About the Company
The key account manager role is responsible to deliver sales volumes and profitability for the assigned area/ group of customers through hunting and building new customer base, managing and growing sales to existing customers and driving customer relationships and satisfaction. The role operates within the Business Unit Sales & Marketing strategy and within the specific market sales strategy and guidelines, in order to plan, organize, direct and control all activities for a group of key customers in order to achieve medium and short term commercial results as expressed in volumes, margins, customer profitability, market share, etc. The incumbent is expected to be experienced, mature, have strong communication skills and ability to maneuver within a matrix organization to drive volumes and profitability.
About the Role
The key account manager role is responsible to deliver sales volumes and profitability for the assigned area/ group of customers through hunting and building new customer base, managing and growing sales to existing customers and driving customer relationships and satisfaction.
Responsibilities
- Nurture, hunt for and develop new customers, new products and new opportunities in assigned market; maximize volumes, sales margins and customer profitability
- Develop and maintain new and existing customer relationships
- Be in front of potential customers to present solution selling ideas, value proposition and full product portfolio
- Research and analyze market/industry developments (including pricing, availability, quality, new products/ trends) in order to prepare compelling customer proposals based on up to date market data.
- Liaise regularly with appointed Distributors to ensure smooth operation of ordering, customer service and product delivery.
- Create annual and strategic business plans for market development and segment sales growth and implement with distributors execution support
- Develop and maintain close and mutually respected working partnerships with appointed distributors to enable fast and effective application of distributor resources to specific account development plans and general gourmet market growth objectives.
- Work closely with Customer Service to follow up on the delivery of goods to customers, and A/R on time.
- Manage the planning of resources (budget, forecast, expenses etc)
- Collaborate with R&D to develop new recipes and/or adjust old recipes to optimize the portfolio to meet customer demands.
- Communicate with internal departments (R&D, QA, production, logistics, finance, etc.) in order to assure that NPI and sales commitments can be properly executed.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree, preferably in Business Commercial subject or Food technologist or equivalent; Master degree preferred
- 15+ years of relevant experience in a commercial B2B environment, preferably in a multinational company in food industry or FMCG; knowledge and experience of food ingredients/chocolate industry is a plus
- Solid understanding of working with large food manufacturers/ industrials
- Demonstrated track record of hunting and building sales portfolio
- Fluent in Business English; Native language in specific country is an added advantage
- IT Skills in the MS Office; added advantage if super user of salesforce, SAP, PowerBi.
- Well-developed stakeholder management and communication skills
- Strong negotiation skills
- Solid understanding of account management
- Strong commercial acumen and understanding of basic business finance
- Good operational experience in coordinating with cross-functional teams towards fulfilling customer needs
- Analytical mindset with eagerness to learn and take ownership.
Equal Opportunity Statement
- We are committed to diversity and inclusivity in our hiring practices.
