Streamlining the Sales Process

Supporting the Sales Team 

Guiding Customer Purchasing Decisions

Increasing Revenue

(Part One)
 

Amy Schwandt

Chief Revenue Officer

AC Business Media

A recent MediaGrowth Excellorator interview with Amy Schwandt, Chief Revenue Officer of AC Business Media, turned into a great discussion/advice session on B2B media sales management.  Amy leads thirteen sales representatives that sell across 5 verticals in supply chain and construction marketplaces.  Here is Part One of a two-part MG Perspective series summarizing some of what she shared about ACBM’s sales structure.  

With so much changing in B2B media and so many complex products to offer, ACBM leadership recognized the need to streamline their sales process, support their sales reps and keep from overwhelming their clients with a 60-product laundry list.  So…

A Director of Marketing Services and a Director of Demand Generation were added alongside the Brand Directors (Publishers).  These directors participate in sales calls and throughout client campaigns. They apply their specific expertise and assist sales and clients by determining the products that will best achieve goals, evaluating campaign results, helping to nurture leads generated and ensuring content created is utilized for maximum effectiveness.  

Production team members were elevated to Partner Success Managers. PSMs reach out to clients for materials, answer process questions, run reports for sales and become what Amy calls “the magic behind the curtain” to support both salespeople and clients.  But they also get to know clients’ needs so well that clients trust and want to work with them. Directors and PSMs work closely to ensure that processes are running as intended.

So now, salespeople have help to ask the right fact-finding questions and to direct clients away from products that will not produce results.   They have more time to strengthen client relationships, achieve call quotas, update activity in the CRM system, formulate weekly forecasts and attend to issues that arise.   

Amy says that clients feel supported by a team with product expertise, the experience to say which products will work for them (and which will not) and the ability to create whatever is needed for success.  Clients feel less overwhelmed by all the possibilities and are more open to thinking outside the box – more open to ACBM's sales reps challenging their thinking, suggesting new products and asking for their entire budget.

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