Unlock the power of storytelling in business with CMKG's innovative Story Arc Framework. Learn how to captivate your audience and drive results through compelling narratives.

Virtual meetings and presentations are not going away; even when we return to the office it's likely we'll continue to do much of our work and client transactions this way in the future. I’ve put together a list of steps to help you make your virtual meetings more productive and polished from beginning to end.

Our industry has changed the way that supplier sales teams go to market – or at least it should have changed! Gone are the days where sales teams rely solely on the relationship they’ve built with their retail customer — a major shift driven by: changing customers and economy, less opportunity to see our retailers face to face, the demand from retailers for value-based category solutions, and the advancements of retailers from both a data and technology perspective. Over the past few years, I have had the privilege of personally training many sales organizations on how to improve their fact-based presentations approach and have documented three steps here, including barriers, analyzing data, and building the presentation.

Selling is a requirement in any business. In the retail industry, selling takes place both internally and externally for Retailers and Vendors across departments and teams. There are multiple “Seller” to “Buyer” relationships, including: EXTERNAL SELLING RELATIONSHIPS the account manager or sales director (Seller); calling on the category manager or business unit lead at the Retailer (Buyer). the category analyst or vendor advisor (Seller); calling on the category manager, or someone else in the retail organization responsible for different components of the category review process (Buyer). the Retailer’s category manager with a new promotion or plan (Seller); calling on an account manager or sales director (Buyer). INTERNAL SELLING RELATIONSHIPS the category manager at the Retailer promoting an idea or concept (Seller); to their business unit lead or manager (Buyer). the Vendor’s category analyst or category management director promoting in an idea or concept (Seller); to the marketing director or sales director within their organization (Buyer). So when you think about developing selling skills, expand your concept of Sellers and Buyers beyond the Vendor’s sales team. The graphic below summarizes: Two critical components of any selling approach include your ability to create engaging and informative presentations that focus on your Buyer (either internal or external). These components include the ability to use software tools like PPT and to tell a compelling story with relevant, fact-based details to your audience. Both components are critical, and must be developed BEFORE you can focus on strategic selling skills.

Gone are the days where decisions and recommendations to retail customers are made based purely on intuition and relationships. Sales and marketing teams need to take a fact-based approach to their business, starting with developing new skills in “retail understanding”, “proficiency in data”, and “category & business insights”. A fact-based presentations approach will help you uncover development opportunities as well as combat potential weaknesses through joint business planning (JBP). Some of the questions you need to be able to answer, include: Who are your Retailers and what are they trying to accomplish? What data sources are available to me and how do I analyze and interpret them? How do I create actionable recommendations for the Retailer using the tactics? Adding value to the Retailer through solutions and recommendations that tie in with their overall strategies and their biggest areas of opportunity will help move you from relationship-only selling to an added-value, more collaborative sales approach. The result? Win-win solutions for the Vendor and Retailer. But keep in mind, once sales teams answer these questions, their job is only half done. Their next step is to learn how to tell stories through compelling, fact-based presentations that connect with the opportunities and insights they have uncovered. Let’s review the most important elements of fact-based presentations.

Collaboration + Shopper Marketing How can you be successful in both? This is what the Category Management Association (CMA) has to say, “Building a marketing plan ‘through the eyes of the Shopper’ to create value for both the Retailer and Vendor requires collaboration using the best practice methodologies, insights, data and tools available. Category Management can serve as the umbrella under which the collaborative process is facilitated” (Strategic Collaboration for Shopper Satisfaction, 2015). Here are some great resources from CMKG for you to get started: "Strategic Collaboration: Are you Really Prepared?" blog posting Understanding Shopper Trip Missions complimentary download

Fact-based skills are a requirement in today's world The combination of an increasingly complex world, the vast proliferation of data and the need to stay one step ahead of the competition has sharpened focus on using analytics within organizations. Here are some great downloads from Category Management Knowledge Group for you to get started on fact based sales: Turning Data Into Insights complimentary download 5 Requirements for Compeling, Fact-Based Presentations infographic complimentary download