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Job Purpose:
The National Sales Manager designs and executes the commercial sales strategy to drive revenue growth, market share, and brand presence across all retail and wholesale channels. This role leads, mentors, and holds accountable regional sales teams, key account managers, and field forces. The position ensures optimal product availability, excellent in-store execution, and maximum profitability while building sustainable long-term partnerships with major retail chains, distributors, and independent traders
Duties and Responsibilities:
Strategic Planning & Commercial Growth:
- Develop and implement comprehensive annual sales plans, forecasting models, and market expansion strategies aligned with overall corporate objectives.
- Analyze market trends, competitor activities, consumer behavior, and demographic data to identify new business opportunities and threats.
- Allocate regional sales targets, commercial budgets, and resource distribution to maximize return on investment (ROI).
- Collaborate with Marketing and Product Development teams to align trade promotions, product launches, and brand strategies with field execution capability.
Channel & Key Account Management:
- Oversee relationships with top-tier modern trade (supermarkets, hypermarkets), traditional trade (wholesalers, independent mom-and-pop stores), and e-commerce accounts.
- Lead annual joint business planning (JBP) negotiations regarding trading terms, listing fees, margins, rebates, and promotional slots.
- Ensure optimal product assortment, stock depth, and promotional compliance across all trading channels.
- Intervene directly in high-stakes negotiations or operational bottlenecks with major distributors and retail buyers.
Team Leadership & Performance Management:
- Recruit, train, mentor, and manage regional sales managers, key account executives, and field forces.
- Establish clear, measurable performance benchmarks and conduct regular monthly and quarterly performance reviews.
- Design and implement competitive commission structures, incentive programs, and sales contests to motivate the field force.
- Conduct regular field visits to coach team members on negotiation skills, relationship building, and route-to-market efficiency.
Trade Marketing & In-Store Execution:
- Partner with the Trade Marketing team to design and deploy point-of-sale materials (POSM), endcaps, and secondary displays.
- Enforce strict compliance with Planograms, share of shelf (SOS) agreements, and pricing structures across all outlets.
- Monitor and optimize the field force routing plans to maximize store visit frequencies and reduce travel overheads.
- Direct the execution of trade activations, sampling campaigns, and seasonal promotional events.
Supply Chain Collaboration & Financial Governance:
- Provide accurate rolling sales forecasts to the Supply Chain and Production teams to minimize out-of-stock (OOS) situations and prevent excess inventory.
- Manage the departmental sales budget, tracking commercial spend, travel allowances, and promotional discounts.
- Monitor customer credit limits, payment histories, and outstanding receivables to minimize bad debts and improve cash flow.
- Review profitability reports by product line, region, and channel to eliminate low-margin practices.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) & Measurables:
Financial Metrics:
- Revenue Target Attainment: Percentage of monthly, quarterly, and annual gross and net sales value achieved versus budget.
- Gross Profit Margin: Maintenance of targeted profit margins across specific product portfolios and sales channels.
- Trade Spend Efficiency: Return on investment (ROI) on promotional spend, rebates, and discounts, measured as a percentage of net sales.
- Days Sales Outstanding (DSO): Average time taken to collect payments from accounts, keeping write-offs below a defined threshold (e.g., <0.5% of sales).
Sales Volume & Distribution Metrics:
- Numeric and Weighted Distribution: Percentage of target retail outlets stocking the core product portfolio (Numeric) and the volume share of those shops (Weighted).
- Volume Growth (Tonnage/Cases): Total volume growth of units or cases shipped compared to the previous financial year.
- New Account Acquisition: Number of high-volume retail outlets, wholesalers, or distributors successfully onboarded and activated each quarter.
- Strike Rate / Order Conversion: The ratio of successful orders taken relative to the total number of customer visits made by the field team.
In-Store Execution Metrics:
- Share of Shelf (SOS): Percentage of linear shelf space secured for the company's brands relative to direct competitors.
- On-Shelf Availability (OSA) / Out-of-Stock (OOS) Rate: Minimizing out-of-stock incidents at the shelf level, aiming for an OSA score of 95% or higher.
- Planogram and Pricing Compliance: Audit scores measuring team adherence to agreed corporate shelf layouts and recommended retail pricing (RRP).
- POSM Deployment: Percentage of targeted stores with fully functional, approved trade marketing materials placed in high-traffic locations.
Team Capability & Operational Metrics:
- Sales Force Automation (SFA) Adoption: Team compliance with daily CRM logging, route tracking, and digital order processing tools.
- Retention and Talent Development:Annual turnover rate of high-performing sales staff and completion rates for team functional training modules
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Job Requirements & Qualifications:
Education & Experience:
- Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Marketing, Commerce, or a closely related field. An MBA is highly advantageous.
- Minimum of 7–10 years of progressive sales experience within the FMCG industry, with at least 4 years in a senior regional or national leadership role.
- Proven track record of managing multi-channel distribution networks (Modern Trade, Traditional Trade, and Wholesalers).
- Direct experience negotiating joint business plans (JBPs) with national retail buying teams.
Technical Skills & Competencies:
- Commercial Acumen: Mastery of profit and loss (P&L) management, margin calculations, revenue growth management, and financial forecasting.
- Data Analytics: Proficiency in interpreting syndicated data sources (e.g., NIQ/NielsenIQ, Kantar) and internal ERP dashboards (SAP, Oracle, or Salesforce).
- Route-to-Market Expertise: Deep understanding of logistics, distributor models, warehousing dynamics, and field force automation tools.
- Negotiation: Advanced conflict resolution and contract negotiation skills tailored for tough procurement environments.
Behavioral Attributes:
- Strategic Leadership: Ability to envision long-term growth while managing daily tactical execution.
- Resilience: Highly adaptable to fast market fluctuations, competitor price wars, and supply chain disruptions.
- Communication: Exceptional presentation and interpersonal skills to influence both internal executives and external retail partners.
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