Distribution Sales Strategy
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After the Crisis: What Distributors Must Do Next
Despite the many columns and webcasts predicting distribution’s post-pandemic “new normal,” it’s going to be a long time before our industry settles back into a rhythm. For now, expect a “new abnormal,” where powerful forces will continue to transform the industry and redefine how you must compete to win.
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How to Acquire New Customers with Sweet Spot Analysis
Pursuing new customers in existing markets can be an expensive proposition if not done with proper planning, analysis and execution.
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How to Improve Customer Retention and Keep Customers from Leaving You
Well-run companies know that customer retention is critical to long term success as a business. For some companies, an annual increase of 1% in customer retention over each of the next ten years results in 20% increase in annual earnings. Retention is powerful for several reasons.
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How to Take Business Away from Your Competitors
You must look closely at the business you want to acquire from your competitors, in order to define a specific strategy. Do you want to dominate a certain product category or a specific geography? Or do you want to focus on a particular customer type, such as large volume or a specific SIC?
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How to Sell into New Market Segments
It’s a great idea and it requires thoughtful planning. Most distributors want to increase sales by entering new markets — but what does that mean?
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Sales Force Productivity During a Global Health Crisis
How Your Reps Can Make Calls without Visiting Customers Background As of this writing, the coronavirius (COVID-19) is infecting an increasing number of people around the world. We grieve over the human toll this virus takes. With a mortality rate that appears to be about 3% (at the moment) and focused primarily on the elderly…
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A Tale of Two Teams: Proactive Inside Sales vs Customer Service
What’s the difference between customer service and inside sales? What are the skills sets distributors should look for when hiring for a successful proactive inside sales team, and aren’t those the same as customer service?
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2020 State of Distributor Marketing, Part 1: Distributors Struggle to Balance Digital with the Traditional
In general, distributors’ ongoing shift to digital is a good thing; depending on the segment, customers do prefer to be communicated with digitally.
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Featured in IMARK Electrical Now: Opportunity High for B2B E-Commerce
There’s plenty of opportunity in B2B e-commerce right now. Even distributors and manufacturers who have yet to implement e-commerce capabilities can still get in the game.
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What’s the Difference Between E-Commerce and E-Business?
To many distributors, e-commerce and e-business sound interchangeable. Yet, there are important differences in the definitions.