A more modern approach for cleaning suppliers

18th of July 2018
A more modern approach for cleaning suppliers

A new report focusing on the concerns, preferences, hopes and ambitions of supply chain companies across multiple industries - including cleaning - has thrown up some interesting findings. Paul Black, ceo of sales-i, reports for ECJ.

The cleaning supplies industry is among the world’s most important markets. Many other sectors depend on it, it contributes a great deal to global economies, and it has demonstrated an unusual degree of resilience in situations where other industries have been either damaged or rendered obsolete. And yet the industry is not without its own challenges. When it comes to sales, new barriers to success have emerged, and longstanding barriers loom larger than before.

‘Manufacturing, Distribution, and Wholesale in 2018 and Beyond’ offers an in-depth look at what frustrates supply chain companies across multiple key industries, including cleaning supplies. Conducted by sales-i, the research surveyed 233 senior executives in an effort to discern their concerns, preferences, hopes and ambitions for the future.

Many of the findings were surprising; others served as confirmation of long-standing suspicions. In either case, they provide a clear window into what drives the sales strategies of cleaning supply businesses, what holds them back, and where they want to go in future.

The report identified four key danger areas for sales and business productivity in 2018 and beyond.

Skills shortages

Skills shortages are a particularly complicated issue and not least because they’re endemic in a number of industries, a number of professions, and a number of countries – and have been for some time. For some businesses, a lack of qualified, experienced employees is less of a challenge than a simple fact of life.

For those companies surveyed, skills shortages are having an especially strong impact in certain strategically important areas. Overall, 65 per cent of respondents are having difficulty finding the right talent to fill sales roles – with operations and logistics (27 per cent) and production and assembly (21 per cent) coming in at a very distant second and third.

Operations and production are often seen as the priority areas for hiring among cleaning supplies and services companies. The research, however, suggests that cleaning businesses are becoming more aware of a growing skills shortage in sales – and that if they want to maximise their revenues and execute their commercial strategies, they need to make a sustained effort to hire the best salespeople.

It makes sense: when customer acquisition and retention levels are below expectations, the entire business suffers. Production and logistics must also be a recruitment priority, of course, but without talented salespeople, a cleaning business has no orders to fulfil.

To combat these shortages, the industry should work on promoting itself to potential hires. That doesn’t just mean offering a generous salary and benefits package: it means talking up cleaning’s prospects, highlighting its recent growth, and illustrating why it’s a great industry to enter – and make a career in.

Customer relationships

Strategic hiring may partially answer another pressing question for cleaning businesses: how to acquire and retain new customers. The research suggests 59 per cent of companies are struggling to identify and win new customers, 38 per cent are struggling to upsell and cross sell to existing customers, and 25 per cent feel their reps are underperforming.

On each of these points, targeted recruitment will go a long way – but it won’t go all the way. Knowing how to sell, and how to keep selling once you’ve closed the deal is an art form, but one that requires a healthy degree of science. Adopting a data and technology driven approach will offer deeper insights into customers and prospects: their preferences, their behaviours, their likes, dislikes, and more. Having these insights makes it easier to be proactive about delivering what customers want, addressing their most urgent concerns, and making those all-important sales.

Technology and e-commerce

Technology both empowers underperforming salespeople and bolsters high performers. And yet, many in the cleaning industry find it difficult to embrace technology. At 70 per cent, a majority of respondents see e-commerce as an opportunity for their businesses; 61 per cent say the same of automation and smart factories. But this leaves substantial minorities who are either uncertain or opposed towards these technological advancements.

On some level this is understandable. A suspicion of e-commerce may seem irrational in 2018. But the growing influence of Amazon, with its cheaper supplies, faster delivery times, and one-click-ordering, has not been entirely positive for the industry, many more traditional cleaning businesses have struggled with it. And these traditional businesses find it hard to shake their time-honoured methods of working; they don’t call it technological ‘disruption’ for nothing.

But while Amazon may have added to commercial pressures for certain businesses, it has also made a digital sales channel a requirement, rather than something nice to have. Cleaning supply businesses can undoubtedly benefit.

Again, most businesses recognise this: 66 per cent are also using software systems for inventory management, 63 per cent are using them for administrative and reporting tasks, and 84 per cent are employing a handful of other sales and marketing tools.

It makes sense that sales is an area of particular focus: while there may be some suspicion of e-commerce, companies are using other types of customer-focused tech, including CRMs and business intelligence tools. By using these tools, supply companies can identify leads, follow them up, and move them down the funnel a lot quicker. This creates a more responsive and efficient team, and a more responsive and efficient business.

Technology, in short, isn’t a threat to cleaning businesses: it’s a way to survive, thrive, and drive performance.

What about the economy?

Finally, there’s no getting away from the fact that the economy tends to impact the performance of cleaning supplies companies: some 98 per cent of survey respondents see it as crucial to their fortunes.

This is a particularly difficult challenge, and the one that the industry has the least influence over. After all, it can’t prevent recessions, industry downturns, or the general movements of the market. Nonetheless, this doesn’t mean that cleaning companies are powerless.

If the industry can’t control the economy, it can control how it reacts to it – and here, there is often much work to be done. Many businesses, fretful about unfavourable economic headwinds, are apt to slash their prices, continue offering the same old product lines, and hope that’ll do enough to entice new customers and retain existing ones. This is a mistake. Though it can make sense in an immediate, short-term sense, in the long run it perpetuates a race to the bottom mentality where those who can take the hit to their margins win out over those with the best offering.

Instead of relying on these archaic tactics, distributors should respond to adverse market conditions by making strategic improvements to their products and services. That means improving customer engagement; it means creating loyalty programmes to keep longstanding accounts by their side; it means customising packages and innovating in product design to meet the specific needs of target customers. But it also means creating a sustainable, forward-thinking model for cleaning companies’ success.

In the coming years, this will be more important than ever before. The current environment is full of challenges, but it is also replete with opportunities – if the industry is willing to seize them.
It’s time to adopt a more contemporary strategy: one that brings technology to the forefront.

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