5.2.4 Buying Centre Analysis

The decision-making process of the key accounts can be divided into three “buy classes” (Mc Donald/ Woodburn, page 195).

New Buy: When it comes to investment projects (plant modernisation, plant expansion, establishment of new plants), the requirements of all buying influences must be met and influenced by the Key Account Manager. This takes time and can be a lengthy process between the initial discussion and the order closure.

Modified rebuy: It is the strategy of MTPRO to switch competitor products or solutions to their own offering to provide better instrumentation performance and help to increase the production profitability of the customer. This most likely requires a re-examination of the new solution package by many or all of the buying influences who are involved in the New Buy class.

Straight rebuy; When it comes to buying consumables (sensors) it does most likely not require a rigorous examination of many buying influences. As for the MTPRO business the decision mostly is left to Instrumentation & Maintenance people. They should have the authority to decide to switch the supplier for consumables. However, this is a general assumption and therefore the involvement of the buying influences needs to be assessed thoroughly like with the “New buy” and “Modified rebuy” classes.

Finally, the entire buying centre analysis is performed. In chapter 4.2.2 the Miller Heiman methodology of identifying the four buying influences roles and their degree of involvement, their response modes, and the win-results are outlined in detail. This methodology is now applied for a key account in the metal mining segment. Figure 17 illustrates a buying influence worksheet related to a sales opportunity for a “New Buy” class.

There are sales opportunities that contain a large number of buying influences within the buying centre. For such cases an organigram might help to understand better how the individual buying influences are linked to each other.