The importance of having systems and processes in place that support and enable the SAM in the creation of long-term, mutual value with strategic customers cannot be overstated. Based on decades of benchmarking with the world’s most strategic customer-centric companies, SAMA has developed a robust, repeatable process for supporting and enabling the strategic account manager and the value-creation process.

Take a closer look at SAMA insights and SAMA fundamentals to begin learning from us as your organization progresses.

The SAM role has evolved over the past several decades to meet the increasing demands and organizational complexity of large, critical clients. The SAM is responsible for developing and sustaining a long-term strategic customer relationship, leveraging the supplier’s enterprise resources and capabilities to create value-based solutions, serving as a central point of contact for internal and external stakeholders, driving execution and documenting value.

Are you looking for the right people? SAMA’s best-in-class SAM Competency Model® identifies five areas of job competence, three or four skills associated with each one and key behaviors and activities most relevant to each skill. While strategic account management implementation may vary by company, industry and business model, the foundational skills required for the job are remarkably consistent.

Through decades of benchmarking with world-class companies and daily interactions with our world-class member companies, SAMA had developed a repeatable, scalable framework for developing and delivering value with strategic customers. Critically, since as many as 70 percent of buying decisions are de facto made before a request for proposal, four of the seven stages of customer co-value creation take place pre-RFP. While the drawing depicts a linear progression, SAMA’s SAM Process® should be thought of as an endlessly repeating cycle, a “virtuous circle” of co-value creation with a strategic customer over the long term.

How will your organization progress along your path? SAMA’s experience can guide you.