Meaningful Engagement between Distributors and Preferred Manufacturers with Rebate.ai

The underlying premise of buying groups is “We are stronger together.” Distributors pool their purchases to become more competitive in their local markets. Manufacturers welcome the opportunity to grow their market share by offering the group competitive terms like pricing, specials, payment terms, rebate incentives and warranty programs. However, the often overlooked and most valuable benefit of belonging to a buying group is the relationships that are forged between these two parties.

Although buying groups serve to promote and facilitate engagements between the two parties, they do not solve their main concern: “How can we grow profitable faster?”

In buying groups, distributors prefer manufacturers based on the prices of the products they offer. Most manufacturers strive to earn and keep their preferred status. To do so, they regularly compete on product prices and keep a careful check on products bought by distributors outside the group to steal market share from their rivals. Similarly, the purchasing distributor can become more competitive in their local market by identifying products purchased outside the group that could potentially be purchased from a preferred manufacturer.

But how can this be done effectively? The answer is an AI-powered rebate management system that automates rebate sharing and quickly identifies mutual revenue potential for both parties.

With the E2E rebate management and analytics platform, purchasing distributors and preferred manufacturers can take their engagement to a new level. Such a platform uses machine learning and artificial intelligence to identify and categorize every product within the industry to create an opportunity listing of products and outside manufacturers to pinpoint product conversion opportunities. Instead of merely comparing last year’s purchases to this year’s, the platform will prioritize and find revenue opportunities, transforming the relationship between the two parties.

Preferred manufacturers are provided with a “hunting list” of buying distributors ranked by their outside purchases within a product category. With this, they can see which items or product categories are moving quickly within the buying group. However, they can only see the priority on the “hunting list,” not the actual purchases. To protect the individual distributors’ details, they will have access to the items purchased by the entire group in aggregate by product category.

This sets the stage for a better commercial engagement. When the preferred manufacturer can identify their top distributor opportunities and the distributor can easily access the outside manufacturer purchases and specific items that other distributors are buying, a meaningful conversation can happen. Both parties will benefit from this, as they will grow profitably and gain market share.

Rebate.ai provides buying distributors with relevant data, including purchase details from all their manufacturers, both within and outside of the group, as well as specific SKUs from their purchase orders. This allows them to have a complete view of their purchasing behavior, and they have complete control of what information is shared with the preferred manufacturers. Their traditional systems/ERPs, on the other hand, may not give them this view of their business.

The buying group’s executives also gain insights into purchasing behaviors, allowing them to make better decisions about new preferred manufacturers based on distributor purchases and emerging market trends.

Buying groups make it easier for distributors and manufacturers to work together more fluidly, communicate more effectively, and form mutually beneficial partnerships. Our E2E rebate management and analytics platform provide a deeply collaborative space that allows them to grow and prosper. Ensure you are not leaving rebate dollars on the table due to manual or outdated processes, and schedule an introduction to Rebate.ai today!