The Tale of Two Salespeople Visiting the Same Customers

My first job after university graduation was in a large multinational food company. Before entering the marketing department, we had to spend a year in sales.

Sales meant calling on large grocery retailers that stocked our products, a rather hostile environment. Quite confrontational and emotionally demanding.

As part of my induction into marketing, I had to spend a year in sales. Part of my sales training was to accompany sales associates on their daily calls for two weeks. I had two weeks with one, I will call him ‘Mike’. Then two weeks with another and I will call him ‘Gary’.

Gary was taking over Mike’s customers, so I could observe both of them with the same customers, and this is what I learnt.

Mike’s Nightmare Days

Mike was a slightly built man with glasses and had a very placid demeanour. I would meet Mike at his house, we would leave my car there and travel in his car.

His car was a mess. It literally looked like a travelling garbage truck on the inside, snack packets and empty soda cans strewn within. Mike seemed flustered and disorganised. He seemed tense, almost inviting trouble into his day. He would tell me about how he had several problems with most of his customers, and that he expected there to be some heated debate at most of his calls.

He was correct, every customer that we visited treated him like a doormat. He spent each sales call trying to appease them, and was continually apologizing and ‘following up’ on their requests. Some requests that he hadn’t attended to from his previous call. I watched as they humiliated him in call after call.

He would get into his car, scribble some notes, and then frantically phone head office to assist his customers, but even at head office, Mike found little support for his requests. He became more and more stressed as the day wore on. He had little support from the sales support staff, and nobody treated poor Mike with respect. Mike’s shirt was messy and untucked, his tie was too long, and his appearance screamed ‘accident looking for a place to happen.’

I thought I had chosen the wrong career path after spending two weeks on the road with Mike. Every day was a battle. He was trying to appease irate customers. He would beg and plead with warehouse staff to attend to his orders, and nobody took poor Mike seriously.

Mike reminded me of a mouse in a cattery. He was the plaything for everyone. They would all just dump their stress onto him, and Mike accepted it. Mike was disheveled and disorganized. Mike was always on the back foot in a tough world of retail grocery negotiation. It showed in his sales figures too. Mike was bottom of the charts for achieving sales targets.

After those first two weeks, Gary took over from Mike. I expected the hostility and stress that I had encountered with Mike. Gary, however, was very different.

A New Day With Gary

Gary was a large man physically, with blonde hair. Very confident and outgoing. Gary was loud and in no way timid.

I drove up to Gary’s house, and we traveled together in his car. I noticed his car was impeccably neat. Gary was neatly dressed and the first place we went to was not to any customer. Gary first went to the warehouse to greet all the telesales people and the warehouse staff. He told the admin staff he was counting on their support. He found out about stock holdings of key products and any issues with supply or delivery to customers and inbound stock to our warehouse.

He looked at Mike’s sales reports and issues with customers and found out why they didn’t receive their stock on time and why. Then he looked at the costs of attending to each customer, in terms of rejected deliveries and stock returns, stock that had expired, etc. He chatted to the warehouse staff about each customer he would see that day, to find out if anything from their perspective was something he could address with the customers.

I also noticed that Gary would note our products in the storage at the back of the store and chat to the staff in the store who were receiving our orders.

By the time he was to meet with the buyer, he already had several points to address with the buyer and several solutions for the buyer.

The change that I saw was incredible. The villains of the previous weeks with Mike were suddenly not threatening at all. Gary was working to solve their problems but also letting them know what was not working for our business. He had a more collaborative demeanour, but was more confident. He was loud but treated everyone like an old friend. He exuded confidence, and he got things done. He worked for the customer, but not to the detriment of our business.

The people back at our head office wanted to support him as he was in there each day building relationships prior to doing his sales calls. It showed in the sales numbers too.

He was continually on top of the charts. He was organised and knew the reasons for any issues that the buyer would throw at him. He would ask for support from the buyer, highlighting once again how he was assisting the buyer. The buyer felt obliged to assist him.

Conclusion:

Know your business

Know your stock holding, know your numbers and the reasons for the numbers

Build relationships with staff that have a direct influence on your performance

Understand the customer’s issues and have solutions ready when you meet with them

Never compromise your own business to appease a customer, try to find middle ground

Be open with customers, let them know if certain business practices are harming your business while servicing them.