Key Objectives of a Key Account Sales Plan

The key objectives of a key account program are to retain your best customers, increase penetration within customers with whom your organization has only a small percentage of the potential business and to win over high-potential prospects.

Consider the following three points:

• A customer who generates a relatively large percentage of your organization’s business is, obviously, of great value. The business relationship must be nurtured, and every effort must be made to retain this customer.
  
  In addition, if this customer generates a large amount of revenue for your organization, then it’s almost a sure thing that your competitors are working hard to earn that business too! Thus the extra attention.
  
  
• A customer with whom your organization does a small or moderate amount of business, but who has the potential to become a much larger customer must be treated with extra diligence as well, as this customer is a good source of potential sales growth. Since it is typically easier to leverage a current, albeit smaller-scale, relationship than to start from scratch, the extra sales effort is justifiable.
  
  
• A prospective customer with high-potential – possibly one of your biggest competitor’s top ten customers – is worthy of a more focused and larger-scale sales effort. Therefore “payoff” for success in this area might be greater in terms of both sales dollars and competitive position, thus justifying the extra effort.

For more in-depth perspective and a list of action items to formulate your key account plan, please refer to this related article in our e-newsletter.