Webinar
Questions & Answers: Key Account Commercial Strategy
Hosted by Dominique Seguin,
Chief Executive Officer of KESTIO
In this webinar, Dominique Seguin, Managing Director of KESTIO and professor of sales strategy at ESCP, answers all questions regarding key account sales strategy.
How to identify the real decision-makers?
Should the account be entered through C-levels or operational staff?
The basics of key account sales strategy
Several elements are important in the case of a key account approach:
-The significant economic impact for both parties (buyer and seller).
-The number of stakeholders involved in the purchasing process: between 5 and 10 people.
-The concept of building a customized offer: the offer must be adapted to be as close as possible to the specific needs of the client.
Key account sales: complex sales
Key account sales are not simple transactional sales but complex sales.
This is a complex sale because the impact is significant for the client and the seller, and the number of stakeholders involved is large.
Important elements in a key account commercial strategy.
The organizational chart
C-level executives don't have the same concerns as operational staff.
Concerns according to hierarchical levels:
-C-levels: focus on performance and results.
-Directors: focus on processes, their quality, their reliability, and the ability to predict results.
-Managers: focus on concrete actions, prioritization of projects, and tasks to be carried out.
-Operational staff: focus on detailed elements within a logic of activity and task.
A key account sales representative must ensure they have the right level of communication to speak to everyone at each level of the organizational chart.
Complex sales in the age of COVID
Currently, implementing a key account sales strategy can be more complex.
Therefore, it is necessary to develop other channels: WhatsApp, SMS, Zoom, etc., in order to multiply the opportunities for contact that are different from physical contacts.
The stages of complex sales.
Complex sales are done in two stages:
- Step 1: Defining the specifications
- Step 2: The client's final decision