"Foodservice is about relationships" is a common phrase we hear from those who work in the industry, and it's as true today as ever. However, what's changed is how to build those effective relationships. For sales professionals in foodservice, the key to success lies in building the right relationships with best-fit customers to enable you to maximize mutual growth and profit.

When it comes to buyer-seller relationships with national accounts, the bar has been raised, and what worked in the past isn't necessarily what's working for operators today. That's why Kinetic12 has developed the following model, which provides sales leaders with a strategic perspective of how the selling model has changed over time and how to best meet the needs of operators today to accelerate sales growth.

1. Transactional Selling:

The most basic foodservice sales approach is transactional selling, which focuses on closing as many deals as possible from a variety of different customers. The foundation of this approach is getting your product on the price list or order guide at an attractive price. The sales team then works to push the product to the maximum number of customers. We often see this approach when there is limited differentiation between competitive products and the buyer is already aware of the functionality of the product. 

When using this approach, the key decision factors for the buyer often come down to product availability and price. While it benefits from shorter sales cycles, it lacks deeper relationship development, which limits buyer loyalty and runs the risk of increasing churn, leading you to work harder to maintain your results. This lack of stickiness and real differentiation and can often result in "race to the bottom" pricing, which further destroys profitability.

2. Feature-Benefit Selling:

One step up from transactional selling is feature-benefit selling. This approach focuses on helping potential customers understand the key attributes or characteristics of the product ("feature") and the positive outcomes that the features will provide the customer when they use it ("benefit"). Compared to transactional selling, there is more focus on storytelling, explaining why the product differs from competitors and why it's ultimately a better fit for your prospect's business. 

This approach can be very effective, especially when communicating the value of a product to larger audiences such as a particular operator segment. 

While this can address common issues that a segment of operators may have, it doesn't address any unique challenges a national account operator may have and can lack a personalized approach.

3. Consultative Selling:

Consultative selling takes it a step further. It focuses on understanding a customer or prospect's specific challenges and priorities and helping them solve those problems. The supplier is no longer selling just a product but establishing a long-term relationship with the operator by becoming a trusted advisor. Suppliers using this approach provide insights and guidance that support their customer's strategic priorities beyond the products they sell.

The foundation of consultative selling is to gain a deeper understanding of your customers' businesses and guide them toward solutions that address issues or opportunities. Sales professionals who utilize this approach often spend a good amount of time researching their customers ("doing their homework") to better understand their business strategies, innovative ideas they are launching, and how the business operates. They also tend to ask their customers a lot of questions to validate their assumptions about their customer's business and uncover other information that cannot be easily found. The popular Challenger model is a variation of this approach where the seller identifies potential issues and challenges in the customer's way of thinking to influence them to take action to address those issues [leveraging their products or services] rather than assuming the risk of staying the status quo.

This can effectively build stronger relationships, but it tends to lean towards a one-sided story, where the supplier is doing more of the thinking and solution-solving, and the operator is more or less a receiver of information.

"What Approach Should I Use?"

When we train national sales organizations, we tend to focus on approaches 3 (Consultative Selling) and 4 (Collaborative Business Development), both of which tend to be more effective in establishing long-term relationships. Yet most large foodservice suppliers use all four approaches across their business. To determine which method may be most effective, we suggest that sales leaders first assess the following:

1. Financial Goals including Time Horizon (e.g., Are you able to take a longer-term approach?)
2. Segment Fit for Product Portfolio
3. Customer Segmentation, including Potential Targets
4. Customer Value Proposition as Compared to Competition
5. Internal Capabilities & Resources

After you've explored these considerations, you can then use what you've learned to develop an approach that makes the most sense for your organization, and ultimately, enable you to grow your sales with national account operators by deploying your team with rigor and focus.

To learn more about selling best practices and national account operator insights, visit us at https://www.kinetic12.com/. We've also developed an on-demand training program with IFMA, which can be found at https://www.pathlms.com/ifma/courses/33862#.

About Kinetic12: Art Bell, Tim Hand, and Kim Letizia are with Kinetic12 Consulting, a Chicago-based foodservice and general management consulting firm. The firm works with leading foodservice suppliers, operators, and organizations on customized strategic initiatives and guides multiple collaborative forums and best practice projects. They also serve as keynote speakers at operator franchise conferences and supplier sales meetings. Their previous leadership roles in restaurant chain operations and at foodservice manufacturers provide a balanced industry perspective. 



Contact us to discuss or learn more about how we can help your organization understand the Restaurant of the Future and how Emerging and Growth Chains will define the future of foodservice.