KAM Leaders Interviews: Focusing on Strategic Accounts

KAMs on KAMInterviews with the world’s leading KAM practitioners

In the course of my career, from junior team member to Ex-
ecutive in charge of Key Clients, I have always been involved
in the relationship with truly strategic customers across var-
ious industries: design and manufacturing, semiconductors,
Entreprise Software and B2B Marketing & Communication
Services. In addition, and I am grateful for this, my job also
always included driving a true co-creation process with strate-
gic customers and initiatives aiming at influencing the whole
business ecosystem.
When I became a consultant, I have quite naturally put these
topics at the core of my activities. With my partners, we help
companies of all size, analyze their strategic context, custom-
er portfolio, and organizational dynamic in order to design and
implement a KAM/GAM approach in line with their strategy,
resources, and culture. I insist on working simultaneously on
the KAM system AND the people involved in KAM; their skills,
their motivation and how they collaborate and with their Cus-
tomers.
There are many reasons why companies should run a sharp
analysis of the true value of each Customer and drive the en-
gagement with selected Accounts more strategically. In theo-
ry, you can start at any time and the sooner, the better. As an
example, start-ups operating in a B2B environment could take
advantage of using KAM techniques upfront, although very
few do it.
In reality, for medium-size and large companies, the trigger
situation for KAM comes from a combination of internal and
external factors. The major internal factor is when the Exec-
utive Team realizes that KAM is a powerful instrument to ac-
celerate the execution of the company’s strategy, whatever its
specifics. The external factors are related to an evolution of
the environment: market concentration, competitive threat,
new regulation, or the need for more innovation. The trigger
situation can also simply be the request of a few Customers to
receive special treatment.
OLIVIER TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
KEY ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT PROFESSIONAL
AND HOW DO YOU HELP COMPANIES ACHIEVE
GROWTH THROUGH FOCUSING ON THEIR
STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP WITH THE KEY
ACCOUNT?
WHAT ARE THE BIGGEST OBSTACLES YOU SEE
BUSINESSES FACE TOWARD BECOMING MORE
ORIENTED TOWARD SERVICING & ACQUIRING
A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING OF THEIR STRA-
TEGIC ACCOUNTS?
WHEN IS THE RIGHT TIME FOR BUSINESSES TO
START LOOKING AT THEIR CLIENT RELATION-
SHIPS IN THE MORE STRATEGIC MANNER?
The biggest obstacle is definitely the culture. Exploring the
true value of each customer and categorising them according-
ly, developing a deep sense of the real Customer Experience
and where it matters to improve it, further developing the net-
work of personal relationships with Key customers, all of this
requires teamwork, collaboration, and the capacity to drive a
sustained collective effort that cuts across disciplines and or-
ganisational boundaries. Most companies and not only large
ones have difficulties to do this. When you look at why KAM
initiatives fail to deliver on their promise, the lack of attention
paid to cultural change is always part of the picture.
Another frequent challenge is the lack of depth of the analysis
of the Key Account organization and the network of relation-
ship. The superficiality of the analysis prevents the vendor’s
team from finding new angles to strengthen the ties with stra-
tegic customers.
The answer is definitely yes. CRM systems are currently not
adapted for true KAM.and other tools are required. This being
said there are different sort of needs that can be covered with
an adequate software application.
• Account Planning and monitoring of execution
• Definition and management of the Value Proposition
• Opportunities & Share of Business Management
• Relationship & Influence Management
• Communication and Operations (team portal and custom-
er portal)
These 5 themes are quite differentiated although they do over-
lap. I am not sure that a single platform will be able to cover all
these needs at the same level of depth and for all type of com-
panies in the near future, but I do not see this as a big problem.
Companies need to assess their needs and explore where they
should consider adding one or several KAM specific tools to
their existing software stack (or replacing old applications by
new ones).
SOFTWARE IS EATING THE WORLD & ACCOUNT
MANAGEMENT COULD NOT ESCAPE!
DO YOU FEEL THERE IS A NEED OF HAVING
SPECIALIZED PLATFORMS OR SOFTWARE FOR
STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT?
We are in a transition era. Commercially available Software
tools for KAM are just emerging. I strongly believe that the
trend will accelerate rapidly and that the benefits of such plat-
forms will be increasingly recognized by more and more KAM
and IT professionals.
As the awareness of such tools, and probably the breadth of
the offering, improve, KAM practitioners will have to avoid to
reproduce the same deadly mistake as in CRM: namely putting
the tool before the people. KAM software tools will bring value
only if the KAM methodology and toolset used by a company
are adequate and if the KAM teams – all people involved in
KAM – are sufficiently skilled. Such needs are not covered by
any piece of software but by Skills development through train-
ing, on-the-job coaching, and experience sharing and by a true
focus on teamwork.
Act like an entrepreneur. Be able to think and help others
think out of the box and secure support for these new
ideas. In addition, don’t be rebuffed by resistance and
demonstrate patience.
I recommend “Give and Take, why helping others
drives success form, Adam Grant”. One of my custom-
er, Head of KAM in a German industrial company, hW
A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING OF THEIR
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
WHAT IS YOUR ONE MANTRA FOR GROWING
STRATEGIC CLIENT RELATIONSHIPS?
WOULD YOU LIKE TO SHARE AN INTERESTING
BUSINESS BOOK YOU HAVE RECENTLY READ
AND WHAT WAS THE KEY TAKEAWAY FOR
YOU?
Olivier Riviere
Consultant & Head of the
KAM Practice at Invalio
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM
Kam Leaders Interviews 03KAMs on KAM 01

