{"id":26511,"date":"2022-06-02T13:28:41","date_gmt":"2022-06-02T17:28:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xceedesolutions.com\/?p=26511"},"modified":"2022-09-23T13:47:38","modified_gmt":"2022-09-23T17:47:38","slug":"account-management-salesforce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xceedesolutions.com\/account-management-salesforce\/","title":{"rendered":"Next Generation Account Management with Salesforce"},"content":{"rendered":"
For almost every company, existing customers represent a significant share of revenue. However, traditional approaches designed to retain existing customers do not necessarily translate into developing growth opportunities within the account base.<\/p>\n
Understanding the challenge begins with grasping the nature of the Account Manager position. At its core, the problem revolves around the following fact: the Account Manager must identify growth opportunities in order for the existing account growth engine to function.<\/strong> As such, the growth of existing accounts rests squarely on the Account Manager’s shoulders.<\/p>\n Adrian Davis<\/a>, author of Human-to-Human Selling<\/a>, <\/em>points out<\/a> that recruiters have been leveraging two mental models to guide hiring: they seek hunters to fill Sales positions and farmers to fill Account Manager positions.<\/p>\n These models come from psychotherapist Thom Hartmann’s work, who first identified them. Per Davis:<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Thom Hartmann<\/p>\n The hunter mindset, based on nomadic societies, suffered from a short attention span, but had hyper-focus for short bursts of time. The farmer, based on agrarian societies, was patient and worked steadily with the understanding that he would enjoy the fruits of his labor in the future.<\/p>\n Traditionally, hunters in the Sales position focused on customer acquisition, while farmers in the Account Manager position focused on customer retention. As a result, the hunter mindset focuses too much on the short term, which leads to missing larger opportunities. On the other hand, the farmer mindset focuses too much on the long term, is too patient and leads to too much agreeableness towards client demands. These attributes ultimately get in the way of developing a healthy partnership and growth-oriented account management.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n It becomes obvious that identifying growth opportunities takes a back seat for the Account Manager, who handles a breadth of responsibilities. Among them:<\/p>\n With the focus of retaining revenue, Account Managers end up prioritizing service and customer satisfaction over driving account growth.<\/p>\n As mentioned above, account management has traditionally prioritized customer retention. While service clearly drives retention, there’s no correlation between service and growth.<\/p>\n In 2019, Gartner surveyed 750 customers involved in a B2B relationship with a vendor. Their findings confirmed the above assertion. According to their research<\/a>, product success and quality service increased likelihood of customer retention by 101%. However, they found no statistically significant relationship between service and account growth.<\/p>\n Gartner defines product success and service as the Account Manager resolving issues and helping customers maximize the value of their investment in the vendor’s offerings. Retaining account means the customer choosing to reinvest from the incumbent vendor for the commercial interaction in question. Growing account means 1) the customer purchasing an incremental product or service, 2) the customer purchasing unrelated but net-new products or services, and\/or 3) the customer upgrading an existing product or service.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Click to enlarge<\/em><\/p>\n Gartner’s research points to two factors that drive growth in existing accounts:<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Click to enlarge<\/em><\/p>\n The table below lists the Account Manager’s behaviors tied to each account management initiative.<\/p>\n Product Successand Service<\/p>\n AggressiveSelling<\/p>\n Confidencein Account Team<\/p>\n CustomerImprovement<\/p>\n The chart clearly points to Customer Improvement as the most significant factor in driving growth. The associated behaviors suggest that expanding the commercial relationship with the customer ultimately revolves around inviting the customer to do something new in the future, different from what they have done in the past.<\/p>\n In other words, driving growth in existing accounts is ultimately about coaching and challenging customers effectively. <\/strong>As such, this should be the key initiative for growth-oriented account management. Yet, most Account Managers have grown accustomed to developing a relationship based on service, completely different from the kind of relationship required to drive account growth.<\/p>\n An Account Manager who drives growth in existing accounts behaves and communicates like a coach, in a manner that helps customers understand how they could enhance their business in ways they haven’t yet understood. (S)He constructively challenges the customer’s current way of conducting business and offers a vision of how to become more effective and\/or efficient, while backing it up with solid evidence of the ROI.<\/p>\n Notice how the coaching approach revolves around the customer and the road ahead rather than the vendor and past success. The entire growth approach involves keeping a strong pulse on the customer’s business, maintaining the focus on the future and assisting the customer in negotiating the risk and fear of change. The vendor’s capabilities and products take a back seat in this approach.<\/p>\n We don’t want to overlook the second growth factor raised by Gartner’s research: confidence in the account team.<\/p>\n As customers are exposed to a broader account team, they become more comfortable with their vendor. The presence of the team makes it clear that the success of the engagement will not rest solely on the shoulders of the Account Manager, thereby reducing the risk of expanding the relationship \u2014 a critical factor in driving account growth.<\/p>\n In order to effectively drive and monitor Customer Improvement, the Account Manager should build a customer record similar to a hospital’s patient record. <\/p>\n As the repository for all customer information, it makes perfect sense for Salesforce to serve as the platform to drive existing account growth. Each driver leverages the efforts of the entire account team to drive Customer Improvement.<\/p>\n If Customer Improvement is the goal, and introducing the entire account team to the customer is a key driver of account growth, the entire account team must have access to the customer record. Everyone on the team needs to know the customer intimately to discuss the customer’s business as an insider.<\/p>\n Moreover, with access to the customer records, the entire team to contribute information and insights that the Account Manager can later bring to bear in making a case for expanding the relationship<\/a>.<\/p>\n As soon as the engagement begins, the Account Manager can coordinate efforts to obtain an initial KPI snapshot<\/a> and record it in Salesforce.<\/p>\n (S)He will be tracking the customer’s evolution against the snapshot to demonstrate ROI as the relationship evolves.<\/p>\n As the engagement progresses, the Account Manager should document all forms of improvement in the customer record in Salesforce. Using a sophisticated data model, it is possible to track different KPIs over time within Salesforce<\/a> itself, making it possible to monitor the customer’s evolution.<\/p>\n Such a capability will prove useful not only to demonstrate ROI to the customer, but also to prove the value of the product or service to other customers in the future in the form of a case study.<\/p>\n Any time a member of the team hears a complaint from the customer about any part of the business (not necessarily related to the vendor’s offering), (s)he should capture it in the customer record.<\/p>\n Most opportunities emerge from complaints about the status quo.<\/p>\n A central issue that plagues account teams is that communication about the account is spread out across media and channels. Most companies that use Salesforce already include email correspondence with the account in the customer record.<\/p>\n However, it’s important to also bring internal team communication about the account onto Salesforce. Whatever internal chat solution the team uses, it’s possible to integrate these tools with Salesforce and attach relevant conversations to the customer record.<\/p>\n The account team may decide to organize an educational seminar at the client’s premises to reinforce the importance of implementing a technology solution. Or, the team may decide to invest in a custom, highly produced report that showcases the results of the engagement.<\/p>\n\n
Service isn’t a growth driver<\/h3>\n
Driving account growth: what are the key factors?<\/h2>\n
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Growth-oriented account management is about customer improvement<\/h3>\n
Account management is a team sport<\/h3>\n
Driving customer improvement with Salesforce<\/h2>\n
Give the entire account team access to the customer record<\/h4>\n
Take a snapshot of key KPIs at the beginning of the relationship<\/h4>\n
Document all improvements, quantitative and qualitative, in the customer record<\/h4>\n
Document all customer complaints and weaknesses in the customer record<\/h4>\n
Bring all team communication regarding the account on Salesforce<\/h4>\n
Plan and provision critical education initiatives and investments along the year<\/h4>\n