Program Overview

Managing key accounts requires a diverse skill set — skills often more closely aligned with management than traditional sales. During this two-day seminar, Drs. Scott Downey and Dave Downey will lead you in specifically addressing strategies for working with large-scale producers in the evolving agricultural marketplace. You’ll explore complexities of working with growers and delve into the areas of strategic account planning, resource allocation, information analysis and the use of sophisticated selling tools.

This program is especially beneficial if you are responsible for, or have similar responsibilities to: serving and selling to key accounts, managing relationships with key clients, serving local and regional markets, developing strategies for evaluating customers on profit and growth potential, and integrating technical and sales efforts with customers.

For questions about this program or more information on who should attend, please contact Aissa Good at aissa@purdue.edu or (765) 496-3884.

“Precision Selling exceeded my expectations. The presentations were fantastic, and the information is immediately applicable. The hospitality was great.”
– Noelle Harding, District Sales Manager, Westway Feed Products

Key Benefits

During this seminar, you will:

• Establish a framework for handling key accounts;
• Create a plan for developing one key customer relationship and outline necessary action steps;
• Participate in a live interview with large-scale farmers and immediately put into practice the tactics learned in the classroom;
• Learn how to build stronger partnerships with customers;
• Review best practices and characteristics of high-performing sales professionals.

Program Content

Precision Selling: Understanding Market Dynamics

Changing producer preferences have shifted in the market from responsive to proactive selling. Looking ahead, we anticipate dramatic changes in the factors that influence agricultural purchasing—not the least of which are those involving large operations.

The Discovery Process

The complexity of large farm operations requires a unique approach to conveying ways that sellers can provide value. Large-farm operators have needs that extend far beyond the basic products, services and information that are provided to traditional customers. They also are heavily influenced by technical experts and advisors on and off of the farm. During this session, faculty will walk through the ways the needs of the farmer and the influencers have to be intentionally explored in order to discover actionable seller goals.

The Farmer Interview

Two large-scale producers will be invited for an interview session about how they make decisions for their operations. Participants will prepare discovery questions for the farmer guest and Purdue faculty will facilitate the discussion. Following the interview, the group will debrief what was learned about factors that influence farmers’ decisions.

Prioritizing and Targeting Prospects

Customers are too complex to invest in every opportunity and need. When determining which customers to spend time with, sellers need to consider profitability and the ability to foster a positive gain for the farmer, along with operation size, growth potential and management ability. Purdue faculty will walk you through the Prospect Priority Index tool to help identify where to focus your efforts.

Strategic Account Planning

Purdue faculty will lead you through the development of a strategic account plan for a key customer identified in the Prioritizing and Targeting Prospects session. As this plan is developed, you will use the concepts you learned about the discovery process, how to work with influencers, and the resources and steps needed for an action plan. This plan will include specific steps with questions and call objectives. This process will give you an actionable tool that can be put into practice as soon as you return to the office.

Co-Creating Value

Value is easily measured as price, but is much more difficult to measure as a benefit. Sellers can identify means of co-created value through a four-step process of identifying resources, making competitive comparisons, locating differentiation points and mapping to customer preferences.