Blind spots block growth. Outreach gives you full visibility into what’s happening in your entire pipeline so you can coach better, forecast accurately, and close quicker. Streamline your revenue ops.
The work of an account manager is often defined by tedious outreach, constant negotiation, and savvy relationship building that, if lucky, culminates in the blissful high of closing an account. While deals make headlines, the challenging moments that come up along the way often don’t.
Being a closer often comes down to effective mediation, so we spoke to three account managers about how they react to challenging accounts and how they find solutions for them.
Always finish the job
At her first job at cybersecurity firm Kaseya, Ally Langan looked over an account where client data became separated and disorganized following her company’s merger with Datto. Mishandling data is a huge no-no, especially at a security firm, and it resulted in a break in client trust. New to both the role and workforce, and scared she’d lose her client, Langan tapped about two dozen colleagues to help fix the data problem. After about a month, the data issue was addressed, but the breach in trust still needed repair.
To mend the relationship, Langan, still in her first month at the job, coordinated meetings with her supervisors, conducted frequent calls with the client, and worked across teams to recover the data.
“At first I was intimidated,” Langan, now an account manager at TheRealReal, said. “But I was like, if I don’t do this, this problem is still going to exist for this account, and they’re running a business. This is their livelihood, and I was like, ‘I need to help them fix this problem.’”
Even when the error was finally corrected, Langan was sure the client would leave. Instead, Kaseya’s president of sales thanked her for her persistence. She kept the account.
Time loves a hero
For Nick Stevens, account manager at financial solutions company OrcaCap, a challenging account is characterized by disjointed communication or a less-than-ideal pace of decision-making. For example, if Stevens needs an accounts receivable report, but his client doesn’t have it, he will bypass his underwriter to find a faster solution.
“The lesson to me is that time kills all deals,” he said. “The biggest obstacle or hurdle that we have to run through is that a deal gets stagnant. The amount of time a deal sits, the less likely that it is to close or fund. Anything that starts to get hung up, I always ask the question, ‘Is this a legitimate reason to slow down the deal?’”
Communication breakdown
John Burkhalter, a producer at insurance brokerage Higginbotham, said information, or rather a lack of it, creates the most challenging client dynamic. When managing insurance accounts, Burkhalter said unexpected rate increases can often lead to hostile relationships, or ultimately losing a client.
“There’s nobody in the world that likes being blindsided,” Burkhalter said. To prevent friction, he said he goes to lengths to communicate any market factors that might lead to cost increases.
“I’m able to get out of an upset client or a conversation that’s going south by explaining exactly what's going on in the marketplace,” Burkhalter said. “It’s about relaying to them, in their own words and in their own terms, what’s going on around them whether it be interest rates, increased construction costs of material, just named storm events that are happening in the country.”
Ultimately, Burkhalter said that his approach not only avoids conflict but is also a sales tactic, as clients ultimately want the account manager that keeps them the most informed.