B2B Account Manager

Hi CornishOptimist,

I guess if you were to give my last job the correct title, it would be B2B Account Manager so I could certainly give you an insight though naturally this HEAVILY depends on a) the product/service the company supplies b) the nature of transactions c) the companies' expectations of the role.

So firstly, you will be responsible for managing (looking after) accounts (and by this, they mean your customers, not to be confused with the financial term haha!). Depending on the business, this may be a few big accounts/customers, to all customers within a certain area, or to all of them. By managing, this essentially means that you act as the point of contact between them and the business and deal with all their questions. So this (again this varies between roles) could include;

> visiting them
> discussing with them about any projects or ideas they have
> sending quotations
> answering technical questions
> resolving any issues or complaints they may have
> attending trade shows and exhibitions
> following their orders and seeing everything runs smoothly
> growing the business by generating new business

And may extend to slightly more senior responsibilities such as;
> sending invoices & chasing payment
> deciding on promotions
> forecasting future orders

I've worked two different types of account manager role and both were wildly different so you'd (again) need to gauge what their expectations were.

The first I looked after accounts in the south of the UK, 4 days a week I was expected to be on the road visiting existing and new customers, and presenting any new products/or products they didn't take. I would then have one day a week to book appointments and touch base with the office to make sure everything was running OK.

The second I was at the office for 3-4 days a week and, personally, is the type of role you want. My day to day consisted of dealing with emails and phone calls, preparing quotations (the service we offered for example could easily take 30 mins to quote for per customer!), buying the stock that customers ordered (we weren't a manufacturer), organising couriers, invoices, etc, it was basically seeing the order from receipt to delivery!

You mention business speak, if there's any terms your unsure of, don't hesitate to ask!

CornishOptimist wrote: »

From what I understand, they expect the role to be generating new business and maintaining current clients whilst "working in a high paced, self motivated sales team."

I haven't got a problem with being proactive around gaining business, but I really dont want it to be essentially a cold calling job. Did that many years ago and never want to repeat that!

I know absolutely nothing at all about sales of any kind, and suspect I would be absolutely pants at it, but my gut reaction to what you've put here is that I would be asking them by what % they were anticipating you'd be able to generate new business?

and I'd also expect you to know the competition - you say you'll be working shifts, so how many other companies offer this kind of service, and offer it over the shifts you're going to be working?

What I'm driving at is, will you be touting for business from your competitors, and are there many of them? Or will you be touting for business from companies who've never actually realised that the kind of service you offer exists, and it would benefit them?

To my uninformed brain, that would tell me something about the nature of the sales calls I'd be making ...