Strategy & Business Development Director at Kantar

Reference No.: R036599
Location: Ikorodu, Lagos

Role Description
Draft and monitor strategic direction of the team, with specific focus on:

• Increasing our win rate
• Renewing existing business
• Filling the pipeline with ‘new’ business, including targeting business with competitors

General Responsibilities

• Set up and maintain centralised hub for business development documentation & information
• Set up and maintain central site for the wider business to access historical proposals & pitches
• Provide CS teams with templated proposals for quick-turn and core solutions, like Link, including keeping abreast of global proposal template updates to ensure relevancy
• Create standardised proposal inserts for common requirements
• Liaise with existing, lapsed and potential clients
• Upskill CS teams on proposal writing, including making use of WPP assets to set us apart
• Align with and keep Exco updated on BD activities

Win rate Focus:

• Pipeline process set up, develop associated documentation and oversee on-going
• Monthly reporting on win rate at team level, including analysis of reasons for losses
• Set up & oversee of weekly regional sales meetings to introduce and drive winning behaviour
• Select/ present proposals at weekly review committee to drive winning proposal writing
• Monitor and follow up with CS teams/ clients on proposals sent (i.e. make sure we close)
• Assist domain leads in driving their sales and platform adoption targets

New Business - on going / current:

• Maintain a broad knowledge of Kantar offers across domains in order to identify key stakeholders to feed in to proposals
• As the first line of site for client briefs and opportunities, identify and involve key stakeholders from the start
• Participate in brainstorms and allocate tasks to the right stakeholders to ensure best possible output
• Manage the ‘big pitch’ process and ensure that a proper timeline is in place from the outset and that it is adhered to by all
• Write / support the writing of proposals, including review of central question, business context and objective and commercial imperative
• Ensure proposals meet business priorities for automation, analytics/ non-survey data integration and strategic / integration workshops
• Together with costing and operations partners, cost research and advise on packaging of value-based price options
• Meet with and present proposals to clients (based on value)

New Business Opportunities:

• Remain close to new technologies and offers being developed globally in order to offer our clients latest thinking and cutting edge design
• Brainstorm/ review client plans across teams for up-sell and cross-sell opportunities, including driving and monitoring on-going actions
• Attend relevant industry forums and events for new business/ networking opportunities
• Monitor wins from previous years for renewal opportunities
• Align with client centricity pillar as an additional means to facilitate on-going client engagement and relationship maintenance pre and post commission of research
• Identify opportunities that sit with our competitors and actively chase them, using a planned strategy and pulling in the right experts & stakeholders to support

Role Requirements

• Ideally, 5 + years’ experience in client service, research or business development
• Sound ability to listen to clients, understand their business needs and persuasive selling skills in meetings and pitches
• Strong proposal writing skills
• Understanding of Kantar solutions and approaches
• Ability to write clear internal briefs that articulate the client’s key needs
• Engaging oral/written communication skills
• A self-starter able to go after client opportunities tenaciously
• Solid working knowledge of Microsoft Office (in particular, PowerPoint and Excel)
• Highly responsive, assertive, reliable, proactive and trustworthy
• Strong administrative skills.