Rockwell Promotes Sustainability, Opportunities for Distributors

The typical Rockwell distributor is tasked with growing their industrial automation business, growing their MRO business and increasing their contractor sales (since most also sell to commercial construction contractors to have a balanced business.) Some also sell industrial supplies and power transmission products. We’re including “green offerings” (i.e. electric vehicle charging stations, solar, etc) and robotics (and similar) in the above broad categories.  It takes either a very skilled salesperson or, and more likely, multiple salespeople. And this is in addition to the “Rockwell specialists” that a distributor employs.

While the distributor salespeople call on their existing customers and typically focus on maintenance, repair, CapEx driven and upgrade opportunities to keep equipment running, they can also help companies improve productivity, evolve towards Industry 4.0 and more.

In other words, a distributor salesperson for a Rockwell distributor needs to not only be an “account manager” and a “demand generator” but they also need to be a “consultative salesperson.”

Ideally, they, or someone at the distributorship, need to also be able to “sell high” as well as “sell low” – so at all levels within an organization. Rockwell’s sales organization also supports the “business card to business card” sales strategy and has specialists. It’s a high touch business.

Rockwell Distributors = Solution Sellers

So, Rockwell distributors, ideally, are “solution sellers.”

A recent article in CSRWire, which focuses on corporate social responsibility, featured an interview with Andrea Ruotolo, Rockwell Automation’s Global Head of Customer Sustainability. Here’s some excerpts from the article:

“Ruotolo, a Ph.D. and Fulbright Scholar, is among th­­e leaders of a growing Rockwell team that’s accelerating the global development and launch of new and enhanced customer sustainability offerings. In her newly created position, Ruotolo develops and leads strategy and initiatives focused on helping Rockwell customers achieve their sustainability goals.

“With Rockwell’s unmatched capabilities in industrial automation, we can be more than solution providers,” Ruotolo said. “We can help our customers become better stewards of natural resources and better able to do business in ways that are more productive per unit of energy and resources consumed, and more environmentally responsible.

“We already support the operations of our customers’ facilities with thousands of smart devices,” she continues, “and we have the expertise and the opportunity to unlock greater connectivity and leverage valuable production data to produce actionable insights that improve processes, efficiency, and drive sustainable innovation.”

In addition to her customer-focused leadership role, Ruotolo helps drive innovations across Rockwell’s business units and internal operations to advance the company’s internal Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) commitments.”

So, it brings up some interesting opportunities, and questions, for Rockwell distributors:

• Given Ruotolo’s background, and focus, she can probably help many of the distributors as well as Rockwell Encompass partners improve their sustainability. This is a training / educational opportunity as well as an opportunity to recommend specific strategies that can help distributors. And if distributors learn and do for themselves, and see the value, they are more likely to be able to communicate and sell the sustainability benefits to their customers.
• There is a unique opportunity for Rockwell distributors to position themselves, within their geographies, as more than distributors as the CSR component speaks to different levels within corporate environments, government entities and others. A CSR offering can be much more than Rockwell products and can also evolve into a “CSR practice” that is service and consulting based.
• What will every company need? What additional personnel resources? Training resources? Consulting resources?
• Given that the CSR, and the evolution of the industrial segment, are different businesses, this further reinforces the need for multiple sales organizations. But how much can distributors afford? And how does that investment level change based upon geography and corporate opportunities? The commercial contractor business almost needs to be spun off as a separate business that just happens to use the same warehouse, trucks, accounting department, HR, IT, etc … essentially a shared services business model.
• Can Rockwell distributors evolve their contractor business to also include solution selling? Yes, there are different types of services to sell, but in some cases the contractors could also be lead sources.
• Can distributors earn enough margin or learn to sell time or develop other pricing models?
• What other product offerings do distributors need to represent to effectively serve their customers?
• How will distributors market this message? It is much different than their current strategies … and business.
• How will they train their sales organizations on whom to call on and the different sales techniques  … which change by size of company?

For Rockwell distributors, sales is now “fulfilling existing customer needs, identifying conversion opportunities, capitalizing upon industrial investment and solution selling.” The solution selling element may be the biggest challenge as it is a different sales, marketing and service approach … a different business approach.

The continued evolution of Rockwell, and the opportunities that they are pursuing (or are presenting themselves and the company is capitalizing upon) can create unique opportunities for distributors to differentiate themselves as well as improve the rest of their business.

It will be interesting to see how both companies capitalize upon the opportunity.