
Offering customer incentives is a tried-and-true strategy for accelerating and winning deals. Whether the incentives take the form of dedicated support teams who can help customers navigate challenges with a product technology, or financial discounts and credits which provide customers with a clear incentive to migrate from competitor products, customer incentives are an essential tool for any successful business aiming to grow their revenue and market impact. As important as these incentives are, it is equally important to develop the processes and structures which can ensure that the right incentives go to the right customers, and that all decision-making and financial accounting is completed with efficiency, accuracy, and auditability.
In this case study, we share how Nextant partnered with a Fortune 10 client for over five years to develop and operate efficient processes, modern tools, and intuitive reporting which connected field sales teams and executive decision-makers to win deals with some of the largest enterprise customers in the world.
SITUATION:
The client, a Fortune 10 company, had determined that customer incentives were an increasingly important part of their strategy to win large deals with their enterprise customers. Due to the size of these enterprise deals, and the magnitude of the financial incentives which would lead to wins, C-suite executives would need to be the final decision-makers regarding where incentives should be applied and what the expectations would be regarding deals which received incentives.
After sizing and setting aside the funds required to accelerate these deals, the next order of business was to make sure the right incentives were going to the right deals. With this, Nextant’s client needed efficient ways for global sales teams to escalate time-sensitive enterprise deals requiring incentives, a documented process of approvals from executive decision-makers, and auditable financial accounting to ensure that all incentive resources were properly leveraged to win deals and secure long-term enterprise customers.

SOLUTION:
Nextant assembled a multidisciplinary team of business consultants and data analysts to develop a comprehensive solution package of processes, tools, and reports which enabled our client to efficiently leverage and document customer incentives on enterprise deals for over five years. This long-term project has included the following consulting services and solutions:
Incentive Request Intake: Nextant partnered with our clients to create a streamlined process and tools for global sales teams to submit requests for enterprise customer incentives 24-hours per day, 365 days per year. Nextant team members review incentive requests to ensure that all required information is provided, and that corporate finance requirements are met or exceeded. When a request is missing required information, Nextant consultants work with sales teams to update their request before it is forwarded for executive decision-making.
Executive Presentations: On a weekly basis, the Nextant team supported the preparation of executive summary documents and other required assets to inform decision-makers of the largest deals requiring corporate support and customer incentive investment. These assets provided executives with detailed information on the status of enterprise opportunities, the financial implications of leveraging customer incentives, and the strategy for ensuring opportunities led to landed deals.
Comprehensive Reporting: To ensure that all necessary stakeholders had access to accurate reporting on enterprise deals and customer incentives, Nextant developed a suite of Power BI reports which provided real-time information on tracked opportunities, customer demographics, investment details, and landed revenue associated with a variety of products/services. Nextant also built an intuitive business application utilizing Power Apps to allow corporate teams to efficiently track customer, opportunity, and investment details which supported trend identification and analysis.
Event and Communication Management: Once the effectiveness of the customer incentive governance program was established for our client’s largest enterprise customers, Nextant supported a series of smaller programs focused on opportunities from targeted geographies and strategic industries. Nextant consultants provided essential support in the orchestration of deal discussion events with regional sales teams and decision-makers, while also creating timely communications for global distribution with data-driven summaries of opportunities and awarded incentives.
RESULTS AND IMPACT:
The comprehensive support provided by Nextant over five plus years helped our Fortune 10 client establish predictable and effective means of awarding, tracking, and documenting customer incentives for a significant portion of their largest enterprise deals. The processes, tools, and reports our team developed led to:
Timely Identification of Needs: Global sales teams were provided with an intuitive and agile process for escalating their incentive requests to corporate decision-makers. | | Confident Decision-Making: Executives were provided with accurate and holistic information they needed to make investment decisions and accelerate opportunities to wins. |
| | |
Financial Accountability: The tools and reporting developed by our team ensured that financial details related to incentive investments were documented, organized, and retained for successful audits. | | Revenue Growth: Incentives awarded as part of the governance program over five years have directly led to our client securing market-shifting enterprise deals and tremendous global company growth. |
Comments