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Set up your sales process first, and then design software to support it.

A big challenge faced by many EMS marketers is getting leads for new business. Obtaining lists of names is not difficult. There are databases, industry networking groups, marketing channels, research reports and the institutional knowledge of a range of experienced sales representatives. The real challenge is obtaining the names of decision-makers who are in a selection mode and willing to evaluate that particular EMS company. Much like the quest for the Holy Grail, EMS marketers often search for the perfect list.

The primary difference between EMS sales and other types of business-to-business sales is frequency of purchase decisions. While some large multinational OEMs are constantly in some in level of EMS selection, many OEMs go through sharply defined selection cycles that identify a cluster of approved EMS providers every few years. From the outside, it appears those companies are continually awarding projects, but the pool competing for those projects may be broadened only every few years.

Additionally, the field of EMS providers is broad and the vast majority of companies fail to uniquely "sell" their services. Evaluating EMS providers is labor-intensive and costly. Consequently, even a team in selection mode may be unresponsive to a sales pitch from a company they feel is comparable to companies already under evaluation. This lack of responsiveness can vary from simply ignoring marketing attempts to actually telling a salesperson that the OEM does not outsource or that the respondent is not part of the decision team.

Finally, some selection teams develop preconceived opinions about the value of a given class of EMS providers or may have developed opinions about a specific EMS provider based on outdated experiences.

In these examples, an EMS provider without an existing relationship may find the door closed because the name on the list is unwilling to review materials or schedule a sales call. The issue is not a bad list; rather, it is bad timing or unmotivated prospects.

At the same time, the average mid-tier EMS provider typically has a field of 500 to 800 possible accounts scattered all over the regions they support. Tier 1 EMS providers and regionally focused smaller EMS providers have a smaller number of likely best-fit accounts because their screening criteria may eliminate accounts based on project size (either minimum or maximum size), desired capabilities or location. These accounts are continuously cycling in and out of selection mode.

As a result, timing calls based on salesperson knowledge of selection decisions is difficult. An all-too-common sales story goes like this: "I was in that account six months ago and they said they weren't outsourcing. Now they've handed a project to Company XYZ - I can't believe they didn't call me when they started quoting. We are better than that company." Company XYZ may not have been the best qualified, but won it either because they built a relationship that ensured a place on the bid list or they simply managed to put the right message in front of the right decision-maker at the right time.

Covering the likely target market through sales calls alone can be cost-prohibitive, since clients may be scattered over a wide geography. It becomes important to have a system that generates "intelligence" about where salespeople are best placed based on prospect level of interest. Poorly timed long-distance sales calls can easily run several thousand dollars a month in a mid-tier EMS provider.

Developing a qualified database of decision teams and providing some level of marketing communications on a regular basis creates a pool of prospects whose level of interest is built over time. Often, purchased databases or reports are the easiest way to build an internal prospect database. Tapping the institutional knowledge of both in-house salespeople and rep firms through development of a master database is also important. But building the list is just a small piece of the account acquisition puzzle.

Customer Relationship Management

A variety of CRM or contact management database software can support customer acquisition efforts. Some of it is complex and expensive. The EMS selling cycle does not require the most sophisticated systems because the target market is relatively small and the range of activities needed to adequately perform mindshare maintenance and qualify account status is not complex.

The challenge many EMS companies have is generating a continuing sequence of mindshare maintenance activities and motivating sales team participation in maintaining the master database. Marketing budget and personnel tend to be lean in many EMS companies and often salespeople are fairly independent in their pursuit of accounts.

Critical elements in a good contact management database system for EMS providers are: a logical data collection strategy, an ability to support collaborative computing within the sales team and the migration of critical sales knowledge about the prospect to program management. To clarify, consider the activities likely to occur in an efficient EMS sales process and then consider how the database should be able to support it.

Customer acquisition occurs in three primary phases:

• Prospecting/qualification. Target accounts are identified, salespeople start building relationships and ultimately project scope and decision team composition are profiled.