The focus of our activities at Hinterhuber & Partners is pricing,
specifically value-based pricing and value quantification. Typi-
cally SAMs or CEOs of B2B and B2C companies approach us
with the intent to achieve commercial excellence or excellence
in pricing. We typically target and achieve margin improve-
ments of 0.5-2% over 12 to 18 months during these pricing
projects.
Our collaboration is based on two implicit premises: First, pric-
ing is a critically important profit driver that is frequently not
managed very well: unclear understanding of customer willing-
ness to pay, sloppy processes, weak controlling, limited pricing
and negotiation capabilities, absence of clear goals, heavy vol-
ume orientation and no clear roadmap in pricing. This is quite
normal in B2B and also B2C, but the opportunity costs for this
state of things are high.
Second, pricing is all about value quantification, i.e. document-
ing that higher prices are justified by incremental, tangible
customer value, i.e. profit improvements. Also in this respect,
very few companies have developed the capabilities that are
necessary to withstand B2B procurement price pressure and
thus, unnecessarily in many cases, respond by discounting,
thus eroding company profitability without actually improving
the competitiveness of their clients.
ANDREAS, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS
A KEY ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT PROFESSIONAL
GROWTH THROUGH FOCUSING ON THEIR ‘
ACCOUNT?
Andreas Hinterhuber
Partner – Hinterhuber &
Partners
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
Best in class companies take a different approach: they have
developed value calculators or value quantification tools that
document to procurement that the investment in a higher cost
product is justified by documented quantitative as well as qual-
itative benefits that improve customer profitability. These value
quantification tools thus show that it would be against the cus-
tomer’s own interest to purchase the lower cost product. As a
result, both parties are better off. The fundamental insight is
thus: a focus on value helps to turn an adversarial relationship
with procurement into a win-win relationship that improves
customer profitability and rewards suppliers for doing so. De-
veloping value quantification capabilities is a key requirement
in this respect. Hinterhuber & Partners has recently conduct-
ed a research project with US B2B companies that shows that
companies that have invested in building value quantification
capabilities at the level of sales and account managers have
higher performance than other companies that have weaker
capabilities in this respect.
Sales and account managers thus have the possibility, through
all stages of the offer development process and via value quan-
tification, to transform the nature of customer relationships.
Simply put, this drives profits.
We expand on this point in our
new book “Value first, then
price”, due in September 2016.
Suppliers cannot impose this – value is co-created, and cus-
tomer participation is essential.
Most of the times, however, customers will be receptive to a
strategic approach to managing the relationship with their sup-
pliers as long as suppliers can clearly outline the benefits of
doing so.
WHEN IS THE RIGHT TIME FOR BUSINESSES
TO START LOOKING AT THEIR CLIENT
RELATIONSHIPS IN THE MORE STRATEGIC
MANNER?
There is a huge gap between the promises and actual delivery
in software. “A fool with a tool is still a fool” or so goes a pop-
ular saying.
Software is a tool, not more: 20 years ago many companies
burnt a lot of cash in attempting to implement enterprise soft-
ware without changing their business processes. With nuanc-
es, we are seeing the same mistakes again with account plan-
ning or price management software that companies hope to
implement without working on the underlying processes, capa-
bilities or infrastructure.
Software is beneficial, in many cases necessary, to work on
the analytics in pricing, but pricing excellence goes far beyond
software implementation.
Big data and the digitization of manufacturing industries are al-
ready fundamentally reshaping the pharma, IT, automotive and
other B2B industries: take the internet of things, predictive an-
alytics, remote services, or smart factories where companies
such as Siemens, Rockwell or Trumpf are supplementing their
traditional product-based businesses with IT-based services.
This, I think, is a very promising area: Wherever large data
about customers, products or transactions exists, companies
are well advised to invest in capabilities to handle them well in
order to increase the competitiveness of their customers.
Value first, then price.
SOFTWARE IS EATING THE WORLD AND
ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT COULD NOT ESCAPE!
WILL SUCH TECH PLATFORMS BECOME ‘A
MUST HAVE’ FOR ACCOUNT MANAGERS AND
THEIR LEADERSHIP OR DO YOU FEEL IT
CONSTITUTES ‘A NICE TO HAVE’ CAPABILITY?
I just did, and you know it!
YOU?
KAMs on KAM

I have been teaching business communication skills to sales
professionals for four decades. The bulk of my training is
based on my own personal experience in the world of sales
where I set records that remained unbroken for many decades.
I was fortunate to be invited to speak and train others. Yet had
to learn how to become a professional speaker in order to do
a good job.
First and foremost, I encourage the students of my training to
remember that we do not sell to businesses. We sell to people.
We are in what I call the “people business.” Yes, those people
may represent businesses but at the core, the relationship be-
tween the decision-maker and the account representative is
where the sale happens.
It is always the right time to think strategically. There are thou-
sands of nuances that come into play in selling situations.
Each one requires a certain amount of strategy.
For example, if selling to a group or committee versus an indi-
vidual decision-maker, it is important to understand body lan-
guage to determine who in the group is the dominant party in
the process. There is nearly always one person whose opinion
matters more than the rest. At times, they may be the quiet one
sitting in the back. Other times, they may make themselves
known by leading the questioning process. Even if they are the
quiet ones, through the study of body language nuances, you
can usually tell as the rest will defer to them in some subtle
way.
TOM, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
I think the biggest obstacles are when the business thinks they
know what clients want instead of asking clients what their
expectations or needs are. I have seen companies set “cus-
tomer service policies” in stone. They don’t allow for special
circumstances and possibly tie the hands of those who are
working with the accounts in how effective they can be. Each
client should be recognized and treated as an individual—with
individual needs.
Of course, having company parameters to follow is necessary,
but those companies who are flexible in the methods and fre-
quency of servicing accounts will retain clients longer…and
gain more referral business from them.
The more information we have at our fingertips the better. I
believe having some type of account management or CRM
platform is a necessity for any thriving business. Otherwise,
how can we provide our best service to clients?
I believe the software is a tool to serve the needs of the com-
panies and account managers—not the other way around. This
goes back to my comment earlier about It is understandable
that companies need structure in how they keep information.
It is critical to situations where an account manager moves
up into management or on to another firm. The new account
manager must be able to hit the ground running with accurate
information about the relationships with each client. However,
again, the software is a tool to make the job more efficient—
not a structure that dictates how accounts are managed.
SOFTWARE IS EATING THE WORLD & AC-
COUNT MANAGEMENT COULD NOT ESCAPE!
SPECIALISED PLATFORMS OR SOFTWARE FOR
I must listen twice as much as I speak. We must operate our
ears and mouths in proportion. When speaking, we are only
saying what we already know. When we ask good questions
that require the other person to speak, we are gaining new
knowledge—knowledge that will help us determine if and how
we can assist them with our products and services.
I enjoyed reading “Procrastinate on Purpose by Rory
Vaden”. While I believe in doing the most productive thing
possible at every given moment, Rory suggests a strategy I
hadn’t thought of.
It’s about determining your highest value actions (both person-
al and in business) and suggesting you give yourself permis-
sion to procrastinate on anything that’s of high value.
It’s similar to my thoughts on managing time and productivity,
but with a different twist. It’s an enjoyable read.
AND WHAT WAS THE KEY TAKEAWAY FOR YOU?
Tom Hopkins
The Builder Of Sales Champions
– Tom Hopkins International, Inc.
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM

