Many companies lack professional strategies. Following our concept, we identify a firm’s growth generators in four main areas, especially in sales. Based on the results, we work with executive management, middle management, and selected stakeholders to create customer-centric growth strategies that provide guidelines for departmental strategies. These projects typically take 2-3 months.

The concept of Key Account Management (KAM) has been around for 30 years. Yet many firms are still in the beginning phases of implementation or desire substantial optimization of current KAM approaches. Our work draws on the St. Gallen KAM Concept, jointly developed by Prof. Dirk Zupancic with St. Gallen colleagues Prof. Christian Belz and Dr. Markus Müllner. This tool evaluates and optimizes existing KAM approaches. We provide optimal structure and realization during the (re-)introduction of KAM. Our collaboration with executive and middle management plays an important role in this process, but the true focus is on the key account managers.

Today’s firms often position themselves as the solution provider to a customer’s problem. Beyond products and core services, firms develop additional services as part of a full-service solution. Value Selling takes it further. Here the point is to perceive, conceptualize, and sell your own services strictly in terms of creating value for the customer. Newer approaches, such as Challenger Sales, go considerably further. The provider offers a challenge to the customer’s existing business model and collaborates with the customer on new development. Value Selling and Challenger Sales demand a lot from the sales team. Typical projects include seminars or longer-term courses for the sales staff, account managers, key account managers, and back office. But management must also be prepared for new challenges and higher standards, and we address these points through seminars and coaching.

Personal selling using a sales staff is the most expensive channel to reach customers. It only pays off for transactions that require considerable interaction but remain profitable. In all other instances, narrow channel solutions are required, and these include functions like the back office, call centers, inside sales, and online shops. Professional and successful Lean Selling does not depend solely on the channel; it also depends on argumentation, customer service, and the configuration of the Customer Journey. Work on this aspect is primarily conceptual and content-based. We offer workshops for customer-centered employees, possibly pulling in customers as well. Lean Selling projects usually take 3-6 months.

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a strategic approach to systematic analysis and optimal design of all strategies and interactive processes involving customers. Sales Excellence seeks to achieve top performance in all relevant aspects of these strategies and processes. One major support for these undertakings is the selection, acquisition, and implementation of CRM software. But that’s not all. We prefer to tackle CRM and Sales Excellence in a coordinated fashion. Projects of this sort are complex and involve customers as well as sales and service staff, among others. The success of such projects, which normally take a year or longer, depends on complete support and active participation of executive management.

Customer acquisition is a fundamental building block in every growth strategy. However, customers are increasingly reluctant to be approached by firms in more traditional ways, such as trade fairs or direct marketing. On top of that, everyone – including the professional decision-makers in B2B transactions – spends a great deal of time on the internet. A promising avenue for acquiring new customers capitalizes on generating new leads through professional online marketing and shepherding those leads into existing sales channels. These projects involve various stakeholders within the firm as well as external service providers, such as ad agencies. Depending on the existing level of internet activities, initial results in small projects can emerge within 2-3 months.

Doing leadership right while doing it well is a challenge. That’s especially true for the sales area. Good salespeople are rarely naturally good at leadership. Anyone who takes on a leadership role in sales – or hopes to do so – should be well prepared for the task. Good leadership can be learned! Not simply in seminars, but in a combination of seminars, coaching and direct experience. In sales it’s especially important to find the right balance of ambitious growth goals and a certain amount of pressure along with providing quality leadership in the form of mentoring employees. We call it Sales Driven Leadership, and we design concepts at the firm and individual level to develop true leaders in sales and marketing.

Vision and Mission are elements of a corporation’s strategic planning process. Its not enough to phrase some good sounding marketing claims. Vision and Mission are very valuable for leadership and positioning of the company. In 2 – 3 days we are able to develop together with our customers effective Visions, Missions and Goals that, of course, also sound good.