Last week we had the opportunity to speak with a couple of manufacturers and a number of reps. The conversations turned to how companies are reacting to the economic environment. Some companies proactively restructure to manage expenses and ensure profitability; others wait but still make changes; some are like “deer in the headlights”; others see opportunity and reallocate expenses to revenue generation initiatives/roles and so on.
And sometimes the biggest challenge can be psychological or emotional.
In talking with the manufacturers, both made comments that they had recently changed reps in given markets. In both instances they said that their former reps said that there was “no” business in their markets. In changing reps, the new reps have already exceeded the prior year’s opportunities. The difference … they knew where the business was and were focused on “the right opportunities” (and one was in Detroit and another in Las Vegas!)
When talking to the reps, we noticed a difference in attitude. A rep we spoke with in Detroit, and another one in Houston, both supply-oriented agencies, told us they were tired of seeing sales declines and basically told their salespeople, “Get out of the office. Get in front of distributors and customers / end-users.” You guessed it. Both agencies are seeing sales improvements for a number of their lines. The difference? If you are in front of the customer, you will get some business. The distribution industry is a relationship business. Being at the customer helps one take market share.
Will it work for everyone? No, but it is better than sitting in the office waiting for the market to dictate your sales performance. As everyone knows, manufacturers have made many changes in their salesforces. An aggressive agency calling on the “right” distributors and the “right” contractors and engineers, will earn business. Remember, the industry was estimated to do about $50B last year. It had to be done with someone. Why not you.
And do you think the same holds true for distributor salespeople? Get them out of their comfort zone and get them into existing, and prospective, customers. What bad could happen? The difference between growth and contraction could be your sales management!
6 Comments
Many sales organizations face a major problem: They have no process in place for measuring their salespeople’s effectiveness. If a slow down occurrs, they have three choices.
1) Believe the sales person and blame the economy
2) Doubt the sales person – Squawk and hope something changes
3) Fire and saleperson
If they had a process, they could tweak things and make adjustments
And many that think they have a measurement process use “numbers” only. This is not a good measurement in this economy.
I agree wholeheartedly with the above in the Tale Of The Two Reps. Get out and get in front of the customer and you will get some business. The problem over the last 12 to 18 months we as Sales people are spending way too much time sending in reports whether it be for the Agency’s or Manufacturer’s request, more so then ever before. It’s tough enough to do 8, 10, 12 hours a day on the road and then go home and do emails and quotes. Then on top of that reports explaing why business seems so bad. At some point people will gravitate to doing some of this stuff during the day and therefore missing the opportunity in front of the customer. You might want to talk with some distributor and/or agency Sales people to see if what I am saying is accurate.
Amen! Manufacturers have gone crazy with paperwork. Must be their new management style! And they say they want us calling on engineers? Kinda hard when they kill productivity.
I also read the above and the comments. I have to agree the reporting our Manufacturers and/or Agencies are requiring ( and it has gotten much worse over the last year or so)is absolutely ridiculous. I have been doing this for just over six years after coming out of distribution. I thought the independence of being a factory rep would allieviate much of the distributor bull stuff reports as we called them and give me the opportunity to make more money. Well I must say I have made more money, but from what we are doing now in reports (over 130 last year) if I expect to see my family at all I will be forced to do these during the day when I should be making calls. In 04 I was up 16%, 05 up 19%, 06 up 23%, 07 up 28% 08 up 33% and last year down 18%. I probably worked harder and longer last year than any year previous to finish down. Even though this year has started out a little better business wise I have seen more reports piled on. Someone please tell me how to stay in front of the customer when we have everything else that needs to be down and then do reports on top of it. With Nemra coming up in the next week or so maybe one or more of the Agency Principals will grow a set and bring this subject up with their manufacturers. I am at the point as much as I love the people I work with and for I will need to look for a position that does not require the reporting we doing now because in the long run it will cost me money!!!!
Boy that last guy hit it on the head. I can say from the distributor I work for it doe not sound like we have it any better, call reports, responses to individual customers as to why they are down reports, projection reports quarterly etc., etc., and don’t forget about those mid-day teleconferences and webinars or even the all day Sales Trianing meetings once a month. Maybe the reps don’t have the T.C.s Webinars and meetings we do but whatever it’s hard to get out in front of that customer with everything else we do.
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