Growing up, I watched a lot of Clint Eastwood westerns. “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly," "Fistful of Dollars," and “High Plains Drifter," to name a few. The cinematography was beautiful, the action intense, and the stories rich and exciting. Eastwood’s characters often came upon a town overrun by bandits and swiftly served justice. This concept of good versus evil has always captured my imagination, and throughout my career, I too have sought opportunities to serve justice. Only these days, the bandits look a bit different.
See, the majority of my career has been in account management and I always saw my accounts as those townspeople in need of a hero. Me. I’m that hero. Riding into town on my horse. Upon introduction to a new account, I would often discover that some of my competitors were also servicing that account. These would be the bandits trespassing on my account, and they had to go. Bandits be gone! It would not happen overnight, but over time, my competitors would disappear from my account one by one. Justice served.
Do you have bandits trespassing on your accounts? If so, here are three things you can do to kick them out of your account and take back that revenue.
1. Hunt on the farm. Just because we have a great relationship with one department doesn’t mean we can’t seek out additional business within our accounts. Build new relationships within your accounts, seek out referrals, and prospect, prospect, prospect. If your customer needs something you or your team does not offer, cross-sell with a member of your organization who can help your customer. The more roots we set in our accounts, the harder it is to replace us.
2. If we solve our customer’s problems, we will solve our own®. We won this account because we convinced our prospect that we could solve their problems and add value. Our role moving forward is to continue to add value by identifying new problems and solving those too. Everything and I mean everything we do, should be to focus on the following:
Solve current problems
Prevent future problems
Increase efficiency & effectiveness
Increase productivity
Reduce day to day friction
Meeting deadlines
Maintain a sense of well being
3. Do your QBR’s. The "Q" stands for quarterly, not once or twice a year. QBR’s are a great way to stay connected with your customer, share your successes but more importantly, to discover how you can add more value and solve more of their problems. (See related video: The Most Important Meeting You Must Have With Your Clients)
Get competitive about this! If you see competitors walking the hallways of your customer, you should take great offense to that. I did, and it was never okay that they were trespassing on my account. I did everything in my power to show my customer that I was the Only Choice and, as a result, sent those bandits packing. At Butler Street, we have years of Account Management experience and a robust curriculum to help you Become the Only Choice in the eyes of your customer. Contact us to find out more.
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