Category Archives: Feature

Line Profitability Remains Key to Rep Success

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The February issue of Agency Sales magazine profiled a MANA-member firm that at its beginning was willing to take on any line it could secure. Once the agency turned the corner to profitability, however, the agency owner explained, “Now we keep our product focus narrow and limited so we can effectively serve the objectives of the manufacturer, designer, builder and distributor.”

And elsewhere in this issue of Agency Sales, we describe how at its inception one agency took on 60 lines of products to represent. Now that agency has whittled its representation to a dozen because there’s no way … Read the rest

The Time-Honored Practice of Evaluating Lines

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The practice and the accompanying benefits of line productivity analysis are hardly new.

Consider the description of the process and the advice offered on the subject earlier this year by MANA’s Charles Cohon during the MANAchat described elsewhere in this issue of Agency Sales.

In addition, the subject was discussed and analyzed in depth in the Operations Manual for Manufacturers’ Representatives Firms, a lengthy publication produced with MANA’s assistance in 2006. In that manual the following endorsement for line productivity analysis was offered: “Regardless of the size of your representative firm, knowing and understanding each line’s profitability is … Read the rest

Keeping Focus on the Business

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It’s been more than two decades since Agency Sales magazine visited with Maureen Ingram, owner of The M&M Sales Company, and while over the years change has remained a constant for her agency, there are three things that haven’t changed:

  • Her adherence to the power of focus.
  • Her belief that strong relationships serve as the foundation for her agency’s success.
  • And finally, the maintenance of one of the agency’s core beliefs to provide POS (Positively Outrageous Service).

The Columbus, Ohio-based agency represents a variety of manufacturers that sell products to gift shops, grocery stores, pharmacies, hospital gift shops, major chains … Read the rest

The Game Has Changed: What Do Customers Expect From Salespeople?

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We all know what we expect from customers — or at least we think we do.

We want them to give us their attention, give us a fair hearing, be open to our recommendations, and pay what they owe us. Some customers live up to this standard and some don’t make the cut. Just about everyone in sales also works at making sure customers like them, the cornerstone of a good relationship.

That’s not all. They also expect customers to be frank and open, even though some have an agenda they keep well hidden, leaving us guessing and suspicious.

Whether … Read the rest

Getting Motivated to Prospect

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Recently I was in a sales meeting in which the owner of the company passed out an article on habits.

We discussed good sales habits, how to acquire them, and what kind of habits it ultimately takes to be successful in sales. What was interesting was that we didn’t have any “ah-ha” moments or unearth anything new. Everyone had a pretty good idea of what it takes to be successful and yet, most weren’t doing those things.

Something I’ve noticed over the years is that most people who aren’t doing what they need to do blame it on a lack … Read the rest

Letter to the Editor

“Thank you for the assistance provided to our agency as we explored the topic of liability insurance.”

photo of John AdamiAs a small, relatively young, specialized firm supporting North American heavy duty truck OEMs, we went over 10 years without considering the issue of liability insurance. The topic came up negotiating with a new supplier, so we began looking for a broker and getting quotes. We soon learned that our business model was outside the norm for their industry, and as a result, some of the quotes we received were staggeringly high!

As a sanity check, we reached out to MANA. Charles Cohon … Read the rest

Momentum Is Our Greatest Power in Sales

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“Sandbagging kills our momentum and our belief in ourself and our future success!”

Momentum Is Power

If you watch any sports, you can see the effects of momentum. How many games have you watched where a team is losing, and one play changes the momentum so much so that the losing team comes back and wins the game? The only thing that changed was the momentum of the game. This is also true for us in business and sales. The key is to learn how to generate and keep the momentum.

So often in sales we have good intentions, but … Read the rest

How to Have an Effective Demo Call

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Let’s talk in detail about how to have an effective demo call. I’ve broken it down into 10 things you can do to get better results.

1. Clear Outcomes

Make sure the customer is clear as to what the outcomes are at the end of the demo call. That means you have to be clear.

If you need to have a second demo call, then have a second demo call.

I commonly find salespeople going, “Well I’m just going to see where this goes.” No. I want you to have clear expectations because it’s going to help you stay focused.… Read the rest

Make It Easy for Someone to Conduct Business With You

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Customer service is not very hard, but I think very few firms really try. There are four doors you need to use for effective customer service.

Door One — Physical Location

Your physical location is the most expensive. Your business needs to have hours convenient to the customer. Few firms do. Most banks are open hours and days convenient to the owner of the business. We call this banker’s hours. There are many people that prefer to go to a place of business and see people face to face. If your employees are rude and indifferent, it is the kiss … Read the rest

Three Ways a Professional Manufacturers’ Rep Can Advance a Procurement Manager’s Career

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Although it first emerged in Mexico in the 1950s, outsourcing — the business practice of hiring a party outside a company to perform services and create goods that traditionally were performed in-house by the company’s employees and staff — was first recognized as a mainstream business strategy in Mexico in 1989 and became an integral part of business economics in Mexico throughout the 1990s.

MANA started in 1947 and outsourcing in the United States was well-established in the late 1940s.

As it developed, many companies employed outsourcing as a cost-cutting measure. It can affect a wide range of jobs, ranging … Read the rest

Post-Covid What Changes Are Permanent?

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Thoughts of what happened to everything from drive-in movies, blacksmiths, and stagecoach drivers — not to mention the traditional handshake — come to mind when considering the changes in how reps have conducted business as the more than year-long pandemic winds down.

Think for a moment about the absence of in-person sales calls, not to mention the fact that many of the offices reps used to visit are now empty as purchasing and specifying personnel work from home. Then there’s the marked increase in the use of virtual Zoom or Skype meetings and the increase in the use of email … Read the rest

Finding a Niche With Smaller Companies

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A drive to build a solid foundation for a career as an independent manufacturers’ rep coupled with an entrepreneurial spirit pointed Owen Swift in the direction of opening his own agency in 2017. Today, Swift heads Swift Scientific, LLC, Coventry, Connecticut. His one-man agency represents premium manufacturers of scientific laboratory equipment, reagents, and biologics and matches unique research and development technologies with specific lab applications.

Swift’s career background includes more than 15 years providing automation equipment and specialized consumable supplies to life-science researchers in the Northeast United States. His experience spans the drug development pipeline from discovery and basic research … Read the rest

Why It’s Time to Make Reputation Your Top Priority

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A recent alert grabbed my attention. It made the bold statement that the most important issue facing businesses today is managing reputation. This wasn’t about splashing on a bright, new coat of PR paint, issuing self‑serving press releases, or scheduling TV ads featuring “happy and grateful” employees.

More than ever, today’s consumers align their dollars with businesses that share their values and concerns. It may be somewhat ironic that it took the COVID-19 pandemic to get our attention focused on where we’re spending our money. That’s why now is the time to make reputation your top priority. In the past … Read the rest

Service Recovery:
Handling Service Failures

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When you foul up (and we all do) you can count on customers contacting you to let you know what you’ve done. If it’s a phone call, you can expect to hear ranting and raving and people saying things that are rude and inappropriate. If they are in your place of business, they will confront you face-to-face and it’s up to you how to defuse the situation and put a smile on that customer’s face.

When things do go wrong, it’s how you recover and delight the customer that truly sets you apart from other companies. Opportunities for service recovery … Read the rest

How to Build Trust and Rapport Quickly

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If you’re working hard but aren’t consistently generating enough sales and getting referrals, chances are it’s a matter of trust. One of the most critically important and yet frequently overlooked aspects of selling is creating a solid foundation of trust and rapport.

Suppose you could incorporate a few simple, yet highly effective ideas into your selling process and substantially increase your bottom line?

