Key Account Specialist

Sales Account Specialist

THE OPPORTUNITY: The Sales Account Specialist will be located in the Houston area and is responsible for learning the details of existing accounts, expanding sales opportunities within these accounts, and developing new business with other retailers. This role will maintain and build long-term relationships with buyers and develop sales programs designed to achieve budgeted sales volume and margin – contributing to the growth and expansion of the company.

ESSENTIAL JOB FUNCTIONS:

• Create new business/sales opportunities through organized prospecting, lead generation and networking to increase brand awareness and market share.
• Travel for in-person meetings with customers and partners to develop and maintain relationships, represent the company, close deals and contribute to a high level of customer satisfaction.
• Build strong partnerships in existing accounts by fostering relationships with key decision makers.
• Maintain close customer relationships to understand client needs and collaborate with the sales team on shared business channel sales.
• Share key data and insights with customers and other departments to better understand current and future needs and to drive sales. Recommend product or service enhancements to improve customer satisfaction and sales potential.
• Leverage existing relationships to develop new opportunities such as expanding business in new product categories.
• Negotiate for additional floor space and purchase commitments to maximize sales.
• Documents daily sales activities, prepares accurate reports and forecasts, manages pipeline and communicates such activities to the leadership team.
• Act as a client's trusted advisor by leveraging customer, product and industry data to proactively problem solve, address concerns and capitalize on opportunities.
• Provides field feedback to internal, cross-functional teams regarding services, selling and competitive matters.
• Partner with Product Development to represent customer needs in core product lines, new product development, product customization for specific client accounts, product assortment, and key messaging.
• Participate in trade shows, set-up customer meetings and interface with clients during the shows.
• Serve as primary contact for all replenishment activities. Partner with customer's replenishment team to recommend and implement forecast adjustments based on item performance.
• Submit new item setup documentation and maintenance via customer portals.
• Conduct ongoing retail store audits to complete comp shops, validate items, pricing, promotions and competitor's items as well retail level executions.
• Provide forecast to internal procurement and production teams as requested. Conduct ongoing monitoring to coordinate production priorities based on demand, fluctuations in sales, lead time and market changes.
• Provides the sales team with insights regarding the impact of competition, promotional initiatives, and pricing changes.
• Ability to work collaboratively with employees within the sales function and across functions including Marketing, Sales Operations, Customer Service, and Product development.
• Review and validate post audit claims, deductions for promotions and markdowns as well as other chargebacks.
• Perform other duties as assigned, based on workload and business need.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Bachelor's degree required.
• Minimum of 2-4 years of experience in B2B Sales, sales of consumer goods with major home centers & hardware retailers strongly preferred.
• Proven ability to develop and maintain strong rapport with key decision makers including buyers, merchandise managers and executive leadership.
• Must be skillful with multi-level selling, communication, negotiations, relationship building, territory management, strategic selling, account management, articulation of corporate value proposition, needs analysis and appropriate competitive positioning.