How do account managers work?

Question

Career in IT

I work in an IT company as the head of the web development department. We are focused more on the external, but also on the domestic (CIS) market. I have been working for 2 years, during this time managers for finding clients have changed. All managers were recruited without good experience in the field of IT and over time, one way or another, they switch to finding clients on freelance exchanges. Developers spent time passing tests (on freelance sites), viewing incomprehensible technical specifications and other garbage. Managers constantly had appropriate endless excuses (no portfolio, no profile completed, no tests passed, no clear idea that web projects are needed, but no improvements to Ruby sites). The last "brilliant" offer from the current manager was to take tests on the Toptal resource, which is supposedly loaded with work. Why, then, in principle, a manager in the state is a different question ... My question is the following: And how is the search for projects in your company? Detailed answers are needed, I can’t argue my position, which is now like this - "clients are in any way, but in a different way." Help out!

Answer 1

When I worked in web studios, clients were in several ways:
1. Direct call and an offer to create a website
2. Advertising your office in Yandex.Direct and Google.adwords + search promotion, so that the company was shown to those who wished to search
3. Participation in exhibitions and events, mini stand, business cards, brochures
4. Recommendations from other customers

Answer 2

Detailed answers are needed, I can’t argue my position, which is now like this - "clients are in any way, but in a different way."

wrong position
correct position

find me clients

You should not be interested in what and how they do. It's just that the company should appear with a certain frequency of people who need to do something.
And you, well, in general, should not be touched by the establishment of accounts, tests, sites, freelances, etc.
You just sit down with a client and discuss his needs
And, yes, such a person will receive much more than a team lead / pm

Answer 3

Good "fat" clients are found mainly through personal connections and references. Through "cold" calls, spam, adwords, it is not realistic to start a dialogue with a representative of Deutsche Bank or a similar company. If a sales person "has no experience in IT", then he will not develop such connections in a year.
Exchanges, including Toptal, are a cheap and angry option.

Answer 4

In my humble opinion, small outsourcing (companies with less than 50-100 specialists) is dying off as a species. The competition is over the top (there are too many people who are tired of coding themselves and figured out how to put together a small team by selling their skills), the client wants access to your specialist and does not want to pay for additional staff and overhead costs of outsourcing companies. In general, the normal situation on the market is that we are following the same path that the Western market once followed. Now, in the next 10 years, natural selection will do its job, the number of players in the market will adjust and the era of domestic corporations (Yandex, Ozone, etc.) will come, absorbing young people and flocks of older lone consultants.
Answering the question, customer search managers do a poor job. Everyone is trying to negligently and without understanding to offer development services to everyone in a row. This is mistake. I think you can try something different. Instead of managers to search for clients - assign a bonus to spialists for bringing a client. And send them to all sorts of StackOverflow, Quora, and other forums and social networks - to answer questions on their profile. And, of course, it is correct to subscribe everywhere - they say the company is such and such. Start your own blog or write good interesting articles on social networks. In general - do not run after the client and sell them, but create high-quality information with an invitation to take advantage of these bright minds. We at Toptal write to the corporate blog all over the world - very cool articles - I myself read excitedly, not even in my own stack. Works very well.