Welcome to Episode 44. In this episode, I talk to Alex Raymond from Kapta about everything to do with account management processes. Not project management systems, not CRM systems, but having a dedicated system to guide the agency account management team, when it comes to managing and delve developing existing client relationships. Kapta is a key account management platform.
We chatted about:
– the importance of having a client development plan
– the value of running quarterly business reviews
– how to avoid client churn
– and also how account management’s going to evolve over the next three to five years.
I hope you enjoy my chat with Alex and you can check out the details for KAMCon on the website which is https://kapta.com/kamcon
A reminder also that my next Account Accelerator programme starts on 23rd of September. This is a transformational programme for agency account managers and account directors to take your agency from unpredictable project revenue to more predictable account growth. It’s a playbook for growing existing business, a step by step process and a toolbox of strategies that you can take back to your agency and apply.
On my Training page you’ll also find testimonials from account directors and account managers who’ve been through the programme.
Transcript:
Jenny 00:02
Today, I’m delighted to introduce Alex Raymond to the show. He is founder and CEO of Kapta. And Kapta is a key account management platform. So I’m really interested to hear all about Kapta. And also he runs a yearly KAMCon event. This is for key account managers. So I’m also going to talk about that later with Alex. So Alex, welcome to the show.
Alex 00:25
Great. Thanks, super to be here, Jenny.
Jenny 00:27
It’s lovely to see you. Alex, do you mind starting off by just spending a couple of minutes talking about you, your background and how Kapta perhaps helps the creative industry particularly?
Alex 00:41
So I’m based in Boulder, Colorado, which is a place where there’s a lot of interesting technology companies, there’s a lot of startup companies, it’s a real hive of activity. And that’s where Kapta was born. And Kapta, we have a very interesting story, we’re sort of in the account management space by accident. As often happens, when you’re building a company, and you’re trying to figure out a product, you start in one place and end up in another. And so our journey was we started building HR software several years ago, and that then migrated into account management. And the thing that was the same between the two and led us from one to the other was the tracking of goals and accountabilities. So you do it in HR to say, What did I tell my boss I was going to do, for example, right? So I said I was going to do this month, etc, etc. With the account management world, you do it based on the commitments you’re making to your customers. But it’s a very similar dynamic, I’m still creating a plan. I’m working toward that plan. I’m updating internal and external stakeholders, and all that sort of stuff. And so that’s the link between the two. So we’re literally here by accident, if you will, Jenny, but Kapta is as you were saying, it’s a software platform, specifically for the needs of key account managers. This is people who are responsible for retention and growth of their big customers. And a big customer is anyone who fits in that sort of 80/20 rule, you know, the small number of customers that make up a lot of your revenue and a lot of profits. And we’ve got a specialised tool that helps us understand, where are we? Which customers are healthy, which customers are at risk? Do we have plans in place? Are we communicating value back to the customer, all the stuff that’s really in the day to day of someone who’s in a role like account manager, customer engagement, client services, customer success is called lots of things but the the job is fairly similar. So that’s little about us and about Kapta.
Jenny 02:43
And just a little bit on you, Alex, because actually, I just noticed that you mentor other startup companies. So you’re a true entrepreneur in the tech space.
Alex 02:55
So we’ve been doing Kapta for several years, as part of that we were involved in a programme called TechStars, which is a really fantastic accelerator programme for young companies, ever since we finished that programme I’ve been involved in it as a mentor. So this is going back probably five years now. And I’ve probably mentored I don’t know, 30 or 40 companies during that time. So people who are trying to figure stuff out, or they have a specific question. And I bring my expertise, which is in software and technology, primarily, a lot of go to market and sales and that sort of thing, and sort of my area of expertise. So I spend a lot of time with companies who are trying to figure that out. It’s really fun. I’ve met some great people, it’s really something I enjoy tremendously.
Jenny 03:39
Amazing. And I love that you said that you started off in one sector and then pivoted, because you listen to the market, don’t you? And then you just go where the demand is. So typically for you, Alex, in the creative space, particularly what size business tends to work with you?
Alex 03:57
It can really be all over the map. We’ve worked with creative agencies that are small, like maybe five or 10 or 20 people, so they’re on the smaller end, we’ve worked with some that are a couple of 100. And it really doesn’t matter what the size is, because the problems are the same. And the biggest issue in the creative space is, do we understand our customers goals? And are we helping them to meet them? So you’re always making promises and commitments to your customers during the sales cycle when you’re starting a project when you’re doing a campaign and that sort of thing. And so, the thing that we emphasise a lot at Kapta is understanding really what the customer goals. And based on that, do I have a plan for how I’m going to help them be successful Now important, I’m not just talking here about the goals like I want x conversion rate or this many clicks or this many website visitors or whatever. That’s too granular. What we’re talking about is why did the client hire you. What are they really trying to accomplish? And often it’s a much bigger story. They’re trying to become a brand in a certain space, they’re trying to build up their credentials, or they’re trying to reach a new market or a new audience, or they want to move faster in product development, any of those types of things. And so, as account managers, we need to understand at a really deep level, what’s going on here? What are the triggers that my customer has to grow? And what what’s going to make the difference between them, keeping me around and having us continue to work with them versus choosing not to keep working with us? So that’s a churn scenario, right? So for creatives, no matter what size, the business is, we still have this problem of, Oh, you know, when I first talked to them, nine months ago, we talked about this and the other, but I didn’t write it down. I didn’t really communicate it to anybody. And now when I go back to the customer, I’m talking about things they don’t care about, right? And that’s a big No, no, that’s a huge problem for account managers, you got to focus on the customer, you got to understand their goals, their needs, their challenges. And that’s how you unlock that. And so, no matter the size, these are the things that we talked to folks about.
