What's the difference between a photo and a video? A photo is a snapshot and, so they say, tells a thousand words. A video shows the same scene with the passing of time. How many words is that? Many more I hazard to guess.
In our work we get to see many Account Profiles. From large scale grocery Account Profiles to notes about customers on the back of a business card. Whatever the form, we all understand that information is power. There are many terms for it - wiring, intelligence, DNA etc.
The question I have is how well do we understand changes in our customers over a period of time? History has a way of helping us predict the future and if we track trends in how our customers operate and perform, we might start to preempt and influence much of their future activity.
There's a terrific post on this by Adrian Slywotzky at SalesMotivation.Net. Adrian discusses the importance of keeping up with your customers no matter how they change.
Its all very well to have a complete and up to date account plan and profile, but if you don't use that information to determine where your customer is going, you're destined to fall behind.
Areas where change has a big impact:
When the top 5-15 accounts for many FMCG/Consumer Goods suppliers produce 70-80% of the business, Customer Engagement is no longer a function, it's a mission.
Failure to establish relations other than with “go-to-market” functions, risks being out of the loop when significant changes emerge in customer organisations. The good news is that with fewer accounts, more in-depth relationships between retailer and supplier management teams can be established and maintained.
Remember retailers have a greater need for supplier funding than they care to admit. It must be tempting for them to revert to the behaviours that have always worked….arrogance, threats, abuse, bullying.
But, retailers do have good ideas and there are some highly capable retail decision makers. All retail decision makers are busy…if suppliers can’t be efficient or innovative, they will be abused - and they probably deserve it. We have to justify a different positioning – grab their attention because we can add value.
Carrefour, the French global retailer, estimates that it has more than 20,000 suppliers worldwide. Each one of those suppliers wants to have broad-based access and solid relationships with the top managers at Carrefour. Competition for access, like competition for shelf space, is intense. Only those organizations with a strong benefits story are likely to succeed. Luckily, because most suppliers so thoroughly mismanage customer engagement, those few that spend the time to plan and execute well will see positive results.
So what is a Customer Engagement strategy?
An engagement strategy is a re-thinking of how a company goes to market. The era when customers were thought of as purchase orders is over. Trade demands require ever-greater commitments to information, services and people. Yet, from assortment optimisation to vendor managed inventory, the overwhelming percentage of activity is directly or indirectly related to product sales – moving cases. In developing a strategy, here are some things we should acknowledge:
In our work we get to see many Account Profiles. From large scale grocery Account Profiles to notes about customers on the back of a business card. Whatever the form, we all understand that information is power. There are many terms for it - wiring, intelligence, DNA etc.
The question I have is how well do we understand changes in our customers over a period of time? History has a way of helping us predict the future and if we track trends in how our customers operate and perform, we might start to preempt and influence much of their future activity.
There's a terrific post on this by Adrian Slywotzky at SalesMotivation.Net. Adrian discusses the importance of keeping up with your customers no matter how they change.
Its all very well to have a complete and up to date account plan and profile, but if you don't use that information to determine where your customer is going, you're destined to fall behind.
Areas where change has a big impact:
- Personnel. Buyer churn is a common and deliberate strategy of retailers to disrupt supplier relationships.
- Business process. How decisions get made and executed is a critical part of the knowledge map. Businesses constantly change their policies and practices as they chase efficiency and effectiveness.
- Strategy. In the pursuit for shareholder value, companies review their overall strategies and day-to-day tactics frequently.
When the top 5-15 accounts for many FMCG/Consumer Goods suppliers produce 70-80% of the business, Customer Engagement is no longer a function, it's a mission.
Failure to establish relations other than with “go-to-market” functions, risks being out of the loop when significant changes emerge in customer organisations. The good news is that with fewer accounts, more in-depth relationships between retailer and supplier management teams can be established and maintained.
Remember retailers have a greater need for supplier funding than they care to admit. It must be tempting for them to revert to the behaviours that have always worked….arrogance, threats, abuse, bullying.
But, retailers do have good ideas and there are some highly capable retail decision makers. All retail decision makers are busy…if suppliers can’t be efficient or innovative, they will be abused - and they probably deserve it. We have to justify a different positioning – grab their attention because we can add value.
Carrefour, the French global retailer, estimates that it has more than 20,000 suppliers worldwide. Each one of those suppliers wants to have broad-based access and solid relationships with the top managers at Carrefour. Competition for access, like competition for shelf space, is intense. Only those organizations with a strong benefits story are likely to succeed. Luckily, because most suppliers so thoroughly mismanage customer engagement, those few that spend the time to plan and execute well will see positive results.
So what is a Customer Engagement strategy?
An engagement strategy is a re-thinking of how a company goes to market. The era when customers were thought of as purchase orders is over. Trade demands require ever-greater commitments to information, services and people. Yet, from assortment optimisation to vendor managed inventory, the overwhelming percentage of activity is directly or indirectly related to product sales – moving cases. In developing a strategy, here are some things we should acknowledge:
- Acknowledge that customer engagement is everybody’s business: Leaving account management solely to account managers is a recipe for non-competitiveness
- We engage to learn and profit…not to serve: broad-based engagement is not an exercise is customer service. If the organisational attitude is “We’re here to help…”, the point is being missed. The mission is learning and building – not serving
- Broad based engagement is a pillar of success – As important as products, funding or logistics
- There will be resistance: To engage means that both sides must actively participate. It is a fact of life that the customer is considerably less motivated to enter and maintain an engagement that the supplier
- We, the supplier, will, therefore, drive the process
So, whatever knowledge you have about an account needs to be more than a mere snapshot. It must help you predict the your customers intentions and actions.
Jason Wenn
No comments:
Post a Comment