Key Clients Are Also the Key to Creating Revenue and Hitting Targets
Nurturing key account relationships pays dividends, so what can happen when you don’t do it properly can be a real disaster for any sales team.
You know how you see your key clients as good revenue streams? Well, they’re also potential strategic partners whose success drives yours. In fact, it’s vital you stay close to them, know them, and do more than drop them a call now and again when you need the numbers.
Nurturing key account relationships pays dividends, so what can happen when you don’t do it properly can be a real disaster for any sales team.
What Makes a ‘Key Client’ So Important?
A key client isn’t simply your biggest spender. In fact, the biggest spender can be a misleading metric. A big month for one client is great for your next target, but a consistent and significant purchase pattern from a key customer is great for all your targets.
So, when you think about who you should be nurturing, you are looking for the customers who offer:
- Significant revenue, but also have the potential for growth over time.
- Strategic value, such as insight into new markets or influence in your industry.
- Opportunities for deep, ongoing collaborations rather than one-off transactions.
In fact, research across hundreds of B2B firms shows that effective key account management and the structured way you look after these clients, boosts both financial performance and, importantly, a competitive advantage. The importance of having a competitive edge cannot be ignored if you want long term sales.
In simple terms: when you look after your most important clients strategically, they reward you with loyalty, endorsement, and more business.
Strong Relationships Build Strong Revenue
Here’s why focusing on relationships matters:
They Drive Retention and Growth
Keeping existing clients satisfied dramatically reduces the number that move to new suppliers. It’s what’s known as customer churn. High churn not only means a less stable (and often shrinking) revenue, but it also forces you to spend more acquiring new clients just to meet targets. I have seen just how quickly a high customer turnover slips from ‘harder to hit targets’ into ‘not hitting targets’ to ‘needing more and more new customers just to break even’. That’s not a place you want to be.
According to research, just a 5% increase in retention will significantly boost profit. Some reports even say that through steady ongoing business and referrals, an extra 5% retention will produce up to a 95% boost to profits.
Not bad for focusing on the customers you already have.
Loyal Clients Buy More and Stay Longer
Key account management isn’t just about not losing a client. It’s about helping them grow and growing with them. When you understand their goals then you can align with their success. When you regularly communicate the upsells and cross-selling opportunities naturally arise.
Working with clients so that your services genuinely help them thrive makes you part of that successful formula. You become the supplier of choice because you help them win. That’s a strong bond.
Which brings us to an underestimated result of strong key account relationships…
Relationships Build Danger Zones Around Your Competitors
When your key clients trust you and see you as part of their success, switching to a competitor becomes risky and unattractive. At that stage, your strong relationship has built a sort of danger zone filled with risk that the client needs to cross if they switch suppliers. Yes, your competitor may be cheaper, yes, they may have a slightly better delivery time and so on, but all that means little compared to knowing and trusting you. The gamble of switching to a new supplier becomes exaggerated because the risk of losing their current success is too high. Loyalty like that is a powerful form of business defence.
So, What Does Great Key Account Management Look Like?
From my personal experience and from industry best practices, top performers in client care do these things:
- Get Curious About the Client - Sometimes when I am out and about training, I will ask a sales team about their clients, and they will respond solely with the purchase numbers. I tell them, ‘That wasn’t what I asked, I asked about the client.’ You need more than purchase histories to understand your clients. Get to know their goals, internal drivers, industry pain points, and who their decision-makers are. You need to know them and understand them.
- Communicate Often and Not Just When You Need Something - Proactive engagement isn’t optional. Whether it’s scheduled check-ins, quarterly business reviews or informal updates, consistent communication builds trust and prevents unpleasant surprises. If you want to know about your client, you need to make it a two way relationship rather than a seller to buyer one.
- Relationships Are Strategic Partnerships and A Favour Goes a Long Way - Key account management isn’t transactional. It’s collaborative. Dedicated account managers should act as advisors who help clients solve problems and not just close deals. Be helpful and collaborative, not just sales focused. There is a very good reason for looking for opportunities to help your client without necessarily gaining instant sales from it. When we do someone a favour (or they do us one), it triggers a ‘like’ response. So from the client perspective, you move a little closer to ‘nice person’ and not just a salesperson in their view. Strangely, you, as the person doing the favour, also feel better about the client. It’s like your subconscious says, ‘We did them a favour, we must like this person’. Liking is a strong motivator. If you want to lookit up, it’s known as the Ben Franklin effect.
- Monitor Feedback and Adapt - Clients evolve. Businesses change. Continually gathering feedback and responding to concerns early can stop tiny problems from turning into churn risks. If you build solid relationships, you will stay ahead of the game because your clients will tell you more.
Great key account management is about human-to-human interaction, not just the numbers. If you lose human contact, you are likely to lose the customer as well.
The True Cost of Neglecting Key Clients
Failing to look after your best customers isn’t just a missed opportunity; it’s a real threat to a business:
- Lost Revenue Happens Quickly - When key clients feel ignored, they are more likely to defect. Losing long-term customers often means a cost of 5x more to replace than.
- Negative Reputation and Lower Referrals - Unhappy former clients don’t just walk away quietly, and they can influence others in your market. Word of mouth still matters, especially in B2B.
- Missed Growth Opportunities - Without strong relationships, you miss the upsell and co-innovation opportunities. You end up constantly selling around clients rather than with them.
A call, a follow-up email, a little favour here and there, and you avoid all these dangers.
Invest in Relationships Before You Have to Repair Them
As I said in your article on account strategy here, this isn’t just theory; it’s a practical roadmap. By building trust, staying strategic, and prioritising your key clients’ success, you not only protect your revenue but you also grow it. In an uncertain market, that’s the kind of resilience every sales team needs.
Want to strengthen your key account strategy?
Read my article here, then create a good key account strategy and implement it, but also commit to these three basic actions today:
- Map out your top accounts and their internal stakeholders.
- Set regular, proactive check-ins and stick to them.
- Build feedback loops so you never miss what matters most to your clients.
The truth is that in sales, long-term revenue and consistent success aren’t won in one pitch or one great month of target smashing, they are earned through ongoing partnership.