• Quoting/evaluation. A project has been defined and the salesperson is selling the value of a specific solution.

• Account close/pre-launch. The salesperson understands the competitiveness of the solution and typically is in final negotiations on pricing.

To determine the needed data fields, look at the sales activities associated with each phase, as well as the administrative needs required by management.

The database needs to support prospect segmentation and activity measurement. Besides the company name, address and primary contact information, it is important to have custom fields which define:

• Sales stage the account is in, for progress measurement and marketing activity segmentation.

• Generic service category the project fits in, for service-specific marketing efforts or measurements of opportunities within a given service category.

• Industry category, for industry-specific direct mailings.

• Anticipated project revenue range, for forecasting purposes.

• Win probability percentage, to support forecasting measurements.

• Assigned salesperson to support activity reporting, forecasting by territory and territory-specific marketing efforts.

• Lead source to support measurement of the results of various lead generation activities.

Many off-the-shelf sales support packages also include fields for activity notes and action item due dates, and can interface with email and word processing programs to create links to all prospect communication.

Prospecting/qualification. This phase of data collection contains the largest number of prospects and typically involves the most automated contact. Prospects in this phase may not be in a buying cycle and the ability to categorize them in ways that support volume, periodic marketing activities is important.

Activities at this stage may include:

• Geographically focused direct mailings in support of regional seminars or trade shows.

• Service- or industry-specific direct mailings of relevant news releases, trade press articles or marketing material.

• General mailings of news releases, trade press articles or newsletters to prospects in specific phases of the sales cycle.

The goal of these activities is to maintain mindshare in accounts not ready to spend time in a sales call or evaluation activity. A quarterly mailing of some relevant information is an effective way to remind prospects of your presence. If the information conveyed in that communication is focused in a way that helps illustrate a solution to that prospect's likely service needs, it may help motivate the prospect to discuss needs in more detail. Creating generic "labels" that help group companies in clusters related to specific needs helps support this process.

Quoting/evaluation. In this phase, salespeople are active in prospect contact and have less need for automated direct marketing support functions. Activity tracking, action item reminders, forecasting, win probability and the ability to "map" the interrelationships of cross-functional or multi-divisional decision teams within the account records are important. Automated report generation features which align with monthly reporting requirements are also helpful.

From a management perspective, this is an area for some evaluation. Some ERP systems have a CRM module. The value of a CRM module integrated with ERP can be continuity in quoting data and eventual transfer of information used in quoting directly to the purchasing/program management personnel involved in the project, but this module may be more in line with quoting activity and the transition to production than with the types of sales and marketing contact management support discussed earlier. Adding this type of module may have a far greater cost than buying the network version of off-the-shelf contact management programs.

Account close/pre-launch. At this point, sales activity is highly focused on action items, pricing and contract negotiation. There may be close interface with program management personnel. Having the ability to transfer activity data, written communications files and decision team analysis to program management can be valuable. The solution may be as simple as creation of shared access customer data folders on a network drive or off-the-shelf or custom collaborative computing software.

Ultimately the best contact management or sales automation solution may not be the most expensive or "feature rich." The key to getting good results from data mining activities is developing a consistent process for reminding qualified prospects that your company has solutions to their needs. The best lead database in the world is ineffective if those prospects have no perception of why your company should be in their next evaluation process and that perception will not be created in one contact. Throwing out prospects not ready to buy is a waste of good data and calling on them at the wrong time is a waste of sales time and travel budget.

Effective EMS sales and marketing requires a strategy that addresses these issues and enables cost effective, automated, frequent prospect contact in early stages plus supports good data migration and activity tracking as accounts are won. Superior sales management strategy, not superior technology, is the defining factor in creating outstanding EMS account acquisition results.

Susan Mucha is president of Powell-Mucha Consulting Inc. (powell-muchaconsulting.com), a consulting firm focused on optimizing EMS account acquisition processes, and developer of the EMS Integrated Marketing™ and EMS Concentric Selling™ training programs; smucha@powell-muchaconsulting.com.

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