A medical device maker appointing distributors

The situation

At a healthcare show most visitors to a manufacturer’s stand are distributors looking for an agency. Each wants exclusivity for a country, a price list and the registration status of the product there. Hospital buyers and clinicians come too, with different questions.

Before

Cards were sorted by country in the office. Regional managers received their piles a week later with no record of which product line had been discussed. Twice, two distributors from one country were each led to expect exclusivity.

Setting up

Product lines are set up with a catalogue for each. The four regional managers each lead a team. The follow-up wording is approved in English and Arabic.

At the show

The rep scans the card and taps the product lines and the visitor’s part in the decision. In the note he writes who they are and the territory: Kenya and Uganda, has a service team, sells two competing brands. He sends the catalogue for the lines they asked about.

A hospital’s biomedical engineer gets a different catalogue and a different next action: a demonstration, with a date.

Cards printed in Arabic and English are read in both. Where the reader is unsure of a digit in a phone number, the field is marked for the rep to check.

After the show

Each evening the sales director goes through the day’s leads and hands each market’s to its regional manager. When two distributors from the same country turn up, the regional manager sees both and decides before either is promised anything.

A week later the director looks at the hot leads still waiting and nudges the two managers who have not yet replied.