Jenny 06:11
Do you find that most agencies have maybe a CRM system that’s set up for kind of prospective clients, but then when it comes to existing clients, maybe their notes are, you know, taken maybe in a WhatsApp message or Excel spreadsheet? Is that is that why Kapta seems to have filled this gap?
Alex 06:30
Yeah, I mean, to put it, but in another way, it’s pretty much a mess. Most companies will have invested in some form of CRM or another. Sometimes it’s a big sophisticated package. Sometimes it’s something simple. And then they use that. And they use that for prospecting, and pipeline and lead generation and so on. And they do absolutely nothing when it comes to managing their customers, which when you think about it, is sort of crazy. So in the B2B world, 70% of your revenue every year comes from existing customers, only 30% comes with new customers. So you’d imagine that spending some time on that and some energy making that part of your business work would be really important for creatives and agency owners. And we find that it’s actually all over, people are using Excel spreadsheets, or project management tools, or all sorts of ad hoc systems to manage stuff, and they’re really not doing a great job of it which is why, by the way, you then have customer satisfaction issues, you have churn, you have customers not growing as fast as they could have. So we’re not meeting the full potential. And those are all symptomatic of the issue that we’re not doing a good job ourselves of managing our accounts.
Jenny 07:44
It’s so true, Alex, I’m just kind of racing in my mind thinking about the other systems a creative agency might have. And, you know, typically, you’d have a project management system that’s managing the project. But that doesn’t actually support the account manager in terms of understanding the client’s business. What did we talk about last time we spoke? What were the challenges then? And like you said, nine months later, the challenges have changed. So we were talking about the skills of an account manager as well understanding the client’s business is fundamental and key, What in your experience of coming across so many hundreds of account managers? What are the other kind of top skills that you think are essential for an account manager to have?
Alex 08:26
That’s a great question. There’s certainly, there are certainly three that I think are really critical. And so let me go through those. The first is being strategic and not tactical. So a lot of times the account managers absorb stuff from the customer. They’re constantly fielding questions and doing stuff. They’re answering really little things, or they’re chasing down paperwork, or they’re really busy. And you get to tactical when you do that. And when you get so tactical than then customer sees you as a tactical resource, they see you as a support resource, they see you, someone like that, who’s not adding a tonne of value. So the first skill you want to get is how can I be more strategic, which is to your point, really deeply understanding the customer? Who are they? Where are they going? What’s their industry look like? How can we their peers or other companies in this cohort, you know, that sort of thing. So think strategically about the customer, which can also mean that we are building account plans, for example, we’re looking at the org chart to understand who’s who are the relationship map, who’s who within the organisation. So those are critical things. So want to be strategic and not tactical, too many people fall in the trap of being tactical. Another trap they fall into is being reactive. So I’m always on the backfoot with the customer. I’m always playing defence, as opposed to being proactive. So a skill set for being proactive, is to think about the client and then say, Well, how can I help move them forward? What are the one or two things I can do today right now that are going to help them and therefore help our relationship and eventually help me as well. So proactivity means anticipating your customer’s needs bringing parallels or ideas or insights, where they may not have seen them, drawing on your own repository of knowledge, or really getting out there being and good communicator. So being more strategic, being more proactive, and the last one I mentioned, is executive presence. So this is the ability to sit down with a chief marketing officer, chief brand officer, someone senior and experienced at your customer and have a good conversation with them, and talk to them about what matters to them, and what’s on their plate, and what are their initiatives and that sort of thing, and maintain a dialogue or conversation in a way that makes you look like a trusted adviser, and not just another vendor. Especially in the agency world, there lots of agencies very competitive space, it’s hard to differentiate, well guess what you can differentiate by the conversations you have, by the insights you bring, by the way you project yourself. So those are three things, be more strategic, be more proactive and work on executive presence, those things can really, really help an account manager no matter where they are in their career journey.
Jenny 11:15
Do you know what, as you’re saying that I think you’re absolutely spot on. And sometimes I meet account managers who their business structure is against them. So for example, they are doing the hybrid role of a project manager role delivering, having to be responsive versus also looking for growth opportunities, adding value being more strategic. So sometimes I’ve found that the business model is against them. Have you found that typically with creative agencies? Or do you find that a lot of agencies separate those two functions?
