New Business Development Manager

Overview

We are a Supply Chain and Sales & Merchandising partner adding value to your business through a fully integrated, temperature-controlled network in Southern Africa.

But we are also more than that. We are people serving people. While we boast the best in tech and infrastructure, our people are our greatest resource. With our skilled, curious, can-do people at the forefront, our assets become your assets, our service your solutions.

Vector’s vehicle fleet includes a food industry first in ‘multi-temperature’ vehicles enabling the company to service business across frozen, chilled and ambient temperature zones on a single delivery.

Job Purpose

To develop and implement a strategy for growing our client's profitability through the expansion of new channels.

Key Responsibilities

New Business Development Strategy Formulation and Implementation :

• Formulate short- and long-term (3-year) strategies to deliver sustainable, profitable growth within a new customer base.
• Prioritise products and initiatives by new business opportunity on the basis of demand.
• Ensure alignment across other channels and with the supply side of the business.
• Participate in the S&OP product forecast process to drive improved forecast accuracy.
• Determine the tone and direction the new business development team takes in its approach to working with possible and newly established key customers.
• Drive the achievement of targeted sales growth.
• Evaluate and monitor competitors and their activities and formulate proactive responses when required.
• Perform rigorous product / channel analysis and allocate budget accordingly.
• Work collaboratively across cross-functional teams to align demand and supply across the Company.
• Drive the achievement of SIA targets.
• Participate in the commercial planning process through the development of an annual new customer business plan that supports brand and channel plans.
• Seek out and pursue line extensions, new channels and new business.
• Manage and penetrate new business channels at all levels, develop relationships that enable the achievement of customer plans and objectives and lead all cross-functional team activities related to such accounts.
• Evaluate and expand export opportunities, leveraging SA retailers, wholesalers and distributors in foreign countries.
• Assess and convert expansion opportunities as well as new BOP distribution models.

Market Research :

Conduct ongoing research and market assessments regarding the economic conditions across all possible new channels within the broad sector including future industry and consumer trends and competition.

Conduct regular reviews of new business performance and promotion strategies.

Analyse and track new market, customer and channel trends and in-market measures at the customer and channel level, such as distribution, share, price, and merchandising performance.

Identify likely sales points.

Develop and maintain product knowledge across new channels and products to ensure ongoing alignment.

New Business Operationalisation :

Make presentations to and negotiate with prospective new business.

Estimate market values and conditions to determine appropriate time, place, type of launch.

Develop the preliminary business case to support investment, including pricing strategy and new business model requirements.

Obtain commercial input for all new initiatives and future rollouts.

Obtain Capex motivations to support sustainable investment.

Report and provide recommendations regarding new product / customer / market profitability.

Develop business propositions and budgets for Board approval.

Develop proposals, negotiate terms and conditions, and implement contractual agreements for new accounts with accountability for delivering strong financial results.

Drive reporting and post implementation reviews to the business.

Account Management :

Ensure that all new business accounts are profitably serviced in order for the Company to achieve sales and revenue goals.

Analyse sales statistics to determine new business growth potential.

Plot the annual and long-term objectives for new accounts and ensure all volume, distribution and profit targets are met.

Collaborate with the marketing team to develop and implement campaigns to suit the new channels.

Coordinate multi-disciplinary teams to ensure smooth and efficient operations and delivery of all services to new customers. This includes product development, demand plotting, production plotting and delivering products.

New Product Development :

Drive the collaboration with the R&D and marketing teams to identify a robust pipeline of new products where required for new customers and channels.

Work closely with the balance of the business to develop the appropriate ranges to satisfy the new channels.

Reporting :

Provide monthly feedback to the Board indicating profitability of new channels and business.

Client Relationship Management :

Manage all aspects of new business profiles, including short term performance and forecasts.

Develop and maintain strong work relationships with key opinion leaders in the existing and new markets to inform future planning and sales focus.

Drive the awareness and understanding of new customers’ budgets, goals, strategies, needs and the impact.

Drive the nature and extent of all communications with new customers.

Manage client utilisation and product adoption rates through new business opportunities.

Drive multi-disciplinary teams to provide new customers with market intelligence and other value-added services.

Channel Planning and Execution :

Lead an annual planning process to create customer-specific promotional plans that support annual brand plans.

Participate in determining annual marketing and channel objectives and strategies and advertising and promotion spend.

Lead channel performance reviews.

Estimate ROI for key channel initiatives and evaluate plans post-execution.

Pricing Management :

Participate in setting new product pricing to extract maximum value for new customers.

Track brand and competitive price across customers within existing and new channels.

Recommend pricing corrections and adjustments where required to sustain new business development.

Understand how customer spending is allocated.

Recommend ongoing improvements and pricing innovation to create greater value across new customers and channels.

Financial Management :

Recommend base and stretch financial goals for the new business development team.

Manage and control the new business sales budget.

Understand key drivers of profit and loss and actively support the achievement of financial targets including driving profitable product mix across new channels or at a customer level, maximising profitability, and identifying further business opportunities.

Identify business risks to achieving sales targets within new channels and business.

Staff Management :

Lead and develop staff within the context of the Labour Relations Act, Employment Equity Act, Basic Conditions of Employment Act and the Skills Development Act.

Monitor staff performance and provide regular feedback.

Manage staff activities, ensuring service levels are met and protocols are adhered to.

Coach and support staff where necessary to achieve objectives.

Manage staff leave and general time management issues in line with organisational deliverables and standards.

Manage and deliver on succession plans to enable the development of a future generation of leaders and specialists and ensure optimal turnover and retention levels are maintained.

Champion staff training and development through the utilisation of available training opportunities or contributing to the development of new training solutions in collaboration with national training specialists.

Conduct regular performance appraisals with subordinates.

Establish sound staff and labour organising and communication structures and systems.

Lead the team towards meeting the strategy and targets through regular communication and utilisation of the full organisational talent management tool set.

Drive employment equity within the team to ensure that diversity is achieved at all levels and that statutory targets and requirements are met.

Develop and manage high performance multidisciplinary teams in order to solve problems within the Food Services market.

Conduct regular meetings and ensure that records are kept and shared across the team and that action plans agreed to within team meetings are delivered upon.

Key Relationships

Internal :

R&D.

Broader customer and marketing teams.

Food Solutions.

Sales Commercial.

S&OP participants.

Marketing.

Vector.

Board.

External :

Potential customers, entrepreneurs and markets.

Qualifications, Skills and Experience Required for the Job

Qualifications and Experience

Degree in management, business administration and / or marketing.

Valid Code EB driver's licence.

8 to 10 years' experience in opening revenue channels and closing sales.

Previous track record in the delivery of new channel or business opportunities.

Skills and Competencies

Planning and organisation.

Negotiation and deal closure.

Relationship building.

Project management.

Computer literacy (MS Office and SAP).

Verbal and written communication.

Report writing.

Interpersonal.

Logical thinking.

Innovative thinking.

Problem solving.

Critical thinking.

Decision-making.

Analytical and evaluative thinking.

Achieving sales, profitability, and budget goals.

Implementation of sales and marketing strategies.

Vector Logistics supports the principles of Employment Equity and is committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace. Preference will be given to candidates from designated groups in line with our Employment Equity Plan.

If you have not heard from us within 3 to 4 weeks after submitting your application, please consider your application unsuccessful on this occasion. We truly appreciate your interest in joining the Vector team and encourage you to stay connected for future opportunities that may align with your skills and career journey.

We look forward to hearing from you!

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