I was fortunate to be part of the glory days of an outside distributor sales team. We built strong customer relationships. Using our technical skills, metric reviews, planned vendor calls, and product training, we quarterbacked our sales goals. As a result, we grew sales an average of 8% per year for 30 plus years. Today’s digital landscape, however, has changed the way the game is played. It’s put the outside sales rep into more of a scouting position.
Change in responsibilities
As a result of the pandemic, we have seen a digital transformation in the way we buy and sell. While some smaller markets may still support the old model of selling. Eventually, they too will be affected by digitization.
Technology has changed the advising role and responsibilities of the outside sales rep in many ways. For example, the outside sales rep was once responsible for controlling the flow of ideas, taking orders, checking stocks, chasing backorders, and correcting pricing errors. With the arrival of Automated Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), many of these responsibilities are no longer part of the job. Furthermore, tied into mobile devices like smartphones, ERP makes sales transactions are faster, more accurate, and more direct. Consequently, this has changed the role of the outside rep to the middle man in multiple sales processes.
From quarterback to scout
In a recent podcast, Larry Davis, CEO of AgoNow, discussed the salesperson’s customer relationship journey in digital times. Davis described the salesperson as a football quarterback, a planner, or an executor of plays between the customer and distributor. Correspondingly, the outside rep of today/tomorrow needs to be a scout. “Their job is to scout out opportunities and look for ways to add value through conversations or walking through the customer’s facilities.”
Create strong partnerships
As customers continue to migrate to digital procurement alternatives, the salesperson must be trained in the role of collaborator. To compete, we must be able to coordinate a customer/distributor partnership. That kind of coordination requires access to talent outside the distributor’s four walls. As Davis suggests, the position of an outside salesperson today is that of a scout. He must be able to organize strong partnerships with suppliers, technology integrators, consultants, and information providers.
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