I went from a local market rep to a key account sales rep work-
ing with Fortune 500 companies and quickly realized I needed
to acquire a new set of skills to be successful. Multiple deci-
sion-makers with different definitions of value, longer selling
cycles, and fierce competition require strategic thinking, strong
communication skills and the ability to engage different types
of people within the organization. I discovered that much of
the advice in the area of presentations, in particular, had been
passed down from the eighties – well before prospects were
armed with smartphones! So I researched how we process
and absorb information today and developed a methodology
for applying that knowledge to high stakes conversations that
have been adopted by several Fortune 500 companies.
My firm focuses on helping sales reps develop and deliver
presentations or demos to key decision-makers or stakehold-
ers in a way that communicates value, differentiates them
from the competition, and keeps the sales process moving
forward. Because buying cycles are typically long and often,
Now. Having multiple touch points and multiple contacts with-
in an organization require strategic thinking. But even small-
er clients are expecting a more customized approach to their
business. Unless you’re in a very transactional sale, the days of
cookie-cutter presentations and canned demos is over. With
increased competition and the blurring of lines between many
solutions, a rep that isn’t tailoring their message to an individ-
ual prospect is often wasting his or her time.
JULIE, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
THEIR LEADERSHIP OR DO YOU FEEL IT CON-
STITUTES ‘A NICE TO HAVE’ CAPABILITY?
1. A culture of “quantity over quality” in business develop-
ment and a tendency to rush to present or demo before
reps have a good understanding of the account.
2. Not having a good discovery process in place that helps
salespeople gain the information they need to deliver a
solution that resonates with their audience as well as
helps to move them through the organization.
3. Standardized presentations or demos that lack the flex-
ibility to easily adjust and tailor to a particular client or
stakeholder’s interests.
As quickly as things change today everyone on the account
needs access to real-time information. It’s definitely more of a
“must have” than “nice to have.”
It’s important that the team is on the same page, so having
a platform that team members can quickly and easily access
and share information – that gets used – is critical. Since
most reps are frustrated with their CRM, just adding another
software solution without addressing the core issue can just
exacerbate the problem.
“They can’t buy from you if they can’t remember you.”
Focus on creating memorable customer experiences at every
step along the way – or be prepared to lose the deal to the
vendor who does!
The Experience Economy written by Harvard
MBA’s, Pine and Gilmore first released in the 90’s, predicted
that the companies who were more successful at creating a
memorable buying experience would outperform their peers in
the future. Well, the future is here, and they’ve been proven
AND WHAT WAS THE KEY TAKEAWAY FOR YOU?
Julie Hansen
Author Of Sales Presentations
For Dummies And Founder Of
Performance Sales And Training
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM

I was fortunate to be part of the team that launched our com-
pany’s strategic account management program. I had been
in a position where I was leading the curriculum to upskill our
key account managers as part of learning and development.
At that time, there was no differentiation of account manage-
ment approaches and much of the focus was transactional in
nature.
I was pulled in to lead the overall strategy for building new
strategic account management capabilities which included
the development of learning programs, resources, and tools.
My role has now evolved to include support for our strategic
account leaders and their teams through their engagement
with customers.
There are quite a variety of ways that I can respond to this
question, but I think there is one that stands out – especially at
the beginning of your evolution to strategic account manage-
ment. That challenge is the mindset. Most people believed we
already had a deep understanding of the accounts; however, it
was from our company’s lens. Once the account managers
began understanding the overall business of the account and
starting seeing the world from the customer’s perspective and
priorities, not ours, they were then able to start building that
deeper understanding.
GUY, TELL US ABOUT HOW YOU CAME TO
BE A STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT
PROFESSIONAL?
WHAT ARE THE BIGGEST OBSTACLES YOU FACE
IN ACQUIRING A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING OF
YOUR STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
This is somewhat similar to the previous question. If the solu-
tion is built well, so that the account managers see the value in
using the solution and do not feel like it is add-on work, it can
be transformative. When the account managers would rather
use the tech solution than any other methodology, then you
move from “nice to have” to “must have”.
I would start by saying that having a flexible, specialized plat-
form can be a significant game changer if built to meet the
needs of the account managers themselves and guide the de-
fined account management process.
They can be very powerful tools with the ability to rapidly com-
pile data in a digestible form. You can also use technology to
ease the process for account managers and build in immedi-
ate access to tools and resources.
However, we have to remember that platforms are only tools.
We can perform strategic account management with or with-
out devoted technology. Therefore I would be careful not to im-
ply that a specialized platform or software is the only answer.
Truly understand your customer’s needs from their perspec-
tive so that you can align on areas where you may be able to
generate mutual value.
To have a strategic relationship, you must be
strategic together.
Guy A. Bizzoco
Global Priority Accounts,
Merck & Co., Inc.
(known as MSD outside the US and Canada)
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM

