Key Account Management and Strategic Growth Training Course

Course overview

Key account managers are expected to protect revenue, uncover growth opportunities and coordinate multiple internal teams around a small number of commercially critical customers. That work becomes difficult when account plans are little more than contact lists, customer relationships sit with one individual, and opportunity discussions focus on product features rather than the customer’s business priorities. This course equips participants to manage strategic accounts as long-term business portfolios, with disciplined planning, stakeholder engagement and measurable joint value creation.

Participants learn how to segment and prioritise accounts, analyse account profitability and growth potential, build stakeholder maps, identify buying influences and create account strategies that connect customer objectives to their organisation’s capabilities. The course covers account-plan structure, opportunity qualification, value proposition development, executive business reviews, negotiation preparation and cross-functional account governance. Participants practise using CRM data, Excel-based account analysis and dashboard measures to turn account activity into defensible commercial decisions.

Delivery combines instructor-led frameworks with realistic strategic-account cases, account-planning workshops, stakeholder-role simulations and peer review. Each participant develops a practical strategic account plan for a live account or a detailed case account, including an account profile, relationship map, opportunity pipeline, risk register, 90-day action plan and executive review agenda. Managers gain a clearer view of how participants will apply the course through agreed account actions and measurable performance indicators.

The course is designed for key account managers and client-facing sales professionals who already manage important customers or are moving into a strategic-account role. It is equally useful where organisations need more consistent account planning, stronger customer retention and better coordination between sales, service, operations and leadership.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Segment strategic accounts using revenue, profitability, growth potential and relationship-risk criteria
• Construct a one-page account profile that captures customer strategy, commercial position and competitive landscape
• Map stakeholders using influence, attitude and relationship-strength analysis
• Develop a strategic account plan with objectives, opportunities, risks, actions and review measures
• Qualify account opportunities using BANT and MEDDICC evidence
• Create value propositions that link customer business outcomes to quantified solution benefits
• Prepare an executive business review agenda using account performance, pipeline and service data
• Build a 90-day account action plan with owners, milestones and CRM follow-up activities

Benefits of attending

Target competencies

Who should attend

• Key Account Managers — who own revenue retention and growth across strategically important customers
• Strategic Account Managers — who need a repeatable method for planning complex multi-stakeholder accounts
• National Account Managers — who negotiate and coordinate customer activity across regions or business units
• Business Development Managers — who are converting major prospects into long-term strategic accounts
• Sales Managers — who need to coach account teams and review account plans consistently
• Customer Success Managers — who manage enterprise relationships where adoption, renewal and expansion are linked

Requirements and prerequisites

Participants should have basic experience in B2B sales, customer relationship management or commercial account ownership, ideally with responsibility for at least one established customer or a realistic account case. They should understand common sales terms such as pipeline, forecast, margin, decision maker and renewal, and be comfortable reviewing simple revenue and opportunity data in a spreadsheet. Familiarity with a CRM such as Salesforce is helpful but not essential. No prior formal account-management qualification, advanced financial modelling, Power BI expertise or negotiation certification is required. Complete beginners can attend, but should expect to work with sales scenarios and account-planning terminology from the first day.

Training methodology

The five days use short instructor-led inputs followed by applied work on a running strategic-account case and, where appropriate, a participant’s own account. Participants analyse account data in Microsoft Excel, build stakeholder maps, enter and review opportunity information in Salesforce-style CRM workflows, and interpret account measures through Power BI dashboard examples. Role plays focus on discovery meetings, executive business reviews and renewal negotiations. Small groups critique account plans against clear quality criteria. The final session converts course outputs into a prioritised 90-day application plan for manager review.

Course outline

Day 1: Selecting and understanding strategic accounts

• Strategic account management versus transactional sales coverage
• Account portfolio segmentation using revenue, margin, potential and risk
• Customer business-model and market-context analysis
• Account profitability and cost-to-serve assessment
• Account profile design and source-data validation
• Competitive position mapping within a customer account
• Strategic account objectives and account-selection criteria

Workshop: Participants analyse a customer portfolio and produce a prioritised strategic-account segment and one-page account profile.

Day 2: Building customer relationships and influence

• Stakeholder mapping by influence, attitude and relationship strength
• Economic buyer, technical buyer, user buyer and coach roles
• Organisational chart analysis and informal influence networks
• Customer discovery questions linked to business priorities
• Relationship-gap analysis and contact-coverage planning
• Trust-building through commercial and operational credibility
• Cross-functional account-team roles and communication cadences

Workshop: Participants create a stakeholder map and relationship action plan for a complex account with competing internal interests.

Day 3: Creating value and qualifying growth opportunities

• Customer outcome statements and value-driver identification
• Quantified value propositions using cost, revenue, risk and productivity measures
• BANT opportunity qualification for early-stage account opportunities
• MEDDICC evidence for complex buying decisions
• Opportunity pipeline stages and next-step discipline
• Cross-sell and upsell white-space analysis
• Salesforce opportunity records, fields and account activity tracking

Workshop: Participants qualify two account opportunities and produce a quantified value proposition with CRM-ready next actions.

Day 4: Governing the account and managing commercial risk

• Strategic account-plan architecture and review cycles
• Joint business planning with customer objectives and mutual commitments
• Executive business review agenda design
• Microsoft Excel account analysis for revenue, margin and pipeline trends
• Power BI dashboard measures for account health and growth
• Risk registers for renewal, delivery, competition and stakeholder change
• Negotiation preparation using interests, concessions and walk-away positions

Workshop: Participants build an account governance pack containing review measures, a risk register and a negotiation preparation sheet.

Day 5: Presenting and executing the strategic account plan

• Account strategy narrative for senior internal stakeholders
• Prioritising initiatives by value, urgency, effort and dependency
• 90-day action planning with accountable owners and milestones
• Internal resource alignment across sales, service, operations and product teams
• Account-plan presentation structure and executive challenge handling
• Coaching conversations and manager-led account reviews
• Account-plan quality criteria and continuous-improvement routines

Workshop: Participants present their strategic account plan, receive peer and instructor challenge, and finalise a 90-day implementation plan.

Tools & standards covered

Salesforce Sales Cloud, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Power BI, MEDDICC

A typical training day

Live online deliveries follow the same structure in the East Africa Time zone, with shorter screen blocks and longer breaks.

What the fee includes

How you can take this course

Certification

Participants who complete the full five days receive the Skillset Development Certificate of Completion, stating the course title, course code, dates and delivery format — suitable for professional-development records and employer reimbursement.

Frequently asked questions