by Greg Krauska, The Change Agent Group, Inc.
Sales managers often force their salespeople into unnatural acts through call quotas. Your firm will create better customer relationships, more impact and greater revenues when you focus on creating value at key points in the customer experience, not just activity.
I saw an example of this during a recent field research call I made on behalf of one of my Blue Ocean Strategy clients. The purpose of the field research is to help my client explore and understand what blocks customers from fully receiving value from their suppliers (and what to do about it).
During this particular call, a manager of a health care organization was telling me about her recent experience with a supplier. "I hate it when the salespeople think they have to stop by and say howdy," she told me. "I am already a satisfied customer, and I told my account manager that he really doesn't have to visit our office. We are really happy with their services, but he insists on an in-person visit at least twice a year."
"Why do you suppose he does this?" I asked.
"Because his sales manager makes him do it," she responded.
"In fact, after he had not visited our office for an entire year, our account was re-assigned to another account manager. It was crazy. Now I had to train the new rep to get up to speed on our business. All it did was waste my time. Now I am thinking of finding a new supplier."
What a shame. The sales manager's idea was a good one: stay close to your clients by meeting with them regularly. The problem is that the process was not designed to focus on value. It was focused on keeping salespeople being busy.
in this climate, staying in touch with customers is a great way to show your appreciation for their business and to ensure they are getting value from your products and services. Be smart about your account management program, though. Use your salespeople's conversations to find new business while finding ways to create more value for customers - and at the same time, reduce your cost to serve.
Here are six ways to unlock new value for customers across their entire experience cycle (from Blue Ocean Strategy, by professors Kim and Mauborgne). Use these levers to help develop your customer call program, to develop a structured account alignment plan, to recraft your entire customer experience or to create a Blue Ocean of uncontested market space.
- Productivity: How can you help customers get more work done? Eliminate meetings that waste customers' time. Help customers be more productive.
- Simplicity: How can you make it easy to understand your product, service and delivery? People don't appreciate the work it took to create your product. They value what they get from it. Make the complex simple.
- Convenience: How easy is it to find, use and dispose of your product? Don't create unecessary hurdles. Find ways to become more convenient for your customers.
- Risk: How can you eliminate or manage risks or uncertainties associated with your products? Potential value is only real value when it is predictable. Understand the risks your customer face when dealing with you and your industry - and eliminate them.
- Fun and image: How can you be more fun to work with? How can you enhance your customer's image? Fun is allowed, even in tough times. Figure out how to make your customers the hero in their world.
- Environmental Friendliness: How can you be more relevant to your customers' sustainability initiatives? Green can be either hype or real. How can you be genuinely eco-friendly to work with?
Show your reps how to use these levers to create customer value in every interaction. Then trust them to focus their energy where it can yield the most return. Soon, your customers will look forward to your account manager's next visit.
Greg Krauska is President and Founder of The Change Agent Group. He is an experienced and Qualifed Blue Ocean Strategy consultant, helping his clients rethink their assumptions to unlock new value for customers. www.changeagentgroup.com.
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