I grew up in a sales environment, working in our family busi-
ness at school times. There I learned about the relevance of
customer interactions, which made me study economics and
especially marketing. After some years in a consultant compa-
ny (focus on the acquisition of orders and positioning of that
company) I entered large B2B customer sales in Siemens Nix-
dorf AG (IT). From there I moved to different positions at Sie-
mens AG as Key Account Manager. You see – it started early.
Well, you need to understand customer processes, customer
networks, and customers’ markets. That needs personal skills
and capabilities.
In my opinion founding a KAM team in your company and
creating an open team culture are the most difficult and ener-
gy-consuming topics to address especially in global and large
B2B relations.
HAJO, TELL US ABOUT HOW YOU CAME TO
BE A STRATEGIC ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT
PROFESSIONAL?
WHAT ARE THE BIGGEST OBSTACLES YOU FACE
IN ACQUIRING A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING OF
YOUR STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
I think it already is a must have and all the leaders in Key Ac-
count Management I know already have such a solution – of-
ten a “home-made” Key Account Management solution as a
supplement to their standard CRM-tool.
Sales as a function with product or industry expertise takes
care of transactional business, what means focusing on short-
term success and the opportunities in place. That differs from
Key Account Management where you act long term as an ex-
pert for developing your top customer. Therefore you create a
business plan as well as a relationship network between two
large B2B organizations. Sales-tasks and Key Account Man-
agement tasks: different tasks for different platforms.
You have to deeply understand your customer, its market, and
its resulting needs. That’s a must to guide and support your
customer best. And you need the top executive support in your
own company for embracing the internal silos (businesses, re-
gions, functions and more).
Hajo Rapp
Customer Relationship
Management, Siemens
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
YOU?
Well, Digitalization means disruptions in market and business
models. One relevant consequence for Key Account Manage-
ment is that Co-creation with customers is a more and more
critical option to cover by a KAM. Here “The Co-creation edge”
by Francis Gouillard and Bernard Quancard provides a compre-
hensive overview. A key takeaway is the importance of engag-
ing the supplier’s ecosystems.
A big part of Key Account Management is internal selling
KAMs on KAM

It’s been about doing it and helping others do it. Early in my
time in Mercuri International, I realized the best way to create
sustainable growth for me and my team was by focussing on
key accounts. So to start with I learnt by trial and error and lis-
tening to anyone who seemed a bit further on than me. About
15 years ago Mercuri began working on KAM in co-operation
with the University of St Gallen and I was part of an interna-
tional team doing research with 500+ companies and then
developing an integrated approach to KAM. Since then I’ve
contributed to and learnt a great deal from SAMA. My main
focus has been working on KAM programs where companies
want to create or re-engineer their approach to strategic rela-
tionships and then to work with individuals and teams to help
them figure how to win, grow and manage their key customers.
I am particularly interested in how KAM is applied in highly reg-
ulated sectors, how it contributes to growth in a low growth
economy and how it ties into customer centricity. I’m also very
excited about how social media can be applied to KAM
It starts with top management and then requires changes in
systems and structures and ends with behavioral change. The
biggest challenges I see management face are:
1. The view that KAM is just “big selling” whereas it will im-
pact on every discipline in the business from finance to
marketing to production.
2. A short-term view: KAM takes time to produce results and
can cost in the early stages. I have seen management cut
KAM programs after two-quarters.
3. Turf wars between people who feel threatened by the
changes that KAM brings. Systems and structure: Al-
most all systems are designed to measure business unit
(geography/product line) data, but KAM systems need to
provide customer-by-customer information and insight
across geographies and product/service lines.
Structures also present obstacles. Some try to bolt a KAM ap-
proach onto existing sales structures, simply re-labelling sales
reps as Key account Managers. This rarely works. Others cre-
ate a stand-alone KAM structure that takes the “best” custom-
ers and resources out of the core business. This approach
causes huge resentment and often fails. Finally behaviours
need to change – “lone wolfs” need to become team players;
new disciplines are needed; virtual teams require a very differ-
ent form of leadership; collaboration and co-operation become
essential; key account managers need to become “deep gen-
eralists” who are able to manage what are in effect horizontal
business units that can be bigger than whole countries or re-
gions. So the main obstacles are senior management thinking,
changes to systems and structures and changes to behaviors
across a business.
When they realize they have or plan to have a client that rep-
resents more than 5% of income or where a change in that
client could tip the balance in their whole business. It should
be about both opportunity and risk management.
RICHARD, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
TEGIC ACCOUNTS?
Increasingly “must have” but the business needs to drive the
system not vice-versa. I wouldn’t start with the platform. I’d
get the thinking, processes, and behaviors right first.
Yes and No!
Many CRM systems work best with comparatively simple cus-
tomer relationships – limited contact points, products, etc..
They struggle with the complexity of relationships with say
120 points of contact, a team of 15 involved, 6 service lines
and 20 jurisdictions. However, there is a danger of having a
customized stand-alone system that only applies to the key
accounts. The temptation is to create multiple spreadsheets
which require KAMs to provide data 3 or 4 times over and
which don’t integrate. The ideal is to have a “front end” that
works closely with other systems.
The key is for the front line to have an easy to use input that
produces useful insights quickly while providing critical busi-
ness insights for leaders.
Do less better.
Richard Higham
Principal, C3 Advisory
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
YOU?
“Boost” by Chris Wisdom. It challenges me on the balance be-
tween personal disciplines and energy and the need to be an
outstanding communicator
KAMs on KAM

