BACKGROUND
The Client is a distributor appointed as the national distributor for a major FMCG manufacturer in pharmaceutical, food, candy and natural product sectors with a 52-branch network. The Client engaged with Renoir in enhancing their ways of working to grow its sales volumes.
RESULTS
48%
Increase in Sales Visits
62%
Increase in Effective Sales Visits
41%
Increase in Sales Revenue
45%
Increase in Sales Volume
THE CHALLENGE
The escalating competition within Indonesia’s Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) market is providing a renewed stimulus to improve, expand, and capitalise on the nation’s burgeoning population and economy. Investing in a larger sustainable penetration with positive brand equity in the market in this growth stage of the country will bode very well for growth in future years.
THE ANALYSIS
Renoir’s initial analysis highlighted some key actionable opportunities in areas of enhanced sales strategies, efficient distribution processes, and superior management practices:
- More effective roll down of KPIs to the sales force
- Improve use of productivity and effectiveness measures to better drive sales performance
- Improve visit-management tools to drive appropriate behaviours
- Develop key sales visits processes for planning
- Enhance active selling skills to produce more effective sales visits
- Upgrade supervisor tools for training or coaching to provide regular up-skilling of salesforce
The main objective coming out of the analysis was to improve MNJ’s sales productivity and effectiveness. Sales visit effectiveness was to be targeted by developing and implementing customer contact visit targets which were reported using dashboards and which, in turn, supported data-driven reviews within decision-making processes
PROJECT APPROACH
The ensuing implementation project was planned to be a pilot of 26 project weeks, including 8 weeks of Renoir’s Focus Process®. Af the conclusion of these first 8 weeks, a layout of opportunities, solutions, realisation plan and key performance indicators were presented to senior management by the Management Action Team (MAT) Leaders; one core MAT would be responsible for installing and implementing the system in the pilot’s 10 branches. Should the pilot be successful, roll-out would then continue nationwide for the remaining branches.
IMPLEMENTATION
The success of the pilot was centred around the new sales promoter management control system which covered all ways of working of the sales teams and branches. The elements installed included:
- Existing Customer Management Process
- Sales Pipeline Management
- Winning New Customers Process
- Winning Back Customers Process
- Customer Visit Planning Meeting
- KPI Reporting
- Trade Promotion Process
The focus was on deploying these elements to increase sales promoter active selling tools and training which in turn would drive the increase in revenue. Working very closely with the MATs, the pilot was successful, and the plan to roll-out the same Management Control System to the remaining 35 branches nationwide was activated. The pilot and roll-out in these branches accounted for more than 90% of the company’s revenue.
Each branch would have an initial installation period of two weeks with a single member of the Task Force delivering training to all levels of management in the branches. In each subsequent week, one rotating Task Force member would visit a branch to conduct coaching in auditing the results, provide system support and re-train the workforce where required. The branch’s sales productivity was monitored using an in-house developed dashboard, which allowed to monitor, but importantly, pointed to opportunities for further training, guidance and coaching.
KEY RESULTS
48%
Increase in Sales Visits
62%
Increase in Effective Sales Visits
41%
Increase in Sales Revenue
45%
Increase in Sales Volume
CONCLUSION
As the rollout and progressed and results were analysed, the number of actual sales visits (KWH) and the number of sales visits achieving a transaction (KPH) were key drivers in increasing sales volume and subsequent revenue for each of the roll-out rounds. Data tracking has been instrumental in overseeing the implementation of Round Monitoring. The improvement of customer win-back strategies and turnover processes, combined with methods for acquiring new customers, has bolstered the retention of existing accounts while fostering the growth of new ones.
Every salesman was effectively trained on his ideal day – to know exactly the daily expectation of him and his performance. Both operational KPIs in KWH and KPH drove an improvement in sales revenue and volume above the levels not seen before the project started. Even more impressive, all this was achieved during the pandemic.
Not only did the Client substantially achieve revenue growth, but importantly it now has a proven sales system to apply to future growth opportunities. Meanwhile, the change in ways of working and culture changes achieved across the organisation, from bottom to top, have provided a foundation from which to incrementally improve its sales effectiveness.
