Welcome to episode 97. My first ever podcast was with Kate Whittaker, head of corporate communications at DUAL Group, so working on the client side. During that episode she was explaining the exceptional agency who worked with her, particularly about their excellent client service, but also how they really understand her and her business. So for this episode, I invited the leadership team of that agency, Free Partners, to talk to me about how they work and think. You'll hear from Managing Partner, Lorraine Jeckells, Brand Director, Greg Phitidis, and Creative Director, Guy Cornet. 

We chatted about:- their agency's specialist positioning, focusing just in the insurance market and why that's beneficial to their business, to their team and to their clients. - their agency values and how they bring them to life through their ways of working. - their internal processes and how the three departments (account management/strategy/creative) work together in a client centric way.

They also go deep into the importance of the creative brief, why they have a tactical and a strategic briefing process, and how they grow their own talent from graduate level so that they are moulded into the Free Partners ways of working. And finally, how they delight their clients by being proactive and bringing fresh thinking and initiatives without waiting passively for briefs.

If you’re listening to this at the end of 2023 and you want to build a more entrepreneurial mindset in your account management role or your team, I'm enrolling right now for my twelve month training and mentoring program called the Account Accelerator.

I created the Account Accelerator because agency owners were telling me they knew their existing client accounts could grow further but they needed their account managers to do three key things:

1. Act as trusted advisors rather than order takers, so they understood their clients business objectives and felt confident to have conversations about how the agency could help. 2. Spot upsell and cross sell opportunities and follow them effectively so they could increase retention and generate new business opportunities with existing clients. 3. Ask insightful questions to uncover client challenges and feel confident presenting new ideas and asking for referrals and testimonials so they could help a strong sales pipeline of new leads and capture proof of happy clients.

So if all of this sounds interesting, then please visit my website https://www.accountmanagementskills.com, where you can book a call, have a chat with me and see if this might be a good fit for you or a member of your team.