I’ve worked in the area of global business strategy for more
than two decades. Prior to founding my firm, I was based in
the high-growth regions of Asia and the Middle East for many
years working in the technology and financial sectors.
I grew increasingly curious about what exactly makes strate-
gic account management “strategic.” I was concerned by the
lack of rigor and breadth that strategic account managers
were given in their professional development programs.
My research underscored that “strategic” account develop-
ment was focused on the mere mechanics of strategic plan-
ning — and strategic thinking wasn’t even in the picture. This
restrictive focus fell short of the strategic challenges that are
present in our highly complex and constantly changing world
in which senior leaders are being asked to make the strategy.
Now I support senior leaders and strategic account manag-
ers worldwide to strengthen their strategic thinking by offering
seminars to become more competitive in this highly complex
global environment.
Two things. Firstly, many leaders hold on to a static rather than
a strategic mindset. They rely on a prescriptive, linear, rational
planning approach. But a complex business environment calls
for an ability to think strategically — to be agile, adaptive and
expansive thinkers.
Secondly, studies indicate that 90-93% of strategic plans never
get implemented. A major reason for this is an insular mind-
set and an absence of strategic thinking — relegating strategy
to the brightest and the best within your ranks. We need to
bring in an outsider perspective — mix up the faces, places,
and spaces regularly.
Anytime and all the time. I believe all client relationships should
be assessed within a strategic framework, and this should
happen on a continuous, ongoing basis. The nature of strate-
gic relationships is changing rapidly and unpredictably. This
means that the criteria for what constitutes “strategic” need
to be constantly tested to ensure they are actually aligned with
the strategic intent of your business.
JULIA, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
TEGIC ACCOUNTS?
Yes, customized tech platforms have picked up momentum to
become a ‘must have’ as a means to efficiently generate and
categorize enormous volumes of highly targeted data. How-
ever, more bells and whistles don’t necessarily mean better
strategic decisions. In order to optimize tech platforms as a
‘must have,’ account leaders need to embed strategic thinking
into their repertoire.
There’s no doubt that having specialized platforms and soft-
ware is at the forefront of account management. However,
it would be prudent to not over-rely on convenient, efficient,
and essential platforms and software. There’s no substitute
for mastery of strategic thinking with its complex thinking ca-
pabilities — to identify the underlying premise of data and to
critically challenge the fundamental assumptions about the
conclusions that software generates.
Keep your eyes on all the moving parts and take a broad
panoramic view of your strategic issue. And expect con-
stant change, a high degree of uncertainty and complex-
ity. Paradoxically, to grow a strategic client relationship,
you need to pay attention to what you can not control in
addition to what you can control — these are the things
that can undermine a strategy in a cinch.
Julia Sloan
Founder –
Sloan International, Inc.
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM

I built the first national account organization for Marriott In-
ternational as VP – National Sales. At the time we had no ac-
count management program and the approach was virtually
non-existent in the travel industry. I leaned heavily on peers
that were running successful National Account Programs at
other companies. I met most of these contacts through Stra-
tegic Account Management Association. Over 15 years ago I
founded a consulting firm focused on enabling account teams
to compete. Since then we’ve consulted in over 45 countries
This is the key question! The obstacles that exist today are
so different than those that existed just a few years ago. We
call it Selling at The Speed of Change. Driven by the digital rev-
olution everything required to strategically manage customer
relationships is shifting at lightning speed. We see four areas
of knowledge needed to manage accounts successfully:
1. Customer Needs
2. Your value proposition
3. Your competitor value proposition
4. Corporate strategies that are executed at the account
team level
The reason this is so important is that over the last 20 years
we’ve executed over $20b in win/loss analysis for our custom-
ers. If we look across all those key account wins and losses we
can state one fact:
“Winners win when they show customers how they meet their
goals at higher confidence and lower risk than competing al-
ternatives”
Conversely they lose when this doesn’t happen.
We executed a global survey with cross functional leaders and
sales and asked them if they had the information they needed
to win. 85% said they do not.
The reason is that due to acquisitions, divestitures, new prod-
uct and service rollouts their value proposition is shifting real
time. The same is happening for your competitors. Customer
needs are shifting due to issues like regulatory changes, geo-
political events, changes in strategy. Given all these changes
corporate strategies that are connected to and executed by
account managers are also shifting.
Recently we performed analysis for a Fortune 100 Logistics
and Supply chain management company to look at shifts hap-
pening in the four areas above and found 37 changes that had
occurred in the last 60 days. When we asked how those chang-
es were synthesized and communicated to account teams so
they could effectively compete, there was not a good answer.
This is such a different challenge than has ever existed before
for account teams. What they know is now as important as
what they sell. In order to “win” account teams need real-time
market knowledge to prove, one opportunity at a time how
they meet customer needs at higher confidence and lower risk
than competing alternatives.
The days of annual planning given a static set of customers
needs, your value, competitive value and strategy are over giv-
en the real-time shifts in the market. One executive recently
told us that the equivalent of annual planning now happens
quarterly!
I would say for any company that relies on certain accounts
that drive higher revenue and profit than others. Regardless of
their size, any firm that derives a high % of their income from a
relatively small # of accounts should immediately begin think-
ing more strategically about those relationships.
BRIAN, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
TEGIC ACCOUNTS?
YOU?
If these platforms are used to collect and distribute real-time
market knowledge TO account teams vs. as a reporting tool to
collect information FROM them, then Yes.
There is just no way to compete and win anymore without this
knowledge. Marketing has been tasked with this in the past.
American Marketing Association just reported that over 90%
of what marketing gives account managers is not being used.
The reason is that marketing is not giving account managers
what they need to win.
Columbia Professor Rita McGrath recently published a book
entitled ‘The End of Competitive Advantage’.
What she argues is that due to the digital revolution we now
need to learn to compete on a series of short-term competitive
advantages. Software platforms should be used to synthesize
and distribute these transient advantages, changing competi-
tors value and customer needs as well as changes in corpo-
rate selling strategies such as pricing shifts, etc.
If you liked this blog, you can also read our blog – B2B Sales
is a Funnel. No, It’s an Hourglass aka Damru! or download a
Whitepaper on – Hype and Art of KAM
It has been reported recently that 74% of organizations do not
feel they are getting a high level of adoption for their CRM.
We believe the reason for this is quite simple.CRM has never
fulfilled the promise of making account managers more com-
petitive. This is because most platforms are a tax on sales-
people, they are required to fill out forms that roll up to man-
agement and for sure provide a service in terms of pipeline
management and forecasting but still don’t help us win.
CRM has never fulfilled the promise of making account man-
agers more competitive. This is because most platforms are a
tax on salespeople, they are required to fill out forms that roll
up to management and for sure provide a service in terms of
pipeline management and forecasting but still don’t help us
win.
For me, it’s all about winning the right kind of deals. To
do that we need to understand customer needs, how
our value aligns, how we do that at higher confidence
and lower risk than alternatives. Given that these are all
shifting rapidly and to quote Jim Dickie of Chief Sales
Officer Insights “ knowledge is the new oil for salespeo-
ple”.
Brian Dietmeyer
CEO – Think! Inc.
and 5600blue.
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM
What these platforms need to do is be turned upside down.
In addition to pushing data up to leadership, they must also
be a tool to provide account managers with the real time mar-
ket knowledge they need to compete and win. In essence, it
needs to be the connection to communicate strategy in a rap-
idly shifting, digitally enabled marketplace.

