As a result of attending this one-day Masterclass delegates will:
Understand the purpose, benefits, requirements and implications of KAM within the healthcare market:
• The AM-KAM spectrum
Be able to manage the customer relationship towards planned goals:
• Working in cross-functional teams
• Leading teams with ‘authority’ rather than ‘seniority’
Be able to analyse and influence the customer’s decision making process:
• Develop entry strategies and contact plans
• Build contacts at more senior levels
Develop responses and plans designed to achieve Key Supplier Status:
• Assess the impact of the purchasing revolution in healthcare, and develop the necessary responses
• Use tools to assess the customer's business and operational strategies, and develop solutions that make a positive impact
Be able to develop truly customer focused value propositions:
• Using activity cycle analysis
Identify the obstacles to KAM, and ensure the key requirements for success are in place:
• The deadly sins
• Targeting and Distinction
If any of these things ring true for you, then yes!
• The increasing complexity of the customer’s decision making process means we are at risk of missing the right contacts and losing our influence...
• The customer’s focus on financial criteria is threatening the basis of our clinical value propositions...
• The customer insists on fewer contacts (‘can’t we see one person?’) but we need our multiple contacts....
Each application of Account Management is unique – it depends on the nature of your customer – which means you will have to make choices.
There is a spectrum of account management practice from sales driven ‘relationship management’ at one end – designed to drive volume across a large number of customers - through to cross-functional Key Account Teams working in close collaboration with a small number of customers – designed to develop tailored value propositions.
Both can work – it depends on the nature of your customer – but in its more ambitious manifestations KAM is something quite different from selling.
Time horizons are longer, customer relationships go broader and deeper, and a cross-functional team is deployed. Key Account Managers are business managers first, sales professionals second, carrying out a much deeper analysis of the customer’s business and market, in pursuit of tailored value propositions.
None of this is easy in healthcare markets – the customer isn’t used to it, and most suppliers have focused on other methodologies, with call rates, coverage, detailing and leave behinds to the fore. These things may still have a place in the changing NHS, but under very different circumstances. The challenge is to find the new methodologies that work.
This is the world of Diamond Teams, cross-functional working, and bespoke value propositions – all of which demand a very different set of skills and capabilities. The best advice is often to focus your efforts on a relatively small number of customers – a trial, a pilot, a learning experience.
Trying to implement KAM with too many customers, too quickly, is perhaps the biggest sin – the results are mediocre at best, and enthusiasm soon wanes...
And what of the customer in all this – are they asking for KAM?
They may not use those words, but if you are experiencing any aspects of what we can genuinely call a ‘purchasing revolution’ – an increased involvement of professional buyers, a centralisation of decision making, an increasing use of tenders, a greater focus on financial measures – then it is almost certain that KAM is what will be required to make the appropriate responses.
So, a final challenge:
• The rules of buying have changed....
• The rules of competitive advantage have changed...
• Have you?
To secure your place please complete a booking form,
Email: enquiries@events4healthcare.com
or call the enquiry line on 0844 824 6688
Thursday 14th June 2012
Due to popular demand and 100% of delegates saying they would recommend this course to a colleague, Events 4 Healthcare are pleased to announce another London date for the Key Account Management Master Class with Published Author Peter Cheverton and Hakeem Adebiyi.
Sign up today
The first 10 delegates receive a FREE follow up coaching session.
3 months after your Master Class you will receive a free telephone coaching session to help refine your skills and address any challenges you have encountered to ensure
you maximise your sales opportunities. Sign up now.