Alex 11:47
This simply comes down to the CEO, Managing Director, executive team. How well do they understand the power of true customer engagement? How well do they understand the growth, the profitability, the expansion opportunities that exist by doing a really good job of being customer centric, and for the people who don’t get it, then everything is a secondary thought. Account managers are sort of smushed in with all the other roles, and you’ve got to do three or four things, and, therefore, you’re not really effective at any of them. It’s hard to multitask as, as an account manager it’s hard to do multiple things. So if at the senior level that people who own and run the agency, understand that my path of success goes straight through existing customer relationships and the potential to make them as significant as possible, then they’ll understand and they’ll have resource appropriately, which which would mean separating out the roles of PM versus AM or CSM or KAM, whatever you call it inside your business, really making a very clear distinction there. And also the distinction between new business acquisition, so totally net new, and expansion and retention of existing. And once you get up to, it’s not a very high threshold, once you once you’re at maybe 5 million or even less in revenue, you want to start making those changes. So you want to have someone who protects and defends the existing customers and grows them, you want to have someone chasing the business.
And of course, you need a delivery team, and create the creatives and all that stuff, doing the actual work. So you do want to start to see those roles specialise as you, as you get above, you know, at the very minimum 5 million if not smaller,
Jenny 13:35
So true. The thing that you mentioned about executive presence, you mentioned if you’re having the right conversations, you understand the client’s business, you’re asking the right questions to uncover the challenges. You project yourself as someone that’s a lot more senior that kind of gets it as commercially minded. Are there any other tips that you would share anything that you’ve come across that would help someone that’s maybe listening to this thinking? You know, I would feel quite nervous about talking to the CMO, for example, because I feel maybe I’m too young, maybe I haven’t been in my role long enough. Anything that you’ve come across that you could share that might help them?
Alex 14:11
My friend, Jermaine Edwards, who I think you probably also know, he gave me a great quote on this one day when I was chatting with him. He said, you know in my experience, especially when it comes to these sort of sales and customer interactions, he says, you get sent to who you sound like. And what that means is if you’re running around talking about what colour’s the button, and how do we increase our conversion rate by point 01 percent and the copy, then guess what, that’s where you get sent. If on the other hand, you’re talking about strategies and goals and big picture stuff and headwinds and tailwinds and industry changes, then you get to talk to the senior people. And so remember that you get sent to who you sound like because It’s true. And when it comes to that, and
if you want to elevate your game if you want to talk and be confident in front of those people, one of the most powerful tools by far that if your audience isn’t doing this Jenny, then I really want them to start doing it is conducting voice of customer interviews. Okay, so voice of customer interview. First, this is not a CSAT, or NPS discussion. That’s not what I’m talking. Voice of customer interview is, let’s say we had that mythical opportunity got 20 minutes with the CMO, what do we do? What do we talk about? So we’re really thoughtful in our approach to a VOC, voice of customer interview. And we want to walk that mythical mile in their shoes, so to speak. And so to do this, we just really put ourselves in, what’s their perspective? How do we learn from them the best? And you ask some really thoughtful questions.
It’s things like, what’s coming up for you in the next 12 to 24 months, questions like that? It’s a very simple and easy question. But it gets them talking about things that they care about. So you’re learning from the customer and their words and their language, what they care about, you can also ask a real softball, which is, we’ve been working together now for the last six months, or whatever it is, you know, what made you buy from us? What made you think that we might be the best partner company out there for you. And you’ll again, start to hear in their words, what they like, what they don’t like, that sort of a thing. A similar question, just to give your audience some really specific tools here. So a similar question would be, how do you want to work with partners like us? This is about the relationship. So how do we work together? Are we simply in some cases, all we do is we send you a weekly or monthly report. And that’s fine, because that’s what you want. And that’s how this relationship is going to work. Others are going to say, I want you to come in and brief me on best practices in the industry and competition. Some are going to say I want you to work with this group, and this group, that sort of thing. But you ask, how do you want to work with partners like us? And here’s the other thing you could do, you’re inserting the word partner into that question. So you’re planting the seed that you are a partner, you’re not a vendor? And then the last question, when you’re doing the voice of customer, this is a little more advanced.
So it takes some guts to ask this question. But once you warm up, and you’ve done this a few times, you can start to ask it, you ask the future close question. And that question is basically, so Jenny, if we were to project out two or three years from now, and I was coming back to you with a renewal order, how would you decide whether to stick with us as a partner or not. And so what you’re doing is you’re asking about their mindset, their goalposts, their milestones, and really how they make decisions. And they might tell you immediately, well, as long as you know, x, y, and z happens, then you’re good. Or they may say, I don’t know let me think about it. Whatever it is, you start to get insights into how decisions get made, so that you can bring the resources, you can bring your whole intelligence to that experience, and how you can improve with the customer. So those are just some examples of voice of customer, but I’m telling you, as an account manager, you just pick up the habit of doing these, and you do them, you just make it kind of loose and casual. So you’re just having a conversation, you’re not showing up with a survey, you’re not writing stuff down, you’re not scoring them, you’re just remembering to ask those handful of questions, you’ll really see that relationships sort of escalate.