Before starting my consulting practice in customer experience
management almost ten years ago, I led the development of a
new coaching and training model for sales leaders and sales
managers of a $7 billion corporation. Within this role, I helped
senior management recognize the importance of understand-
ing what customers’ value most during their interaction with
an account management professional and how to use that in-
formation to drive measurable results. Today, our firm special-
izes in coaching senior leaders on how to design and deploy
customer strategies to drive customer-led growth. Although
most senior leaders say that improving the customer experi-
ence is their number one priority, many significantly underesti-
mate the time and effort it takes to lay the foundation to build
a customer-centric culture.
Delivering great service experiences at every interaction isn’t
easy, even for the best-in-class. It requires regular tracking
of customer perceptions and how they evaluate experiences
across multiple channels, interactions and transactions with a
company, brand or service. One of the biggest obstacles fac-
ing organizations today is the inability to track the cost and
occurrence of poor quality and its impact on the customer ex-
perience. Senior leaders today often do not know where their
customer experiences are unreliable. Acquiring a deep un-
derstanding of a strategic account entails an in-depth knowl-
edge of customer perspectives and the mechanisms needed
to ensure customer issues and ideas are visible throughout
the company at all times. Strategic account managers need
a close-the-loop process to identify problem areas and pro-
cesses to collaboratively work towards solutions. Customer
feedback should be aggressively sought and mechanisms put
in place to ensure customer opinions are reviewed and acted
upon quickly.
A business must have the right foundational components to
serve customers and meet expectations, as promised, before
expanding to a strategic account management approach. The
goal of strategic account management is to deeply link ac-
count investment to the co-creation and execution of innova-
tive solutions with a strategic partner. It is more difficult than
traditional account management because it requires struc-
turing and aligning business processes across buyer-seller
boundaries. Senior leaders must understand how difficult it
is to execute a comprehensive SAM customer strategy before
proceeding.
JANET, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
YOU?
I recently read ‘The Value of a Promise Consistently Kept’ by
David Kincaid.
David writes that “the brand is an organization’s most valuable
asset”. He defines a brand as the value of a promise consist-
ently kept. In my view, the customer experience brings a brand
to life. David and I are very much aligned in our thinking. I be-
lieve a brand is the expectation of the customer experience
multiplied by the emotional connection of that experience. Our
goal is to help organizations to design and deliver a Branded
Customer Experience® —one that is intentionally differenti-
ated from other brands through the consistent delivery of a
well-articulated value proposition across all customer chan-
nels.
It is the promises you keep, not the ones you make that
drives growth.
Delivering on your promises each and every time builds
trust and strengthens the relationship a customer has
with an organization. Customer trust and loyalty in-
creases referrals, share of wallet, and lifetime value—
key indicators of customer growth. In today’s environ-
ment where features and price can be quickly matched
by competitors, customer experience is becoming one
of the primary drivers of differentiation and, ultimately,
business performance.
Janet Leblanc
President – Janet Leblanc +
Associates Inc.
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM

