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Overview of Benchmark University Program Offerings
Benchmark Consulting Services, Ltd.
If you would like to get an idea of our full slate of Benchmark University program offerings, take time to peruse this page and then let us know if you have questions.
Advanced Marketing Firm (AMF) Program
Description | This program is designed for growth oriented agency management teams that want to reach the next level by implementing the best practices that we have seen in working with more than 100 agencies.
The AMF Program is a two-year development program that is comprised of four working sessions (where all agencies are together), structured conference calls and visits to each agency site during the program.
Benchmark will direct and facilitate the group through a transition program designed to migrate the agencies to an Advanced Marketing Firm structure. This educational and skills transfer process will focus primarily on target marketing and team based selling and strengthening the core fundamental functions required to grow the Firm’s business. The program’s fundamental concepts will follow the seven Business Development (BDS) pillars:
- Management Team Development and Firm Culture
- Building Teams
- Firm Systems & Processes
- Recruiting to AMF Model
- Firm-wide Planning
- Marketing & Target Market Focus
- Specialists & Strategic Alliances
The management teams learn the Benchmark Planning Methodology and develop a customized plan for implementation as an integral component of each of the four workshops. This takes the classroom information and converts it into action. This substantially improves the retention and the usability of the information and moves attendees from the “knowing about something” phase to the “knowing” phase.
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Delivery Components | 18-24 month program 4 two-day sessions 4 customized implementation plans (one developed at each session) 4 conference calls (one following each session, halfway between sessions) 2 agency site visits (one during the first 18 months, one after the first 18 months)
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Audience | The audience for this program is a Firm’s management team. An agency management team must consist of a managing partner, a sales manager and a marketing director. |
Team Selling Workshop
Description | Creating High Performance Sales Teams that want to double their incomes in the next 24 months is a science.
This program is designed to ensure basic infrastructure of a sales team is implemented using a common set of processes and systems that are built on the experiences of the most successful teams. Detailed documentation will be provided so that the team has all the information needed to understand the high-powered strategies, systems, roles and responsibilities, basic skills and knowledge to accelerate growth.
The teams learn the Benchmark Planning Methodology, which is a comprehensive planning system that will optimize the team’s production over the next six months. Each team will develop a customized plan for implementation as an integral component of the workshop. This takes the classroom information and converts it into action. This substantially improves the retention and the usability of the information and moves attendees from the “knowing about something” phase to the “knowing” phase.
Each sales team is also provided with a Sales Team Manual template to develop using the information provided as well as a Team Progress Checklist to monitor the teams’ progress, identify areas requiring focus and the best way to manage the team. |
Delivery Components |
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Audience | The audience for this program is a Firm’s management team. An agency management team must consist of a managing partner, a sales manager and a marketing director. |
Management Coaching Program Options
Offering | Description |
Annual coaching conference calls | 4 quarterly conference calls to coach firm management teams on solutions to current issues and challenges. When existing solutions are available they will be provided.
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Site visit to develop 3 year strategic business plan and four quarterly conference calls | One-day site visit to do annual strategic planning, develop major new initiative and /or consulting on current agency strategies. Meet with management to develop roof, pillars, and objectives for their plan. 90-day action plan can be developed post session independently.
Four follow on quarterly conference calls to coach the management team through implementation and issue resolution.
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Develop annual plan | One-day site visit to do planning. Meet with management to develop roof, pillars, and objectives for their plan. 90-day action plan can be developed post session independently. |
Site visit to coach management team | One-day site visit to develop to assist the management team to in deciding on where they are and where they need to be with problem solving/brainstorming as part of the discussion. This could be with management and with teams. Any AMF topic could be fair game. |
Plan development with a strategic alliance partner | We can also facilitate the plan building activity when you are developing your initial plan with a Strategic Alliance partner. |
Strategic Business Planning for a client of the firm | Site visit for Benchmark to perform Strategic Business Planning for a Firm’s business clients. |
Benchmark Online University
Description | The Benchmark Online University is an internet based delivery system with curriculums in the following areas:
- Recruiting
- Team Based Selling for Sales Managers
- Recruiting Best Practices that Produce Results
- Fee Based Planning
- Management Development
- Strategic Business Planning
- Team Based Selling for Producers
- Marketing
We have discovered the best practices that good agencies and good producers are using to substantially grow their practices. By making this information available 24X 7 it meets the demands of highly effective, busy people who know that need additional training to experience vertical and personal growth. This program will super charge your existing training programs.
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Audience | Agency management and/or sales teams and producers. |
Benchmark Executive Intelligence System using 1:1 Interview Process
Description | Everyone we speak to wants to know how to improve field productivity. In fact most large carriers spend considerable amounts of money every year in surveying field personnel, holding focus group sessions with producers, holding review sessions with key field management and many other variations on these themes. You want to know what does the fields think needs to be improved so that production will increase. How receptive is the field to the latest products or marketing programs you have released?
It usually takes an inordinate amount of time to collect the data, reach a consensus and then develop solutions that meet the field requirements. In fact considerable money, time and resources are wasted because by the time the solutions are delivered its too late.
We have discovered an entirely unique approach that is being used today by several of the well know leaders in the IT industry. This proven approach will allow you to do online interviews of field personnel in less than 10 minutes per person. Once the interviews are complete you will have an action report that will show you by highest priority what the most important problems are, what the requirements to fix them are and what are some of the solutions as perceived by your field opinion leaders. Rather than guessing about what will have the most impact you will have the hard data to use to make your decisions.
One of the major benefits to this approach in the IT industry is the number of projects that have been cancelled because they just don’t have any real significance. This enables you to put your resources behind the best projects that will have much-improved odds of producing a substantial improvement.
You can look at what needs to be done from a home office viewpoint or you can view the data from a per agency perspective. I believe that you will be shocked at how effective this approach is compared to traditional methods. Not only will you save substantial time, effort and money using this approach it will send the message to the field that you are listening to them and providing more timely solutions. This is designed to give you a competitive market edge. |
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