Donna Glidden
Research Director, Vendor Management
Info-Tech Research Group

• Understand how important your account is to the vendor and how it is classified.
• Understand how informed the account team is about your company and your industry.
• Understand how long the team has been with the vendor. Have they been around long enough to have developed a “brand” or trust within their organization?
• Understand and manage the relationships and influence the account team has within your organization to maintain control of the relationship.

• The vendor account team “came with the deal.”
• The vendor account team has limited training and experience.
• The vendor account team has close relationships within your organization outside of Procurement.
• Managing your organization’s vendors is ad hoc and there is no formalized process for vendors to follow.
• Your market position with the vendor is not optimal.

• Establish a repeatable, consistent vendor management process that focuses on the account team to maintain control of the relationship and drive the results you need.
• Create a questionnaire for gaining stakeholder feedback to evaluate the account team on a regular basis.
• Consider adding a vendor rules of engagement exhibit to your contracts and RFXs.

IT Benefits

• Clear lines of communication
• Correct focus on the specific needs of IT
• More accurate project scoping
• Less time wasted

Mutual IT and
Business Benefits

• Reduced time to implement
• Improved alignment between IT & business
• Improved vendor performance
• Improved vendor relations

Business Benefits

• Clear relationship guidelines based on mutual understanding
• Improved communications between the parties
• Mutual understanding of roles/goals
• Measurable relationship criteria

• Track vendor contacts with your organization.
• Qualify the account team as you would the vendor:
  • Background
  • Client experience
• Consider including vendor rules of engagement as part of your RFP process.
• How does the vendor team classify your potential account?

• Set expectations with the account team for the ongoing relationship.
• Include a vendor rules of engagement exhibit in the contract.
• Depending on your classification of the vendor, establish appropriate account team deliverables, meetings, etc.

• “Evalu-rate” your account team by using a stakeholder questionnaire to gain measurable feedback.
• Identify the desired improvements in communications and service delivery.
• Use positive reinforcements that result in positive behavior.

Don’t forget to look at your organization’s role in how well the account team is able to perform to your expectations.

Measure to manage – what are the predetermined criteria that you will measure the account team’s success against?

• According to Forbes (2012), 55% of salespeople lack basic sales skills.
• 58% of buyers report that sales reps are unable to answer their questions effectively.
• According to a recent survey, 84% of all sales training is lost after 90 days. This is due to the lack of information retention among sales personnel.
• 82% of B2B decision-makers think sales reps are unprepared.
• At least 50% of prospects are not a good fit for the product or service that vendors are selling (Sales Insights Lab).
• It takes ten months or more for a new sales rep to be fully productive.

(Source: Spotio)

Info-Tech Insight

Remember to examine the inadequacies of vendor training as part of the root cause of why the account team may lack substance.

Why it matters

1.8 years

is the average tenure for top ten tech companies

2.6 years is the average experience required to hire.

2.4 years is the average account executive tenure.

44% of reps plan to leave their job within two years.

The higher the average contract value, the longer the tenure.

More-experienced account reps tend to stay longer.