For context, as a CFO and COO for several global organisa-
tions, I chaired Capital Committees and Investment Commit-
tees and thus was responsible for making major buying de-
cisions. Salespeople, engineers, consultants, and marketing
professionals would present their solutions/proposals/servic-
es to us, and we would decide whether to invest with them,
with their competitors, do something internally or do nothing at
all. Leveraging on this C-level experience, I have been helping
Key Account Management teams better understand the deci-
sion-making mindset and buying criteria of C-level Executives.
My personal value added is that I have been on the other side
of the table and sharing these insights with sales / account
management teams is very helpful for them in identifying and
closing opportunities, and in developing strong long-term re-
lationships with the C-level clients.
My approach involves a journey starting with understating the
client’s industry, strategy, initiatives, the needs and priorities
of the key decision-makers and influencers, as well as those
of the customer’s customer. Also required is to know how to
demonstrate the operational and financial impact of the pro-
posed solutions for the client, differentiate yourself from your
competitors, and be able to put all this together in a compel-
ling value proposition with clear before/ after scenarios. So
overall the focus is on demonstrating a differentiated long-
term value to the clients in their own language, consistent with
their priorities.
There are a multitude of factors, but one of the biggest by far
is not to be well prepared. This is not about the amount of
preparation, but the right type of preparation, such as under-
standing trends and external factors that we can’t control but
need to manage. For example, the digital world is transform-
ing many businesses, as well as roles and responsibilities of
the C-Suite Executives. Salespeople need to understand how
that affects the buying process. I’ve seen over 1000 salespeo-
ple in my corporate life as COO and CFO and conducted over
300 workshops and keynotes globally and invariably the right
preparation is still the one common element that is lacking for
success among the Key account salespeople.
It’s a “Must Have”. Especially in order to be competitive in the
age of technology-enabled account management
From the very beginning! That is how Executives think, plan,
and are judged by. So the closer you get to understand our
mindset, the more prepared, credible, pertinent and convincing
you will be to us.
Moreover, a strategic outlook is vital for a long-term client re-
lationship. Of course, you have to prioritize among clients.
Among the factors to consider are the scale of business and
the strategic impact the client can have on your own business.
In the case that these two criteria are met, it becomes critical
to have a strategic outlook. When clients view you as a strate-
gic business partner – someone who really understands their
business and can add value in the form of demonstrated op-
erational impact and ROI, they are much more open to taking
the relationship to a new level—something that a transactional
supplier can never achieve.
JACQUES, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY
AS A KEY ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT PROFES-
SIONAL AND HOW DO YOU HELP COMPANIES
ACHIEVE GROWTH THROUGH FOCUSING ON
THEIR STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP WITH THE
KEY ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
YOU?
MANNER?
I like “Good to Great”, a classic by Jim Collins—which I para-
phrase as “Very good to Spectacular”. I read it several times
and like to re-read it. I often meet a lot of General Managers
and Heads of Sales who are satisfied because their teams
have delivered very good results vs. their sales quotas and
didn’t believe they need to change anything. Getting the C-lev-
el Buyer’s perspective can turn very good results into spectac-
ular results.
Read another Interview of Brian Dietmeyer- CEO, Think! Inc. &
5600blue.
Building trust with clients. And trust first before anything
else. If you don’t earn trust, you’ll never get my business.
Trust is the foundation of great relationships and in the
long-run winning key strategic deals.
Jacques Sciammas
President,
Selling To Executives
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM
Yes. Having specialized platforms/ software for account
management enhances overall productivity and streamlines
the entire process. Some of the potential benefits include less
deal slippage due to disorganised interaction, efficient man-
agement of multiple contacts, stronger collaboration, better
visibility on communication with the account through docu-
mentation and overall time savings for the account manage-
ment function personnel.
MANAGEMENT COULD NOT ESCAPE! DO YOU
FEEL THERE IS A NEED OF HAVING SPECIALISED
PLATFORMS OR SOFTWARE FOR STRATEGIC
ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT?

I’ve been in sales for more than 10 years. Before founding
my company, I was in Key Account Management and senior
account management roles for seven years. I got to a place
where I had taken the training which was out there and I felt
it to be totally out of context to the world we’re in today, its
complexity, engagement and expectations. I wanted to explore
what I was missing. My journey started by interviewing 150
very successful key account managers who were earning and
producing results more than any sales director or KAM I knew
or read about. I began to document what I found as the com-
mon traits, behaviours and activities of those individuals. The
synthesis of that discovery became my company today. Help-
ing key account managers and organisations have more profit-
able customer conversations that lead to deeper relationships
and predictable sales growth
The biggest challenges for a lot of businesses is clarity of pur-
pose and visibility of relationships.
Clarity of Purpose is the why behind the activity which moves
behaviour, decisions and priorities. A lot of people say they are
client centric but the evidence of their culture and activity says
something different. There has to be a real shift in service led
thinking that transforms the way they think about serving their
clients from their clients perspective and not their business.
The other challenge is visibility of relationships. Many com-
panies don’t have immediate, relevant information and simple
access to important data about their clients. The design, ease
and intuitiveness of the tools used to manage these accounts
can have a direct positive or negative impact on the amount
of deals you close, the length of the sale cycle or the influence
and insight you have of a key stakeholder. Having that visibility
of knowing what’s happening in those accounts and relation-
ships is critical.
It should never have been put into the nice to have a catego-
ry. It has to be a must in today’s economy. Clients will not sit
back waiting for you to figure out what to do with them. Theses
specialised platforms help to transform your competitive ad-
vantage because you can begin to see the right client data in
real time. You can respond in real time and plan appropriately
to get specific results that matter to your customer and are
aligned to the goals of your business.
Ideally, all client interaction should be goal focused, strategic
and intentional. There is no real right time for this. Managers
should be encouraging a mindset of being intentional across
all their account engagement. The only difference in the world
of a strategic account is the criteria used in selecting an ideal
account whose goals are jointly aligned to the strategic goals
of your business.
JACQUES, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY
KEY ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
MANNER?
Get clarity, choose the one priority, set the strategy and com-
municate the goals that support the right activity. If you start
with this you have the foundation to build in clear expectations
and processes to help you win in any key or strategic account
relationship.
Jermaine Edwards
Founder, Author & Key Account
Growth Coach,
JermaineEdwards.Com
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM
I absolutely agree that specific and specialised account man-
agement platforms are needed. I may be biassed because my
services are about the uniqueness in skills and approaches
needed for key and strategic account relationships. This was
shown in recent research out of Bath University in a survey of
650 organisations they found
60% of companies reported they did not see any positive ef-
fect on performance through basic KAM training. The oppo-
site was true for companies who gave more specific specialist
KAM training. They saw a direct impact on sales, profitability
and share of wallet.
This relates directly to any other form of tool, software or train-
ing. If it is not directly personalised to the reality and needs of
Key and Strategic Accounts, you’ll probably get a result but just
not the one you actually want.
ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT?