Jenny 18:40
Thank you so much for sharing those tips. Alex, they were fantastic questions. I love all of the questions. Brilliant. And I think this is really useful. It’s tactical stuff that people can put into place straightaway. And as you say, it almost projects a level of confidence, the fact that you’re asking the questions, and it allows the client to then paint the picture of what they see as success, because to assume is just not a good way forward. So love that. Alex, thank you so much for sharing. Going back to that kind of having that future focus. I know that you ran a whole session on how to conduct a quarterly business review. And you ran a webinar, I think it was packed full of value. So would you mind sharing a few tips around running a quarterly business review successfully for us?
Alex 19:31
QBRs or EBRs are now what they’re called, it’s a big topic in the account management world. And a lot of people have some uncertainty or some caution about how to run them and they’re not always run very well. I’ve seen a lot of them. And, typically the mistakes are things like they’re always backward looking. Well, here’s what we did in the past. And here’s what we did three months ago or six months ago that’s a big mistake. They’re always backward looking. Another thing that happens is that they’re basically just turned into these really micro lists of all the stuff that I did. I did this and this, and this, and this, and this, and the team did this, and this, and this. And it’s not interesting for most executives. They think that Well, yeah, I mean, I’ve been paying you money, I expect you to have been doing things. So it’s not that. it’s really, what you want to do in a QBR is you want to link your partnership back to what you know about the customer and to what they’re trying to accomplish. So what are the desired outcomes that they have through working with us, just like I was just talking about with the goals and understanding their customers goals. And so if you can start to link in your QBRs, back to their desired outcomes, then you’re talking in the customers language. So they start to hear you and oh, yeah, this is all stuff that resonates with me. So they, what do they do then, they relax. And they focus because they hear that you’re there to help them. So what are their desired outcomes? Where have we been plus where are we going? So QBR is a great place to insert some of those voice of customer questions. Especially we’re coming out now from this, you know, 18 month pandemic, and so much has changed and has been so much going on. It’s a great time to insert questions like, what are your plans after we make this transition? For example, and you get them talking? The other mistake that people make with QBRs is they assume that they have to do all the presenting themselves. That I’m showing up, therefore, I have to consume 59 minutes and 59 seconds of the hour talking. And in reality, the most valuable QBRs are the ones where it’s a conversation. So here’s where I think we’re going based on our previous conversations. Do you agree, Mr. Customer, Madam customer, whatever. What else don’t I see here? What are my blind spots? How else can I be of service to you and your team? So you’re inserting questions to make it about both of you.
The other thing that people do, who are really good, the black belts at QBR is what they do, Jenny, is they’ll actually co-opt someone from the customer side, to co present and co own the meeting. So I’m not just showing up and presenting to the CMO, I’ve got the director of digital advertising, whoever the person is and we’re co presenting, we prepare the agenda, we prepared the deck, we prepared everything together, we’re getting the right people in the room. And then that’s about a partnership. And so that’s a very effective thing. So don’t make the mistake when you’re doing your QBR. When your boss says, hey, did you do your QBRs this quarter, don’t make the mistake of ‘I’ve got to set these up and I’ve got to talk for an hour. It’s just me doing them. And I have to just talk, talk, talk, talk.’ No, think about the format. Think about getting other people involved. Think about asking questions. Some of this does take some maturity and competence to do it properly. But you know, you do it once or twice, you’ll get the hang of it, it’s not that big of a deal. And your EBRs and QBRs will be much more effective as a result.
Jenny 23:05
I love that. Thank you so much, again, for sharing. I mean, I always believe that if you don’t make that QBR valuable, then they’re going to be unlikely to want to book it in again. So in a way the pressure is on you. I mean, A it elevates you above this kind of day to day, reactive order taker kind of role, and allows you to see the bigger strategic picture. But also, if you’re not bringing to that meeting, something the client didn’t know, maybe you’ve done a little bit of research among their competitors, their customers, the market trends and how it’s changing, then what value is it? Because like you said, if it’s all kind of backward looking, it’s not valuable, it’s not interesting. So I think that’s spot on, actually. You also, you’ve run another webinar, I know how much education you do in the account management space, those keep them coming out Alex because this is really good stuff. You also you talked about client churn. And again, I would love to hear some maybe insights or key takeaways from your webinar that you did around how to avoid client churn.
