Sales Lead - FMCG

Designation : Sales Lead

About the company : It's a JV of an Indian FMCG company with a leading European multinational company having brands in Personal Care, Home Care and Nutrition. The JV in India plans to build brands aggressively in the personal care space. We are looking to hire a dynamic sales leader for the Joint Venture business who can contribute in developing and executing go to market strategy/plans to build a sustainable and profitable personal care business in India. This position will report to the COO.

Location: Mumbai

Qualification: MBA /Equivalent post graduate qualifications in management from a Tier 1 or 2 Institution

Experience:

Must Have:

- 10-12 years overall experience with minimum of 5 Yrs experience in FMCG

- Some understanding & experience in scaling the business through the new distribution channels of digital/e commerce model is required

- A solid sales professional with at least 5 years of P&L management experience.

- Successfully grown sales for multiple brands with proven track record of achievements & bringing sales transformation

Preferred:

- Experience in domestic and international markets

- Worked in both Indian & Multinational companies

- Experience in a start up

- Experience in an e commerce or digitally enabled business

Key Deliverables:

Strategy & Planning : 

- Develop the long-term Category, Sales & Distribution strategy & Annual Sales Plan in line with the overall company strategy

- Guide the sales teams in translation of strategy into sales business plans, and go - to market strategy within budgeted costs

- Develop the annual Sales & distribution plans to deliver budgeted Revenue, Profit and Brand equity targets for the year (By category & Channel)

- Develop an innovation plan for the channel growth through consumer insights

- Gather trends (competitor and self) from market research and historical data around sales to estimate the market size for the brands on both volume as well as value basis to forecast

- Monthly forecast of Rolling Sales Plan (RSP) for product planning and preparation and rolling out of targets for the team (Primary, Secondary Tertiary) and Distributors

- Drive the model wise build up for the distributors across zones.

- Implement the sales strategy for GT & MT formats Pan India and cascade the overall sales targets from corporate level down to the Sales Executive levels.

Business Performance & profitability: 

- Develop and manage annual sales budgets, and oversee the development and management of internal operating budgets.

- Undertake ongoing analysis and review of performance of brands, products, channels, segments and regions to assist in identification of relevant trends, opportunities, key issues and recommend and implement actions for improvement.

- Drive the sales strategy at zone level to support the achievement of overall sales targets across primary, secondary and tertiary levels of distribution.

- Deliver zone sales and profitability targets on a monthly, quarterly and annual basis as projected in the AOP

- Ensuring right forecasting, volume/Value build up for the monthly numbers and clarity on Trade/marketing inputs

- Tracking and Monitoring of Sales plans on Daily/weekly basis

- Monitoring Promo effectiveness on the SKU/brand (both Consumer/Trade Promo)

- Identifying issues and the opportunities at Brand/Category level looking at internal and external trends.

- Improve forecasting accuracy by channels and accounts, and therefore ensure inventory holding within its target levels at trade.

- Ensure that debtors are managed within acceptable levels and all trade schemes are in line with company policy

- Achieve the desired width of distribution at zone level as per the AOP

Distribution Management: 

- Develop and manage distribution business plans for the assigned region. Serve as primary liaison between distributors and their customers in order to increase sales and market share.

- To maintain and grow existing retailer distributor relationships & build new distributor relationships.

- Identify the gaps in zone distribution network through interaction with Zonal Sales Heads

- Monitor the depth of distribution across the distribution network within the zone

- Track and manage distributor engagement performance against business plans, ensure goals are being met, training is being offered and conducted and marketing funds are being allocated towards growth. Provide coaching and feedback about performance and distribution management and determine next steps for continuing relationships and growth strategies.

Marketing & product Visibility : 

- Ensure the presence of brand across zone distribution network and periodically

- Liaise with the concerned Brand Marketing leads to involve and participate in the BTL activities at zone level with a view to drive the zone sales volumes.

- Placement - Ensure placement of products at the stores specifically with counters for faster TAT and better rotation

People and Team Development: 

- Drive a high level of engagement for the sales team always keeping the values at the core

- Generate enthusiasm, excitement and commitment to the vision, business, and targets of the business

- Build capability of the team at all levels including hiring & retaining quality & scalable talent in line with talent management principles

- Drive a high performance culture within the team

- Support the leadership team, as an enterprise leader to drive the total people agenda

Competencies required:

- Must have Experience of translating vision/broad strategies into specific targets and tasks.

- Ability to deliver solution and provide expertise with speed and imagination

- Should possess high degree of business acumen and must have good understanding of P&L

- Strong research and analytical skills

- Flexible and able to multi-task; can work within a fast-moving environment

- Must have good connect and networking in the FMCG ecosystem

- Able to strategize sales & marketing plans through new age mediums including online marketplaces

Personality Attributes:

- Ability to handle pressures of scaling up

- Collaborative working style- with people across departments

- Understanding and adherence of timelines and its impact on business while driving the Brands

- Clarity of thought and analysis

- Courage of conviction

- Entrepreneur mindset

- Analytical & Data Oriented

- Digital native