Shaping a partnership offer for a new professional market

The question

An outdoor equipment maker was preparing to sell into a professional market it had not served before, where each customer is a manager answering for a site every day.

Its plan rested on more than machines. The company wanted to arrive as a partner, with service, support and expertise around what it sold. It needed to know what these managers expect of a partner, and where a newcomer could earn a hearing.

Our approach

We spoke with site managers one to one in six countries, from the best-funded sites to the most stretched, because the offer had to work for every kind of site.

Managers described what they want from the suppliers they already think of as partners before we explored any particular area of support, so the playbook would start from their own definition of a partner.

The company’s team saw an early preview while the work was under way, then the full presentation live, with time to put their own questions to us as we went.

What the team came away with

The work arrived in two parts: a picture of the professional customer, and a partnership playbook the team could use on its own to take an offer to market.

The picture of the customer covered what managers look for in a partner, the goals and pressures behind their working day, how they see the brand and what opens the door to a new supplier, with differences between countries drawn out wherever they mattered.

The playbook set out the support any partner would be expected to provide and the ways a new brand could stand out, each backed by the detail behind it. A fuller version answered the team’s more specific questions, from servicing and parts to finance and training.

With both in hand, the team could plan its offer, and the services around its machines, from the customer’s side of the relationship.