The distribution network

For small and medium-sized enterprises with less possibilities of establishing own sales offices worldwide, it is instead important to build up a good distribution network of dealers and agents. Ideally would be to find distributors who are dedicated to the supplier's own products and can devote all resources to the sales of these. That is not always the case. So how do you choose the right partners?
There are a lot of different distributors out there. There are large ones with a broad product range, small dedicated to a specific product category, major catalog companies with minimal customer contact and smaller companies with more focus on being out at customer sites.
The large, reaching broad has not always proven to be the best. Neither has the small niched ones shown to be the most appropriate. The ones that usually succeed as distributors are the ones that have a clear profile towards the customer, who do not have a too wide range of products, which have the right customer profile in their CRM systems, who have similar products as the supplier and hence can offer them in packages, so called product bundling.
After having worked myself some years for a distributor on the Swedish market, I cannot stress enough the importance of the supplier keeping good contact with the distributor. Of great significance for the inspiration is also the opportunity to receive training from the supplier. When the dealers have a good relationship with you as the supplier, have knowledge of your products and their market positioning, are familiar with the product's unique selling points versus the competition, have good knowledge of the product's customer profile, and feel comfortable with the sales of your products, only then you have a good chance of succeeding with your distribution network.

Competency training nourishes creativity

Working with sales is a way of life. You can never become a skilled sales rep without feeling passion for business. The salesman’s profession is a creative profession. Attending sales meetings or sales trainings is inspiring and nurtures the creativity. In my opinion all staff with some sort of customer contact should have the opportunity to repeated sales and marketing trainings. However, these courses and conferences are expensive and the resources limited.
A good idea is to create your own trainings at the company. Decide for example, to meet once a month for an hour sales talk. Decide an agenda for the meeting. Someone might present a book in sales and marketing which he or she read, you may be discussing an assignment you had from the last meeting, you can listen to sales training courses on CDs, or just discuss different sales situations or something that happened on your market. At some point you can simply analyze yourself as salespersons or members of the team with any suitable method.
If you felt drained of inspiration before the sales meeting, you will come out with new inspiration afterwards. Do not be surprised if you get so inspired that you challenge yourselves to different sales tasks. Maybe you decide you should contact 10 new potential clients a week for a month, conduct a product training at customer site or something else challenging, but still achievable and that can generate future sales.