Commercial Excellence 
Life science companies recognize that treatment decisions are increasingly being influenced by a sizeable number of stakeholders across very large, complex healthcare delivery systems rather than by individual physicians alone. Therefore, many organizations are relying on their strategic account management (“SAM”) strategies to optimize access, drive utilization across health care systems, and provide solutions related to reducing costs and improving healthcare outcomes.
The following best practices are critical to drive an effective Strategic Account Management Strategy:
- Understand the changing healthcare marketplace and customer needs related to quality patient care and cost reduction
- Create partnerships between sales leadership, market access, and Learning & Development to clearly identify the specific skills needed by SAMs, such as business acumen and planning, account management, consultative selling, and communicating with impact
- Define a consistent account management and business planning process
- Evaluate the underlying skills required to develop account plans (including specific activities on how to use business analytics) to inform decision making and resource allocation
- Design blended learning solutions to help sales representatives transition into strategic account managers who are selling to different customer stakeholders at the D and C-Suite levels
WLH Consulting, Inc. (“WLH”) partners with organizations to define a KAM strategy, structure, and processes, along with learning solutions.
Companies rely on WLH to:
- Develop a Strategic Account Management strategy and structure
- Assess current Account Planning effectiveness
- Create customized Account Planning processes, tools, and templates
- Adapt planning processes and tools for specific products or business unit launches
- Design and facilitate customized blended learning solutions tied to SAM competencies
- Help SAMs develop strong account teams that optimize pull-through and field collaboration
- Develop an organizational readiness cascade for field implementation
- Design business review process(es) to measure ongoing execution effectiveness