Alex 24:07
Yeah, so the churn webinar was really interesting, because we had a lot of research when we were preparing it. And there’s a lot of sort of fluff out there about churn or why clients churn, a lot of content that’s not meaningful, it’s not effective that you can’t do anything with. We came up with a model that we called the Zen of churn and we use an iceberg to describe the Zen of churn and the Zen of churn essentially has three levels to it. The iceberg is a good analogy, there’s the surface stuff and is what really, what really can hurt your boat. So, the three levels of Zen of churn first, it’s just that basic, well, it’s about my product or my service. Whatever the customer bought my ‘thing’, quote, unquote, didn’t work for them. And so, you know, no matter what I’m doing, it’s not a good fit for me. They don’t like my ‘thing’ be it product, service, whatever it is, and therefore they’re going to drop me. So that’s the big, that’s the most surface level. I don’t think that really applies so much to your audience, because it’s mainly for software companies or technology companies, people like that. So the idea is I have a value proposition and the customer buys off my value proposition it doesn’t really 100% work for them. And so they’re out. That’s the first level. And that’s the one that almost everybody’s taught. The second level down is, customers are churning because I’m not providing good service. I’m not doing QBRs , I’m not doing the things I need to do to maintain the relationships. And so really, the hole or the gap is with my account management, team or function or approach or strategy. And so I feel that in by getting better at account management, or doing training or buying software like Kapta, and using that, something like that. So it’s a little bit deeper than just they don’t like my product or service, it’s really the team is not properly equipped to do this stuff. But what I argue is that there’s a more fundamental reason that customers churn, and if you can solve this one, everything else is going to take care of itself. And the deeper reason is, your customers are leaving you because you don’t understand what they’re trying to accomplish. Your clients are leaving you because you’re not customer centric. And for most people, it’s very offensive to tell them that. They say oh my website says I’m customer centric, and my boss says I’m customer centric. So how can you accuse me of not being customer centric. But here’s what we know, if you can’t tell me literally at the drop of a hat, what are the top three reasons this customer bought from me, then you’re not customer centric. If you don’t have a visual org chart, here’s who the customer is, here’s where all the people are, then you’re not customer centric. If you haven’t built a SWOT analysis on your biggest two or three customers, then you’re not really customer centric, you’re not thinking enough about them. And if you’re not tying back everything you’re doing to your customer goals, and you’re not living customers centricity, you fix that problem, you’ll fix the other problems. And so don’t worry about this surface stuff, my product doesn’t work, my service doesn’t work, or they don’t like my account managers. That’s not stuff that’s going to make a big impact on your business, the biggest impact will be Can we change our mindset to be truly customer oriented, instead of falling in the trap of always being self centred.
Jenny 27:36
I suppose this is also where Kapta helps because you often have a separate new business team don’t use that initially talks to the client, or the prospective client finds out so much more about them. And then you have this pass over to the account management team that kick things off, do an onboarding, but are they really digging deep to find out what were the original reasons that they bought into us in the first place? And so there’s probably that gap in many instances, not always, but where it needs to be more seamless, because like you said, people buy for their reasons, not yours.
Alex 28:15
There’s a couple of really critical points. So that handoff between sales and account management is critical. It’s often a big source of friction. And the handoff is usually not very great. And so that’s something that you want to really fix. So we try to say what data do we already have that we can start to view. But then importantly, the account manager has to validate all that stuff, make sure it’s still true. And so what people are missing the most here is as it relates to, when I’ve talked to agency owners, or I talk to prospective or existing clients at Kapta that what they’re most missing is a guide, or a roadmap on how to do this. But I might have, I might have some general idea, I might have some experience that I picked up over my career, but I don’t have a guide or roadmap. And so that’s what we’re providing it’s a template, like literally like just step by step by step, what do I need to do to elevate my game to be a good or great accountant. And so that’s what we’re doing. So some of that is customer information. Some of that is the templates on building engagement plans or account plans. Some of that is doing some of the blocking and tackling stuff like voice of customer and SWOTs and org charts, etc. But the whole idea is you create a template because everyone’s so busy. They don’t have time to work on stuff that’s not important. They don’t have time to work on stuff that’s unstructured. And they want to understand show me exactly the route to success. And so that’s sort of what we’ve built into the Kapta approach.
Jenny 29:43
It’s fantastic. Really, really good. You’ve been working now. I mean, how long have you had Kapta? Is that seven years? Like in the last year obviously so much has changed for all of us with the situation. Can you say can you tell us what trends have you seen among the account management community? Anything that’s really marked a difference in how an account manager operates now?
Alex 30:10
I mean, there’s was much pressure on account managers when COVID hit because all of it, remember I said before 70% of your business comes from existing customers, 30% comes from new, well guess what, in the first six months of the pandemic, nothing new happened. So everyone’s business went from 100 to 70. Because then the focus came on protecting and defending that existing customer base. So the account managers had a tonne, all of a sudden on their shoulders, a lot of pressure, a lot of stuff that they had to be working on. And most of them found themselves without the support, without the tools, without the guides, without the knowledge they needed to do so. So there was admittedly a lot of scrambling to make things happen around that time. Now obviously, the pandemic has shifted and lots has changed. But at the very beginning, it was, hey, how do we just make sure that customers don’t walk out the door. And that was the priority number one for everybody, no matter what industry you’re in, no matter what size company you are, that it was the priority. So it puts a tonne of pressure on them to go out there and make things happen. And a lot of stress and burnout as a result in the community.
Jenny 31:16
I think that’s exactly what it’s been mirrored for me as well. And also, again, everything went remote all of a sudden, and clients initially, I don’t know whether you saw this trend or not. But clients initially were kind of a little bit more available, because there was this new situation where they were at home. But then very quickly, it changed almost like 180 degrees, where people were Zoomed out, they were overworking because there was kind of not that structure. So I don’t know what you’re seeing now. But I’m seeing clients less available. But obviously, we’re now thinking about returning to the office. So there’s this whole shift as well, because it’s basically a moving feast, isn’t it?
