makers? Who could be a champion for you?
Not only do you need to proactively
expand your relationships deep into the organization, but you also need to
focus upward, and come to know those people who oversee combinations of units,
and the C-level people in the corner suites.
There is a fundamental equation
in B2B sales, and it operates just as reliably in key accounts as it does
elsewhere:
· Relationships lead to opportunities.
· Opportunities lead to projects
· Projects lead to sales.
So, if you want to increase your sales, begin
with relationships. And, the primary way you do that is to leverage every question, every positive relationship, every
conversation, and every opportunity to more of the same. Leverage, in this
case, means using something to create something additional. In other words, you use every conversation as
an opportunity to open the door to more. Assume the attitude that there is
always more. There are more people to
meet, more opportunities to uncover, more problems to solve, and more needs to
fill.
In every single sales call, you ought to ask,
“Who else should I be talking to?” Or,
“Who should I know in xxxx department? “ If you successfully sell something,
that experience should be leveraged to uncover the next opportunity. If you meet someone, that relationship should
be leveraged to create more. And so it
goes, unending.
Finally, key accounts are no place
for the unorganized sales person.
Successfully selling in a key account requires organizational tools and
disciplines that are a stretch for the average sales person. Imagine all the
people who you need to know, multiply them by the relationships and agendas
among them, overlay that with the account’s strategies, needs and budgets,
factor in all the opportunities and the steps in each process necessary to
bring it to fruition, and you’ll begin to get an idea of the degree to which
you’ll need to collect information, store it, and continually use it. A sophisticated CRM system is a must, as is
the discipline to use it religiously.
While these few ideas are not the whole story, they will get you started in your efforts to successfully sell to key accounts. Recognize the difference, plan your time as if each were a sales territory on its own, and apply the weapons of relationship, leverage and organization to the task. You’ll be well on your way.
Related Resources
