At the 2014 Chief Sales Executive Forum, Dave Clark, Vice President of Sales Systems, Services and Solutions at Johnson Controls, realized his company needed to change its customer relationship. He listened to his customers who were telling him they needed a more holistic approach to coverage where sellers could show them how everything worked together.
Key points Dave made were:
- Organize around customers not products – He combined three sales forces into one with Account Managers representing the whole line and specialists offering deeper insight into technical product where needed.
- Target the right resources at the right accounts – Dave created three tiers of accounts and scaled the amount of resource each account received according to size and potential. The largest received dedicated pre-sale team support.
- Know the customer – Understand the decision makers and their goals and help them meet their objectives by using your products and services. Sell how they want to buy.
The illustration below from graphic recorder Kelly Kingman illustrates Dave’s presentation in a most innovative way. Enjoy!
We look forward to sharing more graphic recordings of more keynote presentations from the 2014 CSE Forum in the coming weeks.
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About the Author
Gary Tubridy is a principal of the Alexander Group and the general manager in charge of the firm’s management consulting business. Gary’s consulting work is focused on increasing marketing and sales effectiveness with particular emphasis in technology and medical products industries. Gary has deep expertise in diagnosing sales management issues and helping clients execute action plans to improve results. His research is focused on best practices of leading sales organizations in North America with particular emphasis on sales force transformation and the role of sales leadership. He leads the Alexander Group executive events series and hosts the Operations and Executive Forums. He is one of three founding stockholders of the Alexander Group.
Gary has been with the Alexander Group for over 35 years. Prior to that, Gary was in sales with the IBM Corporation. Gary holds a B.A. from Brown University and an MBA from the Graduate School of Business at Columbia University.
