Area Sales Manager

Overview

To manage all sales in the Johannesburg South area in order to achieve maximum profitability and growth in accordance with organization plans.

Responsibilities

Sales

• Develop sales plans (90 days) for the area

• Ensure sales potential for areas are captured

• Establish sales goals and targets for the area in line with the SASKO's overall objectives

• Responsible for growing volume and value driving market share as per KPI's

• Predict future sales trends and prepare accurate forecasts based on market analysis and historical data.

• Conduct market research to identify new opportunities, monitor competition, and stay updated on industry trends

• Create and implement effective sales strategies to increase revenue, expand the customer base, and enter new markets

• Track the profitability of sales efforts, ensuring that sales strategies contribute to the cluster's bottom line

• Monitor sales KPIs and ensure sales targets for areas and routes are achieved

• Monitor and manage distributor performance ensuring that targets are met at optimal costs

• Manage sales budget, promotions and pricing

• Route Riding, Oder Management

People Growth

• Monitor the performance of sales staff by setting KPIs, providing regular feedback, and conducting sales meetings and performance evaluations.

• Hire, train, and mentor members of the sales team to ensure they have the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed.

• Encourage a high-performance culture through incentives, recognition, and motivational leadership.

• Work with -WEC; Conduct regular gate to gate meetings with sales supervisors to assess market and identify development opportunities

• Identify skill gaps within the sales team and organize training programs or workshops to improve performance.

• Embed a culture of consumer centricity, personal accountability, compliance

Systems, Procedures

• Understand BI (Business Intelligence) or similar programmes

• Bakery scorecard report

• Understand and evaluate daily sales report

• Understand DRM (Distribution Management)

• Understand, run and read reports daily

Relationship Results

• Strong internal liaison with warehouse to ensure 100% on time delivery to customers and external liaison with 3rd Party Merchandising function to ensure execution in trade according to EDGE principles

• Work closely with the marketing team to ensure alignment between marketing campaigns and sales strategies, driving qualified leads to the sales team.

• Ensure that the sales team works in sync with operations, logistics, or production teams to meet customer delivery expectations.

• Ensure effective distribution of product to all outlets, to always achieve customer satisfaction

• Manage relationships with external sales channels, distributors, or resellers to ensure they align with the company's Objectives

• Mandate management, deals and claims

• Responsible for investment management

• In store execution, customer call implementation and controls

• Ensuring that all SLA's are adhered to

• Responsible for returns and pallets

Innovation

• Ensure that sales practices comply with all relevant legal and regulatory standards.

• Promote and enforce ethical behavior within the sales team, maintaining the company's reputation and customer trust

Qualifications

• Business related 3-year diploma or degree (sales, marketing, business management)

• 3-5 years Sales Managerial experience in FMCG environment

• Demonstrate ability to analyze sales forecasts, competitor activities and to formulate sales strategies

• Negotiate and manage trading terms, price, shelf space & promotions

• Valid Code 8 license

• Systems, procedures and systems E.G. SAP