Distributor Management
- Assess the market potential where you want to appoint the distributor
- Assess the infra support required
- Assess the expected ROI
F stand for FIND
First you should determine the profile of the distributor. Writing down the profile gives you clarity about the kind of distributor that is most suitable for your business.
Then identify the location from where the entire market can be covered efficiently. Ideally this should be the distributor location, but practically you can find this might not be possible, so take call basis the best possible option available.
At this stage you are ready to do a market survey to create a list of prospective distributors.
After doing the market survey, shortlist the top 3 distributors who meets your criteria.
A stand for APPOINT
- Need analysis – understand why he/she wants to take your distributorship
- Share about the Company and Products – Explain the product range and company profile
- Margins – Explain the retailer margin and distributor margin, also share the estimated sale from the territory
- Company’s Expectation – Things the Company is expects from the distributor in terms of support like finance, infra etc.
- Company’s Support – Explain the support Company will give like ATL, BTL, trade schemes, incentives etc.
You meet the top 3 distributors and do the following things:
M stand for MANAGE
Once the distributor is onboarded, manage the distributor by:
- Creating a coverage plan
- Setting up the Distributor Infra according to company norms
- Primary and Secondary processes
- Organizing the sales team and training them
- Calculating the ROI at least once in a quarter
E stand for EVALUATION
Finally, you should evaluate the distributor periodically on the following parameters:
