It’s interesting that a number of manufacturers who decide to direct their marketing and sales efforts to independent reps have already done their homework. As a result, when they contact MANA or take the beginning steps in forming their rep networks, they’re already following a map they’ve drawn for themselves.

For instance, consider the words of one manufacturer who described his efforts in working with reps: “One of our major goals is to create and enhance our presence in the marketplace as quickly as possible. At the same time, we knew we had to keep our eye on expenses and execute a plan whereby our efforts with reps would be more efficient and cost-effective than what we had been doing with our direct sales force.”

He continued: “As we considered our direct sales force, we were learning that just finding competent talent was proving to be a real chore. Compounding that was the fact that once the talent was found, then we had to ensure that they were all degreed engineers. Once that was done, we had to enter a lengthy training process. Even then the job wasn’t done. Once trained, the salespeople and we were faced with the task of them developing relationships in the field. This is something reps can especially agree with because the relationships are crucial — without them the proper business contacts with prospects will never be established.

“Looking at this entire process, we generally consider that it’s something like two to three years before we’d have a competent salesman in place. Looking at our business model, we just didn’t have the time to do it that way.”

This particular manufacturer moved on from his views of a direct sales force when he said, “One of the major selling points for us when it came to reps was the fact that those we should consider already had been in the territory for a long time. They’ve already done the work of creating a strong foundation complete with the business relationships that were necessary for us. In addition, they were able to piggyback on those relationships on our behalf. Also, we found that reps with synergistic lines already have the experience with our products and possess the complementary product knowledge that we’re be looking for.”

He went on to admit he’d be remiss if he didn’t mention the importance of speed in getting feet on the street. “I, and just about everyone else in our industry for that matter, recognize us as the new guys on the block. We’re not all that well-known. We don’t have a local presence in the markets we’re looking at. Furthermore, if we’re looking to enter the market in geographical areas where we haven’t been before, we know that the reps are already there. Why not take advantage of that? They are the locals with the local marketing experiences. They hit the ground running right away.”

With an eye on the current challenging economy, the manufacturer concluded that there was something else he’s currently facing in terms of turnover that played right into his decision of working with reps. “We’re hardly alone in this, but we’re finding that when many of our seasoned employees retire or otherwise move on, they naturally take with them all their knowledge and experience. We’ve found that by partnering with reps, especially those who’ve shared their succession plans with us, we know they’re going to be with us for a long time into the future. They possess the attributes that we’re looking for because they’ve proven to us that they are self motivated, have a desire to stay in the territory and are performance driven. After all, isn’t that what we’re all after — performance?”

A Reluctant House Account

An endorsement for complete communication was provided by a manufacturer who maintains he was forced to make one of his customers into a house account. Here’s how he explained it: “One of my major customers told me he wanted to be served by a factory-direct salesman. This painted me into a corner I didn’t want to be in.” He continued that the move wasn’t done quickly or willingly by him — nor was it done without input from the rep who had worked long and hard to develop the account. “I’m not saying what was done was what I wanted, but even if you contacted the rep involved, I know he’d tell you that through negotiations they were well taken care of. All I’m really trying to say here is that I did all I could to be up-front in all of my dealings. There were no secrets, and I consulted with my rep at every step along the way before making a move.”

A Salute To Synergy

It’s as if one manufacturer was reading directly from the MANA playbook when he described some of the “synergistic” reasons he prefers to go to market with reps. According to the manufacturer, “You immediately gain the benefit of association with his/her other lines and their leads. We get the benefit of the leads generated by their other principals. When they make a sales call in response to one of these leads, the rep has an opportunity to sell our products as well. In addition, his other lines complement ours and support the sale of our complete line of products. For example, there’s one product that we don’t manufacture that goes hand in hand with our product line. We know we couldn’t properly field a direct sales force without that other product. What the rep does for us is carry that product from other manufacturers. As a result, there’s a perfect marriage for us. This is one of the major reasons other manufacturers want our reps to handle their lines. We have the best rep organization in this market and other manufacturers want to jump on.”

No One Size Fits All

An oft-heard complaint from reps is that they find product training programs used by their manufacturers may be fine for some, but not all. And included in that “not all” category are reps who are put to sleep by training that really has no application for them. One manufacturer who is completely aware of this concern let us know that there’s real value for him in the way he’s tailored his training. “We couldn’t create training for each person in every one of our agencies. First of all, that would be too costly and far too time-consuming. What we did to address this problem is to operate with the assumption that there is some basic level of knowledge that most agents had, and that a few knew more and a few knew less than anyone else. We prepared a written test which was administered to every one of the agents at each of our agencies. This test and the answers were all given anonymously. What we were after was an overall picture of what and how much our agents knew and what they didn’t. We didn’t want them to feel threatened by the test. When the results were reviewed, we felt that we had a very clear picture of where we should pitch our product and application training so it would do the most good for the greatest number of our agents. Our training was put together to suit the needs of most of our agents. We feel that it is far more effective now than the old system that we used and which was probably used by the majority of manufacturers.”

© Irina Nartova | Dreamstime.com

Effectiveness of Joint Sales Calls

As Agency Sales continues its examination of the subject of transformational change, the subject of joint sales calls is scheduled for the December 2011 issue. On that subject, one manufacturer who has long been an advocate of joint selling offered the view that most salespeople, whether agents or direct, are seldom able to penetrate their customers’ organization beyond the level of the individuals who buy or use the product they sell. “We all know how helpful it can be for salespeople to at least be on friendly terms with those in general management at upper levels. A few years ago, however, we came up with an approach that works well for us. Our joint calls with agents aren’t only made with our top marketing people, but they often include key top management, including our CEO. Needless to say, these calls are planned very carefully to provide the customer the opportunity to bring in his top people. Actually, they seem to want to do this. Some are somewhat intimated by meeting our CEO without having their key people with them. And, of course, this has worked to our advantage. I guess you have to have the kind of CEO that we have who knows that nothing happens until someone sells something. But maybe you can train the bean counters to have broader outlooks too.”