Permanent - Sales Manager: Bioconditioning - Ekurhuleni (East Rand) - South Africa

Key Objectives:

• Takes overall accountability for the sales of all bio-conditioning products by ensuring consistent, profitable growth in sales revenues through proactive planning, deployment, and management of the sales team within their region.
• Retains key customers by being a strategic key account partner and advisor to the customer, discovering new opportunities to work together for mutual benefit.
• Uses expert knowledge to support the product development team in creating innovative solutions for customers

Key Responsibilities:

Strategy Execution

• Implement and drive the organisations overall strategy by achieving market share, profit share and customer satisfaction objectives across the bioconditioning division, within defined expense budgets.
• Plans how to establish and maintain major account relationships.
• Participates with other company sales management teams in developing sales strategies for national/global accounts and helps identify target accounts and opportunities within the framework of the organization-wide strategy and (organic) growth plans.

Sales planning and execution.

• Develops and executes the sales plan for the assigned area in accordance with the set objectives and targets, ensuring that each team members sales plans are realised, and sales targets are achieved.

Customer acquisition

• Uses knowledge of the market and acquires new customers in a proactive manner through various means in order to retain and grow the customer base according to expectations and to achieve the sales targets.

Key Account Management

• Build strong relationships with strategic and key customers in order to contribute to sustaining and growing our business to achieve long-term success.
• Collect and evaluate customers feedback regarding product innovations with the aim to enhancing customers experience and increasing market penetration.
• Establishes and builds strong client relationships over time that allow for continuity and ongoing representation and profitability reinforced by sales support/delivery programs.
• Monitors competitive activity in each account and ensures that appropriate response strategies are formulated and communicated. Advises management of changes in competition, product availability or related matters.
• Assess progress within a particular account and make a commercial decision about committing future resources to developing the opportunity.
• Coordinate applicable targeted marketing activities

Value Selling

• Asks questions which uncover implicit needs, and which develops those needs.
• Builds value for the customer by investigation to uncover explicit needs and develop those needs.
• Demonstrates company’s capability by explaining how company’s products and services match a customer’s explicit needs.

Internal networking

• Supports product development in launching new and overhauled products to the market.
• Provide regular updates on regional performance and sales force efficiencies with recommendations for maximising business relationships and creating an environment where customer service can be enhanced within the region.
• Based on input from Marketing and Pricing measures, prepares and quotes customers, in order to advise customers appropriately and to conclude the sale of product.
• Proactively aligns (demands and expectations) the internal organization and all relevant stakeholders in order to achieve maximum customer satisfaction.

Product knowledge

• Responsible to maintain and build own product and technical knowledge in relevant product categories.

Manage Sales Team

• Obtain profitable results by managing, coaching, motivating, developing, and retaining key Technical Sales Advisors.
• Ensures Technical Sales Advisors have an expert level of product and technical knowledge in their relevant product categories by providing continuous training and development opportunities.
• Personally observe the performance of the technical sales advisors in the field on a regular basis in order to ensure that the sales team are interacting professionally and providing excellent solutions to their customers.
• Streamline sales processes and systems wherever possible to ensure efficient and effective regional performance
• Ensures that Technical Sales Advisors keep the CRM system up to date with accurate information at all times.

Experience and Qualifications:

• Education: Grade12 plus relevant Bachelor’s Degree, Hons. Preferable
• A minimum of 10 years sales experience, of which 4+ years included experience at a senior level sales position.
• Proven track record of sales success.
• Proven ability to motivate and lead a sales team.
• Excellent problem-solving and analytical skills to interpret sales performance and market trend information with the aim of identifying business solutions.
• Excellent oral and written communication skills, plus an excellent working knowledge of
• Microsoft Office Suite is required.
• Results-orientated with excellent interpersonal skills.
• This position will support, promote, and grow company's business and will therefore require travel within and outside the borders of South Africa.