Alex 31:57
It is and it was easier to talk to people at the beginning and then it got much harder. But come back to what I was saying about you get sent to who you sound like so if you are valuable, then customers will find the time to talk to you. If you want to talk about the colour of the button or the font that you’re using on some website, they’re probably not going to spend a lot of time. So that’s the trick is as an account manager, can you project that level of partnership to the client takes your calls, and they want to talk to you because they know you’re there to help?
Jenny 32:29
I think it comes back to because I know a lot of account manager think, Oh, I just need to pick up the phone more to say or Hi, how’s it going? But actually, people don’t have time for that anymore? What are you bringing to me that’s going to be interesting, valuable, it’s going to help me understand something I didn’t understand before. And it goes back to what you said at the beginning, which was about productivity. It’s about being aware of the business goal the clients trying to achieve. It’s about understanding the marketplace, what’s shifting, what opportunity could I bring to them that they haven’t thought of, or that’s going to support their goals? So that proactivity piece is really key. What else do you find that account managers struggle with when it comes to client relationships and developing business?
Alex 33:17
Well, one of the things I’ll talk about here is account plans. So a lot of account managers struggle with account plans. And a very common scenario, you go to the Kapta website and someone sees Oh, they do account planning, automated account plans, and they think that’s what I need. I need automated account plan. And they call us up and they say, I just want that. And I’ll ask an obvious question, or you know, whoever we’re talking to will ask an obvious question. So what are your account plans look like today? And then they say, well, we don’t really do them today. And this and the other, you know, it’s some excuse. And this is something that’s a personal kind of soapbox issue of mine. But let me put it this way. Not building account plans is a choice. If you’re not doing account plans, so anyone who’s listening to this to this podcast, if you’re not doing proactive strategic account plans today, it’s not because you don’t have the right technology. It’s not because your team doesn’t know how to do it, it’s not because you don’t have the right people. Whatever excuse you’re making up is not true. It’s because you’ve chosen not to do account plans. And so you’ve got to take responsibility for that. If you want to change that, then start doing account plans. You can start on the back of a napkin, you can start in Excel, you can do it on a piece of paper, you can do it in PowerPoint. It doesn’t matter. You don’t need something fancy like Kapta to do it. It’ll help but it’s not required. And so a lot of people they’re willing to, they just sort of flop around right and say, Oh, account plans, I could never do that it sounds so complicated, and this and the other, and then they wonder why customers are leaving, why the C scores are low, why they’re not growing their account why the business isn’t growing organically and all this kind of stuff. And it comes down to that. So a lot of times it’s a conversation about, are you willing to do this? What’s the commitment that you’re making around it? Now the benefits of doing account plans are astoundingly clear. You’re going to be sharper, you’re going to have better focus, you’re going to be a better partner to your customer, you’re going to find new opportunities, you’re going to see new risks, you’re going to drive more revenue, we know those to be true. And so today, there is a little bit of laziness, I hope this doesn’t offend your listening audience. If you’re not doing account plans, you’re stuck in a laziness trap. And that is going to hurt you eventually.
Jenny 35:41
I agree. 100%, obviously, I mean, you’re right. I mean, when people think of account plans, they think of maybe putting hours and hours into this really elaborate document, that then once they’ve done it, they think, phew, now I can get back to my day job. And that kind of sits on a shelf until the next six months. So you look at it again. And for that reason, I’ve got a very succinct kind of client development plan template, which again, is like three pages, it’s just well, three slides. So it’s not even pages, it’s just, this is what we need to know, if someone tapped you on the shoulder and said, right, tell me about your client, you should be able to go boom, boom, boom. And actually, maybe the research initially or finding out that information might take a little bit of time. But actually, you need something that’s going to help you on a day to day basis that you can refer back to and to make sure you’re on track. So I like that you’re having a rant about Alex, I think you’re spot on really.
Alex 36:31
Well, another thing to add, there is part of your job as an account manager is to be an evangelist inside your company, for your customer, you’ve got to be their champion, and you can’t be an effective champion, if you don’t have some critical knowledge of that. So like the template that you were just talking about, if you don’t have those basics, you’re not doing your job of championing customers inside your organisation.
Jenny 36:54
I think also, my mind’s racing about all of the clients that I have all my account managers that have been through my Account Accelerator programme, some of them and again, I think this is down to the structure have multiple clients, probably too many clients. A, they might not be categorising them in the first place. So they don’t really know what a platinum client looks like, or a bronze client. But B it might be just the structure of the way the business is run, that they’re just spread too thin. So again, I think that’s a consideration. You want to set up your account managers for success, either by helping them prioritise or by, you know, structuring it so that they’re working on the business that allows them to have that headspace, because I know in the States, I mean, when I was at Publicis, the States used to have several people working on one client, it was just dedicated. But in Europe, and the UK tends to be across several. But I love I love that I think, where are you going to go if you haven’t got a plan. So making the plan,
Alex 37:55
Segmentation is really important. So that’s, that’s kind of what you’re referring to here, about prioritising accounts. And the thing that I was like to share on that is, people always go for the basics of prioritising based on revenue. And that’s one part of it, but it’s not the full picture. And if you want to really do segmentation properly, you’ve got to look at other things. So you’ve got to look at revenue, you got to look at profitability, gross margin per account as well and figure out what’s there. But you also want to look at some of the qualitative or softer elements here things like customer fit, right? How good is the fit with the customer potential. So what’s the potential for this company, maybe it’s a small one to begin with, or it’s a land and expand kind of programme or something like that. So what’s the potential for it to grow. And then another one that I always like to ask is about commitment. So there’s their joint commitment on both sides if this is a real partnership that we’re willing to invest in. And so when you start to segment looking at all those other elements, you’re really going to get a clearer picture. And like you’re saying, in some cases, just the dynamics of the business mean, I have a lot of accounts, I’ve got 10, or 15, or 25, or sometimes even more customers, it’s very hard to be strategic with that number. And in some cases, it’s no, I just have one account, I only look after one really big customer. And that’s my job. So the segmentation process is part of your account management strategy. And you need to look at more than just revenue, because revenue is only telling you one side of the story.
