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SAM2Win: The world’s only true account management simulation
Much selling today is done by companies to other companies. If you have very large customer accounts, your growth with them is vital to your overall business growth.
Yet how good are you at doing this? Have your account plans mapped what you you can potentially sell to who you can potentially sell to within the account? If so, which of the five account coverage strategies are your account managers pursuing? What process (beyond sales potential) have you used to prioritize the best strategic opportunities of the future, rather than being trapped in commoditized opportunities of the past? Also, how are you going to position yourself for sustained success against the competition within these top opportunities? … and many more pertinent questions! In other words, how “strategic” are your so-called strategic account managers and plans?
The SAM2Win Simulation is the foundation for a serious business game used to develop many of the core skills needed to be a successful Strategic (or Key or Global) Account Manager.
This simulation helps you understand and apply the key principles of effective SAM (or KAM / GAM) – and is unique in the world.
Learning outcomes:
SAM2Win will help you to:
- manage a complex client in a dynamic competitive market
- better prioritize sales opportunities
- diagnose and deal with different procurement situations
- create better and more competitive value propositions
- pro-actively develop a better strategy for growth
- write better account plans with more ambitious targets
- execute these plans better with a lower risk of failure
Join thousands of satisfied participants
SAM2Win has been used to train thousands of current and future account managers around the world. This has been done in universities, corporations and account management best-practice conferences.
The training has varied from being 100% online over several weeks, to 1-2 day intensive face-to-face workshops, to hybrid training combining both workshops and remote gameplay.
A solid provenance
The Simulation has been developed from our decades of experience working with key account teams and key account programmes in multiple industries.
It is also supported by Professor Malcolm McDonald, Emeritus Professor at Cranfield University, Honorary Professor at Warwick Business School and one of the world’s leading experts in strategic sales and marketing.
It is based on the highly successful Market2Win Simulator platform, which has been used by universities and companies to teach strategy for over 15 years.
How it works
The simulation is online and game-based. Participants work in account teams, with each team representing a supplier competing for the business of a large global account.
The account itself has different buying centres and operates in a dynamic market.
To beat their competitors, the winning team will need to demonstrate superior customer insight, focus, anticipation, strategic agility and account plan execution.
Participants have a simple, easy to use interface which allows them to quickly learn about their own company, their competitors and the strategic account.
Various reports can be accessed that provide key information about the account, the marketplace, the products/services and key trends. These help participants understand the account relationship and its changing landscape. They also help participants understand different buying situations and the importance of having superior customer insight.
A performance screen provides powerful information on their company’s current performance with the account including metrics on sales, costs, profits, share of wallet, account potential and performance. Users can zoom in to view their company’s performance for each opportunity in detail. This helps participants understand how these metrics connect together and provides a detailed performance dashboard.
Opportunity Portfolio charts provide useful summaries of opportunity growth rates, share of wallet, future attractiveness and current competitiveness. These charts help participants formulate their customer strategy and articulate it clearly.
Participants need to decide where to invest, when to invest and how to invest in their value proposition. This requires the best customer assessment, the best competitor analysis, the best customer insight, clear focus and a powerful customer strategy. They also need to strike a balance between quick wins and longer term gains.
Included in the Simulation is an account planning template which is used to discuss and capture the company strategy. This can be retained by participants after the game has finished as a practical tool to support their own account planning process.
Key benefits
Often, people know the theory but do not have a chance to practice it. Through using the SAM2Win Simulation participants do not just learn about account strategy, they get to practice it repeatedly in dynamic competitive conditions.
Like any professional who must master their art, this helps them develop the right skills to grow your most important accounts.
This simulation includes key proven tools to help you establish a realistic growth strategy for a major customer account– with services definitely in the picture.
If you want to sell more to large, complex, global customers then this is the simulation for you.
What they say about SAM2Win
We chose several training more or less off the shelf. SAM2Win was one of them which is provided by Market2Win in the UK. For all trainings it was important to choose providers which can deliver them for sure in the four home countries, France, Germany, Spain and UK. But also the possibility to deploy the trainings at specific locations around the world, as well as to deliver them digitally. SAM2Win fulfils all of that.
Why is this important to us? Our Account teams are highly diverse, especially during the sales phase.
An additional factor in favour of SAM2Win is the fact that it perfectly fitted also with our established sales opportunity and bid management methodologies. Overall, the important point here is that SAM2Win shows our SAM and KAM how and where to “mine the account” and subsequently increase our “share of wallet” within the respective large customer account.
