6 manufacturing trends

2020 is not over yet, but manufacturers around the world are facing vastly different environments and challenges, forcing them to change their business models to survive. But responding to the slump in demand and customer demands for innovative products/solutions is not easy, so most industries, especially manufacturing companies, focus on digital technologies to enhance interactions with existing and potential customers. A recent survey by Alexander Group interviewed dozens of business executives about the latest trends in manufacturing. The following are the 6 major trends summarized by the survey:

Trend 1: Adapt to new customer preferences

Under the dual impact of massive data and digital purchasing channels, the buyer journey has also occurred Variety. Respondents indicated that enabling digital technology support is a top priority for their business, but only one in five entrepreneurs believe their organization has effectively deployed digital tools and sales channels.

According to these executives, demonstrating the ROI of products and solutions is also a prerequisite for implementing digital platforms. The company must not only help customers understand the cost of acquiring products, but also let them understand how to deploy and use their own products, and what are the after-sales requirements, and at the same time, they must not make customers feel that the threshold for using these products is too high. outside".

In addition, the trend of digitalization has also led companies to add new technology-savvy roles while training existing personnel to master digital tools. Compared with their peers, top companies spend almost twice as much on training in this area.

Trend 2: Optimizing New Product Launch Strategies

Customers' budgets have shrunk, but their demand for new products and services remains. But as manufacturers' products become increasingly complex, incorporating other products and solutions, it's difficult for field sales to tell the full value.

The transition to an innovative sales model, therefore, requires companies to integrate their business functions. And revenue operations have become an indispensable capability in which to dynamically coordinate. Businesses surveyed indicated that they are investing heavily in senior professional talent and service roles to support customers throughout the life cycle of their solutions. These roles themselves require more structured, complex, cross-domain training. As a result, manufacturers and distributors that invest more resources in the development and training of "integrated professionals" have 27% more sales of new products than other companies.

Trend 3: Integration of Marketing, Sales and Service

80% of respondents said that "customer persuasion" now spans the three functions of marketing, sales and service, No longer limited to one function. Sales and marketing are integrated to optimize the understanding of customer data through a variety of new digital channels. Companies that have achieved success in this area are applying customer-based marketing (ABM), combining data analysis to gain insights and take action to extract more value from traditional marketing functions.

Many of the companies participating in the survey have introduced a variety of integrated business roles in their organizations, including:

- Sales Development Representative, judging the quality of sales leads, leveraging new Channel Tools and Technology

-Digital Marketing Manager, driving the broad development of digital tools and roles

-Customer Success Manager, increasing sales opportunities based on subscribers

-Digital customer service reps to improve responsiveness and sales effectiveness

Corporate executives interviewed have experienced the benefits of an integrated functional role, especially in marketing. Leading companies in this area are reorganizing their business models and dedicating more resources to the role of marketing and service.

Trend 4: Evolution of Direct and Indirect Channel Strategies

With less direct face-to-face contact with customers, manufacturers have to reimagine their channel strategies. About 20% of the surveyed companies have established their own e-commerce channels, while others focus on distributors with a full set of online capabilities. In the direct channel, manufacturing companies are expanding their corporate programs, investing more resources in improving the efficiency of sales professionals, and integrating different sales roles. As companies increasingly rely on digital roles and business development representatives, the connotation of sales roles is also expanding.

On the other hand, despite the rise of digital channels, manufacturers have not completely moved to a direct sales model. About 60 percent of manufacturers surveyed rely on channel partners, or both direct and indirect models. However, it is also true that the requirements for indirect channel partners are becoming more and more stringent, and only 10% of the respondents believe that their own company's strategy in this regard is well balanced.

Trend 5: Develop talent and compensation policies that align with a company's growth strategy

Regardless of the economic situation, the HR market is chronically in short supply with exceptional employees with digital capabilities. In addition, businesses face the threat of an aging population, with many executives surveyed noting that they will lose a significant number of field sales reps to retirement over the next two years.

Even as customers gain new channels of contact, the field sales representative's role in developing and maintaining key customer relationships remains the same. As a result, manufacturing companies must retrain and redeploy these key positions, combined with internal sales and marketing roles, to accommodate new demands.

As companies increasingly focus on e-commerce and interaction through virtual channels, a variety of emerging roles are also forcing companies to search for digital tech talent. Redesign the organization to allow these technically valuable roles to have a place in it. This also means investing significant resources in setting up talent development programs and creating new career paths.

Trend 6: Dedicate resources to revenue (sales) operations

Many companies are transforming to focus on sales operations beyond customer segmentation, account planning, and sales resource allocation other content. The new sales operations team, often supported by the marketing department, will enhance digital sales performance and customer interactions, while working with the service team to gain new customer insights and try to increase recurring/renewable revenue.

The main areas of concern of the interviewed companies in this regard are:

-Sales compensation management

-CRM system supervision and continuous improvement

-Business Reports and Insights

-Technical Support Tools

Sales Operations teams are increasingly involved in revenue operations, where marketing, sales and service intersect provide support. Many corporate sales operations are adopting advanced analytics and consulting support, which used to be part of the marketing function. Nearly half of the companies surveyed cited "cross-functional collaboration" as a major challenge for revenue operations teams. With the complexity of enterprise business models and the widespread use of technical support tools, the standardization of sales/revenue operations can improve the efficiency and productivity of enterprises.