B2B Sales & Account Management Agency

[conb_10]

Hi Guys,
Just wondering if anyone has had experience dealing with a B2B sales and account management agency.

We have been in discussions with an agency that will:
Manage our customer accounts (i.e. be the point of contact for customer queries)
Go on sales calls with our customers, encourage them to buy more/upsell/cross-sell etc.
Analyse customer data and relay feedback back to us

Essentially they will be the gate between our customers and our business.
The customers would always remain our customers, and we could take back management of their accounts at any time.

They charge an 8% commission on all sales from customers we hand over to them and 12% on any sales from customers they acquire for us.

The big benefit to us here would be time-saving. Instead of having people answer emails/phone calls/taking orders from customers all day, they would completely take care of this entire side of the business. Additional benefits to us are that we can focus more people on improving our products and putting more effort into our D2C business.

Has anyone had an experience with similar style businesses? Any caveats / was it worth your while?
For ref, we sell textile products. Thanks

 

[Mark T Jones]

Essentially outsourcing your sales function?

I guess this could work, but you would need to keep an extremely close eye on how they are doing thing - your sales function is the heart of your business after all..

 

[Socio South West]

In my experience of this you end up with pushy sales, poor customer service, disgruntled customers who have had goods pushed onto them or bad advice/information and, long term, a tarnished reputation.
The theory is great, but in practice the experience I was involved with was nothing short of a disaster.

You need to keep control of your sales function: Better to take someone on with a fair base salary plus commission so you at least retain control.

 

[MBE2017]

I agree with Socio South West, your sales function is the most important part of your business, why would you risk letting someone else control it. I always want that close contact with my clients, not someone in between.

One thing I will guarantee, they will not look after your customers as well as you would.

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

I agree with Socio South West

same here