Treat your suppliers as you would your clients

Building and managing business relationships with clients takes time. However, it is time that most organisations acknowledge is well spent. Traditional business thinking tends to believe “these people pay us money, therefore spending time making them happy will make us more money in the future”. It is on that basis that organisations commit both time and money to managing accounts and developing client relationships. When attention is turned to supplier relationships, most organisations take an altogether different view. Gone are the smiles and handshakes and in come the price negotiations and stringent contracts.

Manage downstream business relationships as you would upstream business relationships

Business relationships are not one directional. Remember that the amount of time and money you put into developing your client relationships, your suppliers are trying to put the same time and money into developing you and your business. You are someone’s client too – dismiss this at your peril.

Think of how you would deal with this situation. Two clients call on the same day, asking for a similar type of work to be completed in next to no time. (Doesn’t happen much in the Design world I know, but imagine the scenario anyway) Now, one of these clients, you love. They are always respectful, they come back to you with good feedback on your work, are always constructive in their criticism and they pay you well. The other client makes you miserable. They are always negotiating price, changing briefs half way through a project and generally nitpicking on small things. If you can only turn one of these jobs around within the hour deadline, which job are you going to pick? Which business relationship would you be prepared to sacrifice?

OK, shoe on the other foot time. You are rushing to get this job done for your fabulous client. You have promised him you’ll get this done in the hour. One snag, you have to ask your supplier to spring into action on your behalf to deliver a critical part of it. But hang on, you’ve spent the last three months negotiating his price, changing his brief half way through and generally being a complete pain in the nether regions. Is this supplier really going to ask how high to jump when you call? Probably not.

It’s not about the money

Simplistic though the above scenario was, it happens every day in varying degrees across the B2B marketing world. Suppliers are a vital link in the chain, not some faceless company to be dropped if the price isn’t right. By creating a relationship with your supplier, much in the same way you would with a client, you will get more value for money than you would ever seek to save with negotiation and haranguing alone.

Industry insights, tips, hints and possibly even clients come your way from a supplier that rates and respects you. Your supplier is part of your network and if you come through for them or cut them some slack when they need it, they will extend the same courtesy to you. In changing economic times, strong business relationships upstream and downstream will benefit your company.