In this highly competitive marketplace, winning the coveted supplier contract with a large corporation or the federal government involves getting suited up, doing research and working very hard.
The point of contact for suppliers — also known as vendors or strategic partners — may be called supply diversity, supplier development, sourcing or purchasing. Whatever terminology is used, the seller-buyer relationship is essential. It enables you to get your foot in the door, not only in your target corporation, but also other large corporations it does business with.
Before you rush to your nearest big corporation, do your homework: study those you want to sell to, what they do, their requirements, production processes and standards.
Part of the hard work involves planning. Know your core competencies.
Be sure that you are capable of fulfilling the buyer’s needs in the volume and within the delivery time required.
If you walk into a large corporation with big promises but inadequately prepared, you will most likely be shown the door.
Decide what product or service you will provide.
Many suppliers fail miserably when they try to fit their abilities to the requirements of every big corporation.
Instead, figure out where you excel and then find a corporation that needs your expertise.
Build a track record with at least three years of past performance credentials.
For start-ups, it is a catch-22; it is difficult for them to sell to a Fortune corporation. Regardless of the length of your experience, show gradual scaling up of companies you sell to. Furthermore, establish a sound financial background; a weak financial structure diminishes your prospect of getting business.
Prepare a reference list of clients who will vouch for you. Ideally, it would be a subsidiary of your target corporation or a client of the subsidiary. The more similar they are to the big corporation you want to approach, the better.
Professionalism goes beyond getting suited up to look presentable. Refrain from going into meetings to pass brochures around. Instead, be ready to control the presentation, anticipate questions and expound on your areas of expertise concisely. Brush up on your language and presentation skills. Set your sights on big corporations that sell to the government. This may be a smart move for Asian American suppliers, because these corporations are required to meet federal goals for utilization of small minority- and women-owned firms.
Once you identify whom to sell to, find out how the corporation buys. Do they buy nationally, regionally, locally or all of the above?
Read their annual report (most are available online); this provides substantial information about what and how the corporation buys. If there is a match, you could be added to their supplier database. It may not net you an immediate order because of the sheer volume of competition — some have up to 20,000 suppliers in their database.
However, be persistent. Contact the buyer every three months or so to keep yourself on their radar screen.
I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to build a good working relationship with your buyers.
Trust is a major component of any supplier-buyer relationship.
Corporations know that suppliers could help them gain competitive advantage in the marketplace, so offer solutions to current or potential flaws in your target corporation’s products, services and manufacturing process.
Added value is not just about price, quality and delivery; show them how your business can help to streamline a process or fix a problem. Approaching large corporations could be daunting to suppliers.
However, knowing the market and the right people could get you in the door.
And if you do your research, provide top-notch products or service, and offer competitive prices, you will eventually win the coveted contract.
Susan Au Allen is national president and CEO of the U.S. Pan Asian American Chamber of Commerce.