Jenny 39:21
I’m glad you said that, actually, because recently, I’ve been talking to a number of agencies who have actually resigned their accounts because quite frankly, it was always going to be hard. You know, maybe they came down on them originally from a procurement perspective and kind of squeezed them dry. There was no profit in the business, or just simply that the teams that they’ve had to work with have been just butting heads and they’re difficult to work with. So I think that’s great, actually, that you’ve mentioned, it’s not just about revenue, it’s about cultural fit. It’s about us wanting to grow with with that company. So lovely, lovely point
Alex 39:54
Partnership is a two way street.
Jenny 39:56
Totally. Tell me about your thoughts on how you think account management is going to be evolving over the next kind of three to five years.
Alex 40:08
There’s a lot of there’s a lot of interesting material here. There’s a lot of thought. And some of this, if I may, is that that we cover at KAMCon So KAMCon is our event, we’re doing it this September 9th, it’s a Thursday we’re doing it in central London, and KAMCon is a vehicle for us to explore things like this, like what’s coming up? What’s the state of the art? What’s the newest thinking as it relates to account management. And so we’re going run this event, I’m super excited about it. We can, all your audience can find more about KAMCon on Kapta website. But to answer your specific question, one of the most exciting things that we’re starting to see is, how I get deeper into a partnership with my customer. And this could be called extra prize selling. So selling outside of the enterprise and into my customer, and even into their customer base, it could be called customer transformation. So that’s another one of these topics or it could be called joint success, or mutual success. Or even some people are calling it co value creation, and co value creation and all of these look at not just I’m here selling my thing to you, they’re also looking at how I can then take that to a third customer. So the customers customer, how we can make things a win for me win for you, and a win for your clients. And part of what you need to do when you’re thinking about that is say, first recognise, everybody has a customer. Internal customer, external, everybody has a customer, how can I show up and not just solve the specific problem that’s in front of me or what I’m hearing, but bring additional value. And so cocreation, customer transformation is the same idea, which is really show up, be creative, add value, think about the ultimate problem that’s being manifest here, not just what you’re hearing or the small slice that’s visible to you. So what does it mean? Well, it takes a lot of work, it takes a lot of creativity, it takes a lot of thoughtfulness and planning, and you got to spend some time really working this out. But if you do that, in the case of your clients, that’s the difference between $100,000 deal and a $5 million deal. And it could be the same time it takes the same amount of time for the customer to sign off on it, same person signing your contract, but it’s a 50x difference to you in terms of the perceived and received value. And so those sorts of conversations are super exciting. And we’re going to like, like I said, that’s going to be a topic at KAMCon, for sure. Something we’re talking a lot about. And I think there’s a lot of potential for people to really expand these customer relationships.
Jenny 42:57
Love that. Have your customers customer in mind. So how can I bring value not just to my client, but also how can I help my clients help their customer? So there’s lots of different ways of doing this isn’t there, my mind’s kind of racing now, just thinking of it, just tiny examples of that, where I had a performance marketing agency who were working with a business park, where their customers were people that are going to rent space. And so they decided, because these were all mostly small to medium sized businesses themselves, how they could run a joint educational programme all around how performance marketing works for their customers. Gets you in front of their customer base, adds value to the clients customer, etc. So that’s one tiny idea. But I’m, I know that if you, you have the headspace by attending an event like KAMcon, you could probably come up with 1,000,001 thinking about your own customers. So tell us a bit more about this event, because I know you’ve been running it for several years. I’m sorry, I couldn’t speak at it this year, thank you so much for asking me.