Being run in a remote (i.e. digital) version, was the proof of concept that a hybrid delivery of SAM2Win is possible. It was a nice mix of webinar, practical exercises in the supporting simulation tool provided by market2win, and enriched by coaching calls for the group and each competing team.
SAM2Win is now available across Airbus to be booked by the GAM, SAM, and KAM.
SAM2Win closes the gap between the account operational execution and the active generation of new sales opportunities, as highly qualified leads put into the pipeline.
In other words: We use the SAM2Win simulation to deliver our advanced Key Account Management training across Airbus. It is a highly innovative, practical game and simulation that does a great job of helping us think differently, close the functional gaps and grow our diverse businesses.
Andreas Pilz, Senior Manager of Sales Governance and Excellence, Airbus Defence and Space
I really recommend the SAM2Win Program! In this simulation I was able to understand key concepts of Strategic Account Management and applied then to lead my simulated company to a sustained growth with my key customer. This experience will be helpful developing KAMs in the company I work for. I also had the opportunity to interact with Professor Edmund Bradford and would like to recognize his mastery of the subject and great skills as an instructor. He generously shared with me relevant insights he has developed during all the years in the field. I believe anyone willing to commit effort in this program will have a great ROI.
Luis Ferrey, Director, Sales Excellence Global & NA, Ingredion Inc.
I had an amazing opportunity to take part in Ed’s Market2Win simulator on my sales unit at the University of Portsmouth. It expanded my knowledge of strategic relationships significantly and improved my skills for key account management. It is a very interactive tool that reflects real life situations and provides a valuable insight into marketing and sales world. Thank you Ed for such a brilliant game!
Ausra Gervelyte, Senior Business Analyst, Savvy IQ Hospitality Consultants
The tool helped me to get a better understanding of the key account management process and how my decisions will affect my overall performance on the short-run and long-run. The tool is absolutely amazing and I would definitely recommend to any person who wants to develop better strategic management skills. Thank you Ed for this opportunity!
Ciprian Lucaci, Clinical CMO Senior Project Manager, Thermo Fisher Scientific
Just wanted to say thank you very much for your insights into KAM when playing the KAM2Win simulator, after playing I am very tempted to change career paths and move into key account management in the future.
Nathaniel Powell, Talent Partnerships & Apprenticeships Manager at Five Guys Europe
As part of a team that participated in the SAM2Win simulation game, I can testify to growing professionally and developing a wide range of skills. Not only did my group and I enjoy the simulation, we developed teamwork skills, strategic thinking, leadership, planning, researching and analyzing various international markets, the application of marketing concepts, and execution.
Nancy Melara, Senior Pharmaceutical Recruiter | President’s Club Award Recipient, BioPoint Inc
A massive thank you … The simulation was highly enjoyable as a different learning method and gave me a far greater understanding of how to implement to KAM strategies in practice. Also, Edmund’s presentation and description of each stage was excellent.
Matt Baxter, Head of Account Management at Euromonitor International
I would like to thank Edmund for giving me the opportunity to develop my KAM skills when using the market2win simulation. It was a really enjoyable experience that allowed me to gain a much better understanding of what exactly KAM is and how it works in real life. The simulation was also very fun due to the competitive nature of the game, as all teams are playing against other classmates. Reflecting on the experience, I have learnt so much about different strategies, account planning, tools in practice and KAM in general.
Sam Hudson, Commercial Programme Lead at Vodafone
It really helped us to understand good Strategic Account Management principles and how to apply them to our business. Using a SAM simulation significantly enhanced the overall learning experience.
Program Manager, Customer Relationship and Account Management, Global Corporation
As an final year Hospitality Management student study in University of Portsmouth, been really happy to choose Professional Selling and Sales Management this course as my final year optional unit, During this course, the most interesting and amazing part was using Market2win simulator to gain more and depth knowledge of the Key Account Manager. The simulator teaches us how quick to make decision in the business and also need to make the maximums profit, also know how to be prepared for our competitors and made more business and profit. Also enhance the Key Account Management and Marketing knowledge and skills.
Thank you very much Mr. Bradford bring the Market2win simulator to us and made our course was more interesting and practical.
Aiyin, Student
“An incredibly effective way to learn about account planning.”
“Actually using the Simulation was brilliant”
“It gave a new perspective to account plans and strategy”
Participant feedback