Santa Shares All…. Six Lessons for Distributors For those of you who don’t know, Santa Claus and I have a special relationship.  It began way back when I was still knee high to a short elf. It seems my grandfather, who was a jolly sort of guy himself, somehow connected with Mr. Claus.  Imagine being 3 or 4 years old and learning Grandpa and Santa were buddies. Special feeling?  You bet. I knew it was real when Santa greeted my Grandpa with, “Hey Red (my Grandpa’s nickname,) how late did you stay down at the Eagles’ Club last night?  If they weren’t pals, how in the world could this jolly red suited man know these details? Santa knew me by name too. Really! And from that day back in the early 1960s on, Old Santa and I have enjoyed a close and special friendship.  According to Santa, yours truly has managed to make the “nice” list for 5 of my 59 years, but this story is not about me, it’s about distributors. During a slow point down at the local mall,...

Distributor Newsletters, Naughty or Nice—You be the Judge We’ve been analyzing a bunch of Distributor newsletters and blog sites lately. Yep, just like Santa, we’re quietly watching you to see who has been naughty and who has been nice. We’ve learned a valuable lesson. Watching nice boys and girls at work is fairly boring. Poor old Santa probably gets much of his weight problems from eating while he’s bored stiff. There’s nothing exciting about nice. Have we been sniffing Christmas tree needles again? No, there is a point to this. The Nice Distributor Kids fill their newsletters and blogs with product facts, specifications, and catalog cut sheets. This is what the customers are supposed to want, right? Well….we don’t think so. Reading through the product spec sheets disguised as distributor newsletters is so dull, even Santa would find himself chugging down a dozen cookies and warm milk to get through them. Customers who are probably only marginally interested...

Distributors as Bankers? High interest rates must be on a lot of peoples’ minds these days. During the past month I have received several emails asking my opinion on the distributor’s role as the extender of credit; the organization providing some of the funds necessary for their customers’ operating capital. Let’s look at the current situation: customers who expect extended terms seem to be multiplying like cockroaches in a roadside diner. In the good ole days, customers paid their local supply house distributor at the end of the next month. Some of us even offered special discounts for those who paid by the 10th of the month. Somewhere in the late 1990s, a number of large companies (reportedly led by GE) unilaterally made the decision to pay their local distributors in 60 days rather than the normal 30 days. The conversation went something like this: “The time and effort required to process your invoices takes us longer than 30 days. So, we’re going to start paying in...

I’m a Salesperson, for crying out loud, why do I need an Annual Plan? Some will do just about anything before planning. It takes more than just adding it to the top of your "do do" list. Let me talk directly to my friends who fill the critically important role of Distributor Sales. First, I consider myself to be a member of your brotherhood.  I know it’s a tough job.  Day after day, you load in to your vehicle, had out to face down angry customers, smart-alecky purchasing guys, and unsavory reps from vendors.  You trudge through rain, sleep, snow and traffic that would wilt the heartiest of letter carriers.  If no one has said it recently, thanks for what you do.  Salespeople are the backbone of the Distribution Industry.  Now don’t you feel better?  But here comes the part where I explain precisely why you’ve got to make time for something many find distasteful.  Bear with me… I promise it will only take a moment. Regardless...

Annual Planning for Distributors It’s November. The Midwestern Iowa leaves feature Technicolor rainbows of colors; bright red, deep orange, a thousand shades of yellow. A bit of warmth lingers, but Thanksgiving, December, and the Holiday season rapidly approach. Two painful realities of the season loom in the distance - yard cleanup and annual planning. As I jot down these few words, I feel the approaching pain of a future Sunday afternoon manhandling a rake around the property. Some pay a neighborhood teenager to handle the raking. But it’s hard to find an $8.00 an hour surrogate for End of Year Planning. Planning needn’t be the dreaded task hanging around the corner. Join me as we remove the pain out of the process. Start early . Many of us don’t dig into the task until the last minute. A few of us dread the seemingly gigantic nature of the job so much, we procrastinate into next the year. I know people who move paper clip sorting to the front and center in order...

Shouldn’t Distributors be Territory Experts? Let’s talk selling; not the normal distributor to customer kind pontificated on by consultants everywhere.  Instead, I suggest we explore the backwards sale aimed toward our supply partners.  We never talk about it, but I think every now and again we need a refresher. We distributors sell our value to supply partners in a number of ways.  For example, the gigantic catalog houses pitch their state of the art logistics team and their capability to get the manufacturer’s product from Port A to Point B in very short order.  For some mid-sized distributors, the supply partner sales story contains tales of supply contracts that “deliver” the MRO business of Fortune 500 manufacturing firms. Knowledge-based distributors in the automation world tout the solution building prowess of highly trained sales engineers.  The implied story is this: we can create new and wonderful applications for your product at OEMs w...

Hey Buddy, you just stole an hour of my life: The Worst Sales Meeting in Years If only the real Bandit came with this shirt. Courtesy of Zazzle.com Hey Buddy, you just stole an hour of my life. It’s not that I don’t have a few to spare, I plan to be around for a few more years, but… they say that time is money and you just called me to throw a handful of twenties down the drain. What’s got me hot? I just sat through the worst sales meeting of my life. Here’s the scoop: I was working with a distributor client and wanted to get a flavor for their company culture. I decided to sit in one of their sales meetings. I like to do this because I’m a product junkie. I enjoy learning about new stuff and the markets served by the product. I especially enjoy hearing how the products are targeted to customer groups/segments. As is typically the case with distributor sales meetings, the day was divided into one-hour segments with new suppliers being given the opportunity t...

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Imagine the impact of two additional points of additional margin to your business.   Since I got into the business back in the 70s, distributors have talked about adding just a single point.   They held rah-rah employee meetings, made posters embarrassed with things like “The Power of One” and listened intently as experts extolled the virtues of Matrix Pricing.   Nothing sustainable happened; they were largely unsuccessful.      Over the past couple of years, I have had the opportunity to study the margin results enjoyed by the clients of Strategic Pricing Associates.   Being an engineer by training (and a bit of a computer geek), it was their scientific computer analysis of invoiced pricing that originally drew me to their company.   However, after learning more and interviewing dozens of their clients for my own research in sales process, I would say I am struck with their process. It’s a combination of analytics, documentat...