Alex 44:06
I’m sorry the timing didn’t work out. We’d love to have you at one in the future. This is our third year doing KAMcon, we’ve done it. We did it in 2018, 2019 took a break in 2020 for obvious reasons. And this is the first time we’re doing it in London. So in the past, we’ve done them in Boulder, Colorado. And you know, the reason that we’re coming to London is Kapta has a number of customers in the UK. And so we’re able to see then build relationships and also hear their stories. So several of them are coming to talk which is going to be great. But on top of that there’s just so much interest in so much commitment to the KAM and customer engagement community in London. And so it really allows us to bring that together ii to host the conversation. You know, I always say we don’t have all the answers, but we can create the space where everyone comes to talk about this stuff. And so we’re going to be going over, you know all the account management basics QBRs and account plans and voice of customer and relationship management and stuff like that. And we’re going to be learning both from KAM experts and from KAM practitioners. So the experts are going to be people that you know that I know people like Jermaine Edwards, David Ventura, Warwick Brown, these people who are really like they’ve been in they’re coaches, they’re consultants, they’re experts, and they’re going to be sharing their expertise. And then on top of that, we’re going to have the practitioners who have done this and who have run KAM programmes and sort of gone through the whole life cycle of selling this internally and setting up the programme. And they’ll be sharing what they learned, and unforeseen positive outcomes, unforeseen negative outcomes, all that kind of stuff. The idea when I talk about KAMCon is, there’s no time for basics. This is a one day thing, there’s no fluff, there’s no surface level stuff, we’re all going to just go jump in the deep end of the pool. And that’s where we’re going to spend the day. And so it’s really meant for people who are trying to solve this problem trying to get their heads around it, who wants specific actionable tips and tricks that they can just take and immediately go implement within their business. So it’s September 9, it’s in Chancery Lane, right downtown London, it’s going to be great event. Small, we’re capping it at 75 people, we like to keep them small so it’s easy to talk and network and, and meet people and so on. We’re almost at that number, which is great. So I’m really excited.
Jenny 46:28
Yeah. Amazing. It sounds so valuable, and actually having an account management community that you can tap into, and like you said, people have trodden the boards before they they’ve made the mistakes so that you don’t have to. So it sounds hugely valuable. And I know, so many people have said, so many good things about previous years. So I’m sure the one in London for the first time it’s going to be superb. I’m just sorry, I can’t make it this time. So Alex, tell us, I mean, thank you, first of all, for sharing so much value. This has been brilliant. I know that I’m sure a lot of people are taking notes, to some of those, particularly those questions that you used, I think they’re really fantastic. Any pieces of advice and maybe a subject that we haven’t covered that you think would be useful for the account management community?
Alex 47:11
I think the most important thing is to keep investing in yourself. I recognise one of the things that I learned early in this account management journey that I’ve been on is how little training and skill building, the typical account management team gets, it’s basically usually zero. And so they’re often invited to sit at the back of the room during the sales training, and they get some product and service training or some really specialties stuff, but they get no account management training. And so my advice and one of the things I really encourage everyone to do is invest in yourself and invest in your skills. That could be through your programmes, Jenny, which are fantastic, it could be simply picking up some of the great books that have been written on this topic, it could be brand capital, we also have a lot of resources and blog articles and stuff like that on the site, you know, anything that you can do to elevate yourself and to make yourself a more effective and a more powerful account manager is something that’s going to help. And so I’m always really impressed when I talked to an account manager and they say, Oh, you know, I read this book, and I watch this thing. And I did this course, and so on. It really is the case where people have got to seek it out for themselves. Because unfortunately, you know, a lot of training programmes, bypass account managers there simply there isn’t a lot out there. So the work that you’re doing is helping to grow this community as well. The work that Kapta is doing in growing the community, the work that KAMCon is growing the community, anything like that. So for your audience, first listen to your podcast, which is a great start, check out the books, check out the resources, both you and I we’ve got lists of our favourite books, our favourite resources, all that kind of stuff. So that’s what I encourage everyone to do is to take responsibility for their own personal and career development in this area. Because there’s a lot of opportunity if you get this right now there’s really such an opportunity for people who are dedicated and committed to themselves into their customers to go out there and really shine very brightly.
Jenny 49:05
I think that’s super advice. I really do. Invest in yourself, because that’s only going to accelerate your career, accelerate your success. Alex just finally, any kind of top books that you were just off the top of your head, you’d say top three books recommend.
Alex 49:19
I read, I read a lot. I read a tonne of books and a couple that I’ve been very much enjoying these days. One of the foundational ones for account managers is the Large Account Management Process by Miller and Heiman and so these are the people who started the company, Miller Heiman. It’s a great book. It’s not new. It was written a while ago, but very foundational, really fundamental type of stuff. So that’s one that I highly encourage everyone to check out. Another one that I’ve been reading and enjoying lately is a book called Megadeals. This is by a company called Megadeals. They’re based in Sweden. And this is all about kind of how to crack open really, really significant opportunities from your customer and the work that goes into that. So Megadeals is just a fascinating, really interesting one. And then on a personal note, I’ll just say, the book that to me sort of ends all books. And if you only read one book in your life, read The Untethered Soul by Michael Singer. It is has nothing to do with account management or sales or business, but it has everything to do with you, and the journey that you’re on as you go through life. And I read that for the first time a couple of years ago, and just literally has changed my outlook on life.
Jenny 50:33
Wow. Okay, so I haven’t read either of those, any of those books. So like, they’re going straight on my Audible list. Thank you so much, Alex. This has been superb, I will make sure that we include the link to find out more about KAMcon, to Kapta and to all of your resources that you mentioned. So once again, thank you so much for joining me. This has been superb.
Alex 50:55
Super great. Glad to be here. Thanks for everything that you’re doing for the community.
Jenny 51:00
Thank you.
