Someone Has a Case of the Mondays

"Sounds like someone has a case of the Mondays"

This is a funny line from a movie that often goes through the heads of anyone who works in a traditional or corporate type office.  Sometimes you’re just not looking forward to getting back to the grind.  Other times, you need a vacation from your vacation.  But basically, the premise of waiting 5 more days until the weekend can be a bit daunting.  

I just returned last night from a trip to Mexico City where relaxation was apparently not on the agenda.  Returning to the loads of email, stacks of mail, and a full voicemail, I can say I have a case of the Mondays…on Tuesday.

But I have to wonder, since my fine readers are from all over the world and work in so many different fields, maybe your Mondays signify something different: 

Maybe you’re the fresh new sales guy looking forward to your first sales call.

Maybe you’re in Purchasing and you’ve debated all weekend about implementing a pricing plan and today’s the day you are letting the boss see the margin increase.

Maybe you’re an HVAC distributor and you see all the emergency orders from the weekend as job security.

Maybe you’re in the warehouse and Monday is one of your main delivery days and keeping busy makes Monday seem like the shortest day.

What does a typical Monday look like for you?  Are you planning out your week while responding to messages?  Are you out in the field first thing, so you can catch others in the office while they are doing the catching up?  Or is your world completely different?

Tell us about your Mondays, noting your field and location.  You are welcome to leave your name and/or company anonymous in case your Mondays are filled with social media games.  

We would love to feature some of the comments in a future article, but will not print names.  We value your feedback and your privacy.

Has anyone seen my Swingline stapler?

Strategic Account Planning Part 6

Sometimes, it’s not just what you know, but who you know

...and how you treat them.


I’m sure you’ve heard the saying, “Sometimes, it’s not what you know, but who you know that counts.” Perhaps you’ve been on the wrong end of this old axiom. You did your homework, researched the products, built a killer presentation and followed up with amazing vigor; only to lose an opportunity to someone who already had a relationship with the customer’s top guy. These things happen and sometimes there is really nothing you can do about it. As salespeople, we can either shrug our shoulders and go on about our day, or do something about the situation.

Most salespeople focus on the technical users of their products. For automation sellers, it’s the engineering department. Industrial supply salespeople hit on maintenance. Janitorial and paper product distributor sales folks go to the head of facilities. I could elaborate on the list to nauseating length, but the point is, most frontline sellers focus on a narrow group of contacts at their customer. Strategically, this is a mistake.

Let’s fast forward, your efforts at an account are successful. Your company starts landing some meaningful orders. You find yourself harvesting some big dollars from the account. All of your contacts appreciate the service you provide. Somebody, somewhere is writing some big checks to your organization. Doesn’t it seem strange that you don’t know them?

But then something happens.

A new supplier does an end around and goes straight to the money guys, by-passing all the product knowledge, expert services and other goodies you provide, they deliver a compelling pitch on how they can save your customer money. Suddenly, you’re on the defensive.

Wait, you don’t believe this can happen? Let me reference you to Chapter 5 of The Challenger Sale, where authors Dixon and Adamson go step by step through the selling model W.W. Grainger unleashed on the Industrial sector. Basically, Grainger did an end around and created a new model for MRO purchasing which sent many incumbent salespeople scurrying to save their hard earned business.

Here’s my point, it is impossible to have a solid strategic plan at your account without covering the financial side of the customer.

Every account has a person who is compensated by bottom line profitability. It could be the profitability of the company, a single plant or (as is sometimes the case) a single production line or product category; but somewhere there is a person responsible for money. For the sake of our argument, let’s call this group of people Top Management. Ignoring this potential relationship with the upper level folks borders somewhere between stupidity and travesty in the making.

Here are three things to ponder on dealing with this type of customer contact:

• They are extremely busy. Be prepared to impress with the few minutes they give you.

• Financial folks really don’t understand your product. And, they don’t really care for a tutorial. Instead, they want to understand the financial impact of the ideas, solutions and services you bring to their organizations.

• Most of these people complain their technical people don’t truly understand all of the financial ramifications of their actions. So if you’ve been counting on others to share your high end value story, it probably is not working.

We need to establish a relationship with management. There are a number of strategies for setting up meetings with this type of person. We won’t go into all of them, but here are a couple of my favorites.

Set up an introductory interview
Note the word interview, as opposed to a sales call. In this meeting we quickly introduce ourselves as a supplier of critical goods and services to their organization. Then, launch into a few well selected questions on market conditions affecting their company, difficulty finding technically qualified new people, issues impacting their bottom line and their view of the future. That’s it. No selling, no elaborate product demos, no elaborate mission statement presentations.  

Set up customer satisfaction review

In this instance, you essentially thank the management guy for previous business. Let them know you are working to assist in getting the most bang for their buck and ask for feedback on how the whole thing might have worked better. Again, no selling.

But this is not a "one and done" process.

