Peer-to-Peer Blog: Make the Most of Supplier Relationships Part 1

Mike Jerich, Vice President of Indirect Channels, Global Crossing Inc.

Are you getting everything you can from your account team?  Do you even know who the members of your account team are?

A good relationship between a supplier and its agent can make the difference to your business. Its not just the products, but its the support from the account team thats the glue that holds a good relationship together. So, although it may sound basic,” be sure to ask your account manager who comprises your account team and try to meet each member so you can build a stronger relationship with them.

Once youve familiarized yourself with the members of your account team, its time to build a relationship and trust with the team to ensure that youre aware of and leveraging all the resources available to you.

Your biggest advocate and your main point of contact is your account manager, who can help guide you through the internal workings of the supplier organization. The account manager also can work with you to secure advantageous pricing arrangements and help you close more deals more quickly.

One way to maximize your relationship with your account team is to request an account review and joint planning session. This provides both parties the opportunity to review existing accounts and to look for renewal and new product sale prospects. An effective joint planning session also can help you develop a plan that will secure new customers and penetrate new vertical markets to create sales success.

Another key set of players in your account team is sales engineering. They provide technical customer support to assigned accounts. Sales engineers interact with partners and their customers to execute the technical aspects of the sales strategy by developing appropriate solutions and building technical relationships.

In addition to supporting the customer on your behalf, they also can provide technical training for your staff. Ask your sales engineer to conduct a Webinar or on-site training. The sales engineering team is a valuable technical resource and can educate your team about products that may need more in-depth review.

In Part II of this blog, well take a look at marketing support and how to evaluate a product portfolio.

Mike Jerich, vice president of indirect channels at Global Crossing Ltd., has more than 12 years of indirect sales experience, and strives to provide partners with tools and resources to help them extend their business reach and build a profitable solutions-based business. Jerich manages the indirect sales team consisting of general managers, partner support managers, marketing and sales engineers, all dedicated resources for the partner channel. The team focuses on enabling our partners business through development of growth opportunities such as promotions, SPIFs, joint sales calls, MDF and training. He also is a member of the 2010-11 PHONE+ /Channel Partners Conference & Expo Advisory Board .