How to Work with and Sell Enterprise Clients
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In this episode of Agency Journey, Duncan Craig from Raka comes to discuss growing an agency and how they work with and sell enterprise clients.
Duncan and his co-founders worked together at an agency that eventually sold and, they started Raka together.
Here are the main takeaways from the interview.
Keep It Personal
One thing that stands out throughout the interview is Duncan’s focus on personal relationships. With their clients, they keep the heads of the agency easily accessible. Rather than being handed off to just an account manager, they’re able to reach one of the executives directly and know that they’re talking to someone actively working on the account.
Raka also focuses on making sure that the team’s time is well balanced. Rather than an agency working long hours, they make sure it’s simple to leave at a reasonable time. This keeps the team recharged and enjoying agency work without getting burned out.
To even take the personal nature of Raka further, the name itself is after the agency owner, Stephen Rakaseder, that the partners worked for before. They viewed him as a mentor, and after he passed, they wanted their work to continue his legacy.
With this emphasis on keeping relationships personal, Duncan and the other partners have built an agency that gives them the lifestyle they like.
Working with Enterprise Clients
Working with large enterprise clients is a different challenge from the businesses most agencies work with. It’s much harder to offer a cookie-cutter service, and the emphasis is customized solutions for the client’s needs.
Rather than saying “here’s what we have,” it’s the client giving you the specific challenges they’re facing and what they need fixing. Raka then develops a customized solution to reach the objective.
This includes more partnerships as well on a client project and collaborating to get results.
Getting Enterprise Deals
Duncan takes some time to break down how they began working with enterprise clients so other agencies can begin.
The first step is working with larger agencies. Everyone knows that large agencies sub-contract work to smaller ones, and you can work with recognizable brands, even if it’s just a department.
As you continue to prove yourself with these accounts, you can build relationships for larger projects and work with them directly. By doing this, you will also begin to collect large brand names as clients. You can then use those on your site and in marketing materials to add credibility to your agency.
Credibility makes it easier to land more enterprise clients since they’ll see you have the experience for it.
Duncan’s decade plus of running an agency plus the size of his accounts gives him a lot of insights for agency owners, no matter their size. You can reach him at their website or on LinkedIn.