After these first meetings, find an excuse to arrange a similar type of meeting every few months. Being respectful of their time, these meetings should be short and sweet, with lots of opportunity for the customer’s top brass to give you their feedback. If possible, introduce your organizations leadership to the customer’s high ranking management.

We believe this management level dialog should be an ongoing part of your strategic plan. We’ve shortened the process for the sake of brevity.

Look forward to the details additional items in our upcoming book on strategic plans for accounts.

Strategic Account Planning Part 5

What value do you bring to the customer?

Several months ago, I had the opportunity to “ride along” with what my client described as “one of our promising new sales guys.”  Because I wanted to just get a snapshot of the quality and quantity of this guy’s work, I didn’t do much to brief him on our objectives for the day.  Instead, I emailed him, "I just want to ride along and observe your work."  A few days later he texted coordinates of a greasy spoon where we would slosh down a cup of coffee and brace ourselves for the day.

After a handshake and a few social niceties, we dove into the day ahead.  I was pleased.  He had real live appointments at three accounts and plans to drop by another couple if time allowed.  Demos and literature were well thought out and carefully stored in the back seat of his meticulously clean company car.  He had invested in timely topics to explore with the various people scheduled to see us.  I could easily see why this guy impressed the boss.

During our 30 minute drive to the first appointment, we talked about his company; locations, people, size, products on their line card and lots of sundry details.  These folks were on the move.  About midway into our drive, I asked, “What kind of value to you deliver to the customer?”  The answer was both typical and scarey; something to the effect of, “We have the best service in the whole area.”  And, in spite of a couple of unfocused pushes, the best I could get was “better outside sales”, “great customer service” and a “willingness to listen.”

This is an all too common response.  And it’s epidemic in our industry.  For knowledge-based distributors it could be a fatal flaw.

What should have the sales guy responded?  A detailed list of services (which translate into value) provided to customers would have been a nice start.  Here are a dozen examples:

1	Policy of stocking emergency inventory to assist customers during emergency and downtime situations.
2	After hours access to inventory and staff in emergency situations.
3	Ongoing customer training sessions including one-on-one training for new engineers, maintenance personnel and others.
4	Ability to handle blanket orders and provide summary billing which drives down the customer’s administrative costs.
5	Inventory services to assist customers with managing consumable parts.
6	Willingness to join customer in tri-lateral negotiations to improve costs on high volume purchases.
7	Salespeople with technical backgrounds capable of assisting in the selection of the best product for the customer’s application.
8	Highly trained Product Specialists who assist with product concepts and layouts.
9	Troubleshooting assistance with technical products.
10	In-house value add group with capabilities to provide complete sub-assemblies ready for installation.
11	Engineers and Specialists who work with customers to “value engineer” existing designs in search new technology and/or products with better fit with the goal of driving down unit costs.
12	Willingness to source hard to find parts which drive up administrative costs at the customer.

Is this a complete list?  I doubt it.  Most distributors we work with can come up with 20-50 more things they do to provide value to their customers.  The point is you have something to sell above and beyond the products shipping from your warehouse.  And, a good strategic plan pulls from the list.  Why?  Because not all of your services match up with every customer, but you need to have a very solid grip on what’s available before you can proceed with your plan.

On to the plan…

Way back in the 1970s, Feature/Benefit selling was the rage.  You detailed your product one feature at a time; matching corresponding customer benefits to each feature.  Average performers simply reiterated each feature/benefit set in every customer presentation.  It sounded like the drone of a skipping record.  Great salespeople, on the other hand, worked to only stress the features and benefits of importance to the customer they were speaking to at the time. 

The same thought process must be used when matching your company’s value to each account.  Additionally, care must be taken to closely match values presented to the right person at the account.  For instance, in example 5 above we noted the distributor had the ability to assist the customer in managing consumables.  No doubt, the customer contact charged with the task of inventory may see this service as a potential threat to his job security.  At the same time, a facilities manager concerned with driving performance at that same account may see this as very valuable and as the key to reassigning the inventory guy to something more productive. 

Thinking more deeply...  In most instances, it pays to bring your values to the customer in an order which is well thought out.  Some values are expensive.  Others may actually be less well defined (a nice way of saying "worse") than an incumbent competitor.  This dovetails back to the power of a strategic plan for each major account. 

Where might you easily demonstrate your ability to provide value?  Once that value has been demonstrated, how can you expand into other areas of increasing importance?  Are there competitors which could easily be displaced and their business rolled into your cart?

A final couple of thoughts…

It’s never enough to just provide value.  Get feedback from your customers.  Customer emails detailing how you helped solve a problem open other doors to sales.  Ask the customer if they will send an email you can share with a supplier or your boss.  And even if the customer hesitates to send you some documentation, create your own log of actions, values provided and other milestones at the account.

Never try to introduce multiple values at the same time.  While they do make for a great capabilities presentation, too many choices confuse the customer.  Instead, work to understand the customer’s own priorities.  Gather the kind of data we spoke about in Part 3 of this series.  Ask additional questions and introduce your value; one step at a time.