If you take almost any business sector, you will find a number
of fairly similar suppliers offering similar products and services
to the same customers. Even when one supplier has a signifi-
cant product or service advantage we find that its competitors
will quickly replicate it. So I find it very interesting to observe
that despite their apparent similarities there will always be one
or two companies which significantly outperform their rivals.
I have always been very interested in understanding why this
might be. When I have had the opportunity of talking with large
customers, I have found that there is a strong correlation be-
tween the positive view the customer has of the supplier and
the supplier’s performance in terms of its share, margin and
longevity of the relationship. In other words, I believe that there
is a clear correlation between the strength of the relationship a
supplier has with its most important customers and the com-
mercial performance of the supplier. It has always fascinated
me and led to my interest in helping companies to develop
their relationships with their strategic clients, knowing that in
turn this will lead to an improvement in the supplier’s commer-
cial and financial performance.
Many of the obstacles companies face are of their own mak-
ing. In many cases Senior Managers simply don’t take strategic
customer management seriously; they assume it a sales job
and that we are simply talking about selling to big customers
which is a terrible mistake. The same Managers would never
let the Production Managers buy equipment costing millions
without board level input yet they are happy to allow relatively
Junior Managers deal with customers worth millions.
Senior Managers who don’t appreciate the concept of strate-
gic or Key Account Management often fail to recognize the
implications of this type of approach on their overall business
and demand results in timescales which are wholly unrealistic.
Another problem is that too many companies work on very
short performance timelines – perhaps even as short as three
months. The development of a strategic customer relationship
is likely to take an excess of more than 12 months – so you
could be working hard for more than a year before you see any
financial return.
We recently conducted a survey of the leading consumer re-
tailers in Europe to understand how effectively their suppliers
were able to meet their information and data needs; only those
suppliers with dedicated account management systems came
close to meeting the requirement. Managers using traditional
CRM models could not access, analyse or present the data ef-
fectively. A difficulty is that many Senior Managers especially
IT Managers do not appreciate the difference between selling
to customers and managing strategic relationships. As a con-
sequence they don’t recognise the need to invest in dedicat-
ed support systems and so their managers are not properly
equipped.
Unless a company finds itself with more customers than it can
cope with or had no interest in developing its current business,
then the time must be now. Most companies will find that their
competitive environment is very tough; there will be competi-
tors offering a similar solution, competitors competing strong-
ly on price, increased competition from new channels, share-
holders demanding maintenance of earnings and customers
demanding more for less. This means that it is crucial that a
supplier is able to identify who its preferred profile customer
should be. Companies which try to sell equally to everyone al-
ways end up in trouble because they finish up being nothing
to anyone. So the identification of those few customers which
should be the principal commercial partners is very important.
Note also that we say ‘should’ because an essential task for
many companies is to work out who is should be supplying
tomorrow rather than who it is supplying today.
RICHARD, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY
KEY ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
MANNER?
Focus on delivering and measuring value. This is how you can
compete effectively and this is how you can gain a premium.
But value must be recognised and measured by the customer
– if not they will not be prepared to pay for it.
Also read our blog on – Why Strategic Account Management
needs more work than Normal Account Management.
“Why Strategic Account Management Needs More Work
than Normal Account Management”
Richard Ilsley
Managing Partner –
The Sales & Marketing
Consulting Group & The Key
Account Management Group
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM
Yes certainly. Most companies have invested in some form of
CRM, but this software is often poorly used by the sales team
which often sees it as an administrative burden.
There is a vast difference between selling to customers and
developing long-term strategic partnerships.
In fact, a measure of a successful partnership which we use
is that there is no selling happening – many Senior Manag-
ers find this concept difficult to comprehend. So the typical
CRM platform simply does not do what is required for strategic
management.
ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT?

When I founded Whetstone Inc. fourteen years ago, I initially
focused our efforts on sales effectiveness. It didn’t take me
long to realize that one of the things that differentiated us from
other sales consultants was our ability to help organizations
sell to C-level executives. It was our knowledge of corporate
strategy, combined with the sales process; that enabled us
to carve out this niche. We then found that the customers we
were helping our clients acquire had greater value to the or-
ganization than others. Bringing corporate sales strategy into
the sales conversation helped me see that suppliers could
achieve significant growth if their strategies were aligned with
their customers’ strategies. Eventually, our focus shifted to
helping our customers partner more deeply with existing key
accounts.
The biggest obstacle is how companies are structured. Since
the Industrial Age, companies have found it advantageous to
structure themselves around their products and the geograph-
ic markets they are pursuing. This leads to the development
of product experts who are really good at educating the cus-
tomer on the virtues of what the company sells. Becoming a
strategic partner today is less about being an expert in your
product and more about becoming an expert in the customer’s
challenges and opportunities. Shifting to a structure that truly
supports the servicing of a handful of strategic accounts is ex-
tremely difficult. This is why most companies fail at providing
the level of cross-functional transparency required to excel.
Practically speaking, the issue of strategic customer selection
usually doesn’t become a priority until organizations begin
to struggle with declining profitability. Declining profitability
leads them to reevaluate the how they create value. As val-
ue is a moving target, they must come to the realization that
increased profit margins will only come when key customers
acknowledge the economic impact they have on the custom-
ers’ business. They are already becoming must-have capabilities. We are in a
race for value and suppliers that cannot provide strategic val-
ue on a global basis will find themselves increasingly irrelevant
and shut out as customers seek to consolidate the number of
suppliers they do business with.
Ideally, at the very foundation. Unfortunately, most entrepre-
neur’s are so desperate for cash that they are happy to acquire
any and every customer that they can. Eventually, this works
against them as
1. They do not become known as specialists in any particu-
lar niche.
2. Their disparate customer base makes demands of them
that pull them in multiple directions resulting in them
compromising their value every segment.
ADRIAN, TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY AS A
ACCOUNT?
STRATEGIC ACCOUNTS?
MANNER?
Context before content! This means we must understand the
customer’s business realities before we try to help the custom-
er understand the details of our product offerings.
You can also also read our blog about Insight Selling – The Key
to good Strategic Account Management
Adrian Davis
President – Whetstone Inc.
Interview with
By Milind Katti
CEO - DemandFarm
KAMs on KAM
Yes, and the software must be specialized. Unlike most of the
other problems, software is developed to address, Key Ac-
count Management software is not simply about automating
processes. What is really required are platforms that support
and enable strategic thinking.
ACCOUNT MANAGEMENT?

TECHNOLOGY TO MANAGE AND GROW KEY ACCOUNTS
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KAM Leaders Interviews: Focusing on Strategic Accounts

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