Successful salespeople have a knack for making people feel important. They understand the value of building trust and rapport early on in the selling process. For you see, it really doesn’t matter how knowledgeable you are about … Read the rest

Stop Going Around the Horn!

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Making all meetings less boring and more engaging.

Why are most meetings not productive?

Have you ever attended a boring meeting with your boss or organization? Or worse — have you yourself hosted your own boring meeting? If you said yes, don’t sweat it, you’re not alone — in fact most leaders have, though not all of us recognize it. The most common contributor for this is the infamous “going around the horn” for updates. Going around the horn can be a good activity during a meeting, but when used for peer updates it leads to a meeting “for two” … Read the rest

Ways to Make Closing a Breeze

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One of my all-time favorite “sales” quotes came from a man known simply as “The Greatest,” the late boxing champ Muhammad Ali: “The fight is won or lost far away from witnesses — behind the lines, in the gym and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights.”

At the end of a boxing match, spectators see the glory and adoration of a victorious champion. They don’t see what it takes to get there. They don’t see the hard work or the blood, sweat and tears. It’s the investment of time, effort and discipline leading up … Read the rest

Why I Love Sales

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I love sales. I absolutely love it. I hope you love sales too. At this time of the year, I want to share with you 10 reasons why I love sales.

1. It’s About Helping People

That’s what sales is all about. Salespeople help every day. We get to be out there helping others see and achieve what they didn’t think was possible. What could be more exciting? It’s our job day in and day out to help others! And add to that the ability to have a job where you could spend all day helping people.

2. It’s About … Read the rest

Praise: The Key Word for Your Business or Personal Tool Kit

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The dictionary definition of this one simple word is “the expression of approval or admiration for someone or something.” I would add the word “sincere” to that definition. Praise can be a word with powerful consequences that many people don’t feel comfortable with.

Criticism is a more preferable expression. Praise can yield amazingly good results for the user in business, or in one’s personal life it can also make the individual giving praise feel good. It should, however, not be used to obtain anything, which is why I added the word “sincere” to the definition. You don’t need to know … Read the rest

Operating Room Nurse to Independent Rep

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Armed with a self-described “big mouth,” a love of medicine and a desire to wear a suit and carry a briefcase, Willa Moats, CPMR, made the jump from operating room nurse to independent manufacturers’ representative 35 years ago. Today she heads Willcare Associates, LLC, Milford, Pennsylvania. The agency serves the greater New York area, northern New Jersey, and upstate New York.

Given her extensive medical background, the obvious questions for Moats are how and why she embarked on such a dramatic career change. She explains, “In the mid-1980s, as a single mother, I wasn’t making a great deal of money … Read the rest

The Need to Educate Principals

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When MANA members considered whether they had a responsibility to educate principals new to working with an outsourced sales force, caution was advised. In response to the question, “Is it a red flag that a potential principal has no experience working with the rep business model?” participants in a MANAchat responded with a resounding “Yes!”

In the chat, conducted over a week with 26 association members participating, some cautionary words were heard, however:

  • “If a manufacturer has performed his due diligence (and, why wouldn’t he do that?) before approaching an agency, you’d think that they’ve educated themselves about the ins
… Read the rest

MAC Meeting Tackles Covid Response

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While the COVID-19 pandemic continues to negatively impact business and the world of reps specifically, there are a number of positives that have developed over the course of the last 12 months. That, in general, was the tone of the conversation from a Manufacturers’ Agents of Cincinnati (MAC) meeting held late last year.

In a luncheon meeting moderated by Jerry Leth, MANA’s, vice president and general manager, and Jack Foster, Agency Sales’ editor, a group of MAC members discussed how the pandemic has impacted their lives and the lives of their principals and customers.

Founded in 1971, MAC is a … Read the rest

Preparation Over Correction: The Difference Between Coaching and Managing

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As leaders we have a responsibility to make our employees better, not just more knowledgeable or experienced (by the way this is imperative for leaders of leaders as well).

