A Driver Sales Representative that is any good at his job keeps an eye on his regular customers and communicates anything that may be an advantage to the Account Executive.
Again , I question what the Account Executives spend their time on during the day - take it as a criticism if you will , but I'm happy to state the fact that I have no idea what they do during their workday. We have some that ride with select drivers on occasion but that's a small sample.
I am using my terminal as an example: for the last decade we have had no new local accounts. Personally , I would like to see more new local accounts. The only new freight that has come to our terminal has been national accounts. Personally , I think that's wonderful but , I don't want all of our terminal's eggs in one basket.
What's wrong with national accounts? When there is a problem the local Account Executives don't have a lot of incentive to try and fix whatever is wrong. It's not their account. And as far as running into or getting ahold of an Account Executive , it helps as far as making sure the customer's satisfied with what XPO Logistics is doing for them.
And yes , of course we want the Account Executives in front of the people that make the decisions as far as who hauls their freight , but it's troubling to me as a driver that I've had those decision making people complain to me on the dock about not seeing an Account Executive.
So , I admit , I'm ignorant to how an Account Executive spends their time during a workday , if someone would care to share , please and thank you.
Again , I question what the Account Executives spend their time on during the day - take it as a criticism if you will , but I'm happy to state the fact that I have no idea what they do during their workday. We have some that ride with select drivers on occasion but that's a small sample.
I am using my terminal as an example: for the last decade we have had no new local accounts. Personally , I would like to see more new local accounts. The only new freight that has come to our terminal has been national accounts. Personally , I think that's wonderful but , I don't want all of our terminal's eggs in one basket.
What's wrong with national accounts? When there is a problem the local Account Executives don't have a lot of incentive to try and fix whatever is wrong. It's not their account. And as far as running into or getting ahold of an Account Executive , it helps as far as making sure the customer's satisfied with what XPO Logistics is doing for them.
And yes , of course we want the Account Executives in front of the people that make the decisions as far as who hauls their freight , but it's troubling to me as a driver that I've had those decision making people complain to me on the dock about not seeing an Account Executive.
So , I admit , I'm ignorant to how an Account Executive spends their time during a workday , if someone would care to share , please and thank you.
Quite possibly the most ignorant statement- "Local accounts not bringing on any new business." Local accounts are the only profitable accounts in this industry. We need national accounts due to their volume to pay for all the overhead. Any profit beyond that is due to local accounts that pay higher rates and don't have every accessorial fee waived.
Decisions are not made by the warehouse personnel any more. They are made in offsite office buildings and in the front office. That's why you don't see salespeople in the back of the building with the drivers much anymore.
prior to about 6 years ago, local account executives at con-way were only responsible for one thing- outbound revenue. That was irregardless of who was paying for it or making the decisions. That led to account executives hanging out and buying pizzas for big national accounts with a lot of outbound freight with no decision making ability. Then down the road the corporate says "no more con-way" for whatever reason and the freight stops. Account executive goes in "hey where is the business?" Customer says "sorry, corporate says we can t use you any longer". Salesperson says "what about the pizza lunches and games I took you to and everything I helped with smoothing out issues?" Customer says "thanks for that, but I can't use you. Corporate says".
All those pointless sales calls on people not even calling the shots. Now local account executives are responsive for revenue that hits the customer's negotiated pricing agreement. Outbound prepaid, inbound collect and third party shipments billed to the account. I'm sure there are some crappy salespeople out there. There are a lot of good ones too. If they are good they are sitting In front of the people calling the shots not just bs'ing on the dock or at the terminal listening to themselves talk. Salespeople know how that drivers are doing their jobs even though they may not see them everyday. Salespeople have goals and need to meet them to stay employed. So trust they are doing what they need to be doing as well.
On another note, we could be blowing the doors off this place if we could reduce damage. We churn about 30% of our business every year due to damage, service, or lower price to the competition. We cannot prevent low ever competitive pricing but we can reduce damage and improve service.
My question to you is, is it easier to grow by 5% every year by selling 35% new business or by reducing the churn by improving damage and service?
Please respond intelligently instead of throwing out a blanketo statement with no facts to back it up.