Last week, I was up in St. Paul, MN and had a chance to speak and meet with the 3M Safety & Industrial team. I had some time in between sessions to walk around the 3M Innovation Center and look at some of the history of 3M.
It was like a museum tour for an Industrial distribution leader: The early history of 3M, established as the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company in 1902, to mine minerals for sandpaper, Scotch® Tape development in the 1930s, the Post It® Note epiphany, and so much more. It was a blast just walking by key innovative products and seeing their history. 3M calls this facility the Innovation Center for a reason, as that word “Innovation” is at the core of who 3M is as a company.
Teresa Wu and the 3M team are strong supporters of ISA and the Industrial Channel, and it was a great “Planning week” with their team. As I was on the 3M Campus, the one thought kept coming into my mind was how can you as Channel Leader “Innovate” in your upcoming 2026 planning sessions?
Clearly define your Unique Selling Proposition (USP) and communicate that relentlessly to your team, partners, and end customers
It sounds simple and if you have already done this great…keep doing it. But, many companies who think they do it well often fall short. Your Unique Selling Proposition (North Star, Core Beliefs, Vision) should be able to be picked by a visitor or outsider who spends significant time with you and your business very quickly. With a company like 3M their team, partners, and end customers understand their USP, brand and product positioning, and the value they bring to the channel quickly.
For some seasoned channel leaders, they may not put much stock in the communication and definition of their USP. I see many companies that are not much more than we have great people, we work hard, and do not forget we are nice people…We are the best choice for your business – why? Just trust us.
Today, I believe that you need to have a clear vision and story that you tell again and again to your team, partners, and end customers.
Great Channel Planning Meetings start with partners knowing each other’s USP, Market Position, and Value Proposition for End Customers
If you are spending valuable time in an annual planning meeting telling each other for the first time what customer segments you are focusing on for 2026 – what product segments are you trying to grow – then you are wasting valuable time.
If you look in the mirror and say “yes that’s us” then one way to shortcut that issue for 2026 meetings is with improved pre-planning meeting communication.
I have always put this pre-meeting communication into 3 buckets that help planning meetings really drive the business forward.
- Company Vision – What market position/share do we have today, and where are we are going in 2026 – What customer segments drive our business together? What product segments are we in today? What is our positioning with the market and end customers? When we ask our customers, this is what they tell us we excel at in the industrial market?
- Where we are investing to help US grow our business together – (IT investments, Personnel, T&C’s, Rebates, Technical Sales support, Digital, etc.). Pre-Sell what you are doing differently from the COMPETITION. Then communicate it relentlessly with that partner team that you are having a planning meeting with in advance repeatedly.
- Where we can grow together in 2026 – Share gaps and missed opportunities at the product and customer level. Please note – I would recommend you consider sending the high-level overview as pre-reading and save the details for the meeting. For example- We have identified Metal Working end customers as a key target for growth in 2026. We have three new NPI’s we are launching targeted for the Metal Working customer and here is a preview of those solutions. Then come to that meeting with us much data as possible: The market opportunity is X Million, these three customers are our top targets, our competition in this product set is XYZ with these specific SKU’s, etc.
Profitable Sales Growth is what drives our Partnership…Stay on Topic.
I’ve been in too many Channel Planning Meetings over 25 years that are ineffective “Social” Planning sessions, where little gets done other than platitudes about growing the business together, with very little done after the meeting…to “Strategic” Planning meetings where both sides actually partner together to grow the business together and take share.
In Strategic planning meetings at the local level when you have the right outcome you should know which 3-4 top customers are you targeting together for growth with as detailed a plan as possible. These “Must Have Accounts” are crucial to each partner and need to be the lead story. In Top-to-Top corporate office level meetings you will likely have to limit this to the top 10 customers you have together regionally or nationally.
What are you going to do to create barriers to exit together (Special Pricing Agreements, Inventory Management Commitment and Support, Joint Training, etc.) with Must Have/Keep Customers?
Come with Gap Analysis Data to every Planning Meetings. Where by customer, product, market, and SKU are we missing opportunities together? Here is how we propose we can fashion a joint plan to grow our share together at the customer and product level. If we achieve our goals for 2026 together this is what it means to your profit line and our mutual market share gain growth.
Key Takeaways for Industrial Channel Leaders
Annual Planning Meetings and Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs) range widely in effectiveness. The Common denominator and foundation of all excellent Strategic Planning Meetings is next-level data and a true commitment to execute a joint business plan.
I personally have a list of over 80 different data metrics that I use with partners I work with today to choose from. There is no magic bullet of use these 10 metrics each and every time. Your unique business needs your unique metrics to be developed in a menu format for your manufacturer or distributor to use with the right partner at the right time. The list of metrics to focus on together is a “depends on” answer, but it is almost always less than 5 key metrics to use.
If you are a manufacturer who has great gap analysis tools that you provide to distributors, but you are having a meeting with a distributor who has no ability to do anything with that data then use a metric that does work. If you have distributors who can’t act on gap analysis make sure you give preference to those distributors who can and will act on your gap analysis. Those proactive distributors will win more often IMO.
One thing is clear… those manufacturers and distributors who have a clear USP and come to annual planning meetings and QBR’s with next level data are going to win more often at the expense of those competitors who do not.
What are your opinions on the future on Planning Season in 2026?
As always, we appreciate your feedback. Please feel free to reach out to me at any time with any questions or comments.
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