One of the most common mistakes made by leaders is the focus on “correction” instead of “preparation.” To give direction is to share clear expectations on what we the leaders expect from our people, not just job descriptions and sales goals or results. Preparation is about helping our employees understand how we expect them to think, prepare and execute. This mistake looks like this: leaders spend more time correcting their employees … Read the rest

Nine Habits That Cause Us Unnecessary Trouble

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Most of us are talented at excusing personal habits as trivial idiosyncrasies or minor infractions. Yet, they can come together to form a clear picture of who we are in the eyes of others.

Here are nine habits — among many others — that we can easily overlook or ignore. However, if we do, they can cause us unnecessary trouble, both personally and professionally.

1. Winging It

What is it? It’s assuming we’re so smart or experienced that we don’t need to prepare for a presentation. It starts out innocently. We run out of time and decide to “wing it.” … Read the rest

Are Your Producers Not Producing?

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Last week I was talking with a friend of mine who owns a business, and he repeated something I’ve been hearing from a lot of business owners. He said, “Every year around my insurance expiration date, I have anywhere from three to six insurance agents, in addition to my current agent, show up looking to quote my insurance. You know how many showed up this year?” I knew the answer because, as I said, I’ve heard it from other business owners, but I humored him, “How many?” I asked. “Zero.”

What’s the definition of producer? (…fill in the blank.) Right. … Read the rest

How to Overcome Call Reluctance and Pick Up the Phone

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I get them every day and you probably do too.

I’m talking about connection requests on LinkedIn that are really cold prospecting messages. You know the drill — someone you’ve never heard of sends you a connection request. Against your better judgment, you accept it partly because you’re a nice person and partly because you think, “Well, I guess a person can never have too many connections.”

About 15 seconds after you click “accept,” you receive a LinkedIn direct message from the person nakedly pitching some product or service.

There are a lot of reasons why we receive so many … Read the rest

Seven Steps on How to Survive the COVID-19 Sales Downturn

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Customer service in the United States has reached a new low. Frankly, it is getting worse each week. You’d think with all the closed businesses, as a result of the pandemic, that the companies that are struggling would be so much more aware of their customer service.

The problem is almost all CEOs believe they provide great service, and almost everyone thinks it is awful. When top management does not see any problems with their level of customer service, they face a major problem.

My experience in the past is too many employees lie to cover up lousy service. I … Read the rest

Your Line Card — A Major Selling Tool

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Manufacturers please pay attention. It may not seem important to you, but it is.

Why is your rep’s line card important to you? Later we’ll discuss why it is so important to the rep firm and the rep firm’s customers.

For a manufacturer, the line card that a rep firm presents to all of its publics is of vital importance. These are the publics:

  • You, the principals that they represent.
  • Their customers and buyers who purchase either directly or through distribution.
  • Their employees.

We will review all three.

First of all, the line card is a clear, concise overview of … Read the rest

Rep Stresses Business Fundamentals

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Rick Wickizer humorously recalls that rice and beans were a staple on his dinner table when he opened his agency more than a decade ago.

According to Wickizer, Wickizer & Associates, Woodland, Washington, “Thankfully I had some savings and other resources because initially I knew I wasn’t going to make a lot of money.” He couldn’t have been more correct in anticipating a lack of income since he only turned a very modest profit during that first year.

In a nutshell, here’s how Wickizer got to where he is today: During the last recession, after the building industry collapsed, Wickizer … Read the rest

Finding Great Manufacturers’ Representatives

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Given the opportunity to compare notes on how best to attract top rep agencies, manufacturers who participated in a MANAchat held nothing back when it came to describing their experiences.

With a working title of “Finding Great Manufacturers’ Representatives,” over the two-day chat 14 manufacturers weighed in with how they found, signed and maintained successful relationships with independent reps.

One of the most effective means employed by one manufacturer was to counsel with some reps that he knew. Here’s how he explained his experience: “I met with some retired reps — reps who knew they weren’t in the mix for … Read the rest