Distributors have helped keep the pharmaceutical supply chain healthy during the coronavirus pandemic by maintaining adequate inventory, says AmerisourceBergen supply chain executive Heather Zenk. "Not only does the pandemic add an additional layer to our emergency planning, but it has also taught us that we need to add an increased focus on the human capital behind what we do," she says.

Distributors can get more comfortable with change by learning about new products and other topics and pursuing training, according to Geoffrey Graham, an account manager at Border States Electric. "I cannot get better if I'm not willing to take risks and continue to learn how to properly blend new ideas together with tried and tested avenues of being a resource for my customers," he says.

Focus on the potential for revenue growth and tighter margins to increase the chances that a digital transformation will succeed, McKinsey analysts suggest. They advise using selection criteria that incorporate "technology cost, investment, and risk," and a willingness to use new operating models.

Companies can use existing warehouse-management systems and radiofrequency devices to do business safely during the pandemic, Steve Banker writes. The technologies can facilitate social distancing and contact tracing, as well as notify businesses about customers at risk of receiving contaminated products, he writes.

Brands that want to maximize their SMS marketing efforts among today's more homebound consumers should consider front-loading copy, using automated triggers and leveraging data for enhanced targeting, writes Acoustic's Norman Guadagno. "In today's challenging landscape, moving consumers through the customer funnel as efficiently as possible is paramount to business success," he writes.

Many sales meetings fail to deliver maximum results because participants fail to document what was agreed upon, writes David Brock. "The act of simply writing things down and distributing the results is the critical step necessary to turn great conversations into results," Brock writes.

Research from Smartly.io indicates that 51% of global consumers purchased a product in the past 30 days upon seeing a social media ad. The company's Corinne Demadis calls creative content "the performance lever" and offers three other steps to help marketers maximize the potential of social ads with a focus on targeting, automating and testing.

Employees within firms and across industries are increasingly sharing their compensation details with each other via crowdsourced documents and HR experts warn companies against taking retaliatory action and instead advise transparent discussions around pay. "We've already seen this move to transparency in pay equity, and extending to pay ranges, pay philosophy and career opportunity," says Mercer's Tauseef Rahman.

What will be the impact of AI on distributor sales and operations? While AI hasn't transformed distribution yet, the change is coming soon. Integral to research being done by the NAW Institute is hearing directly from distributor executives. Will you please spare 5-10 minutes to help ensure that we get the most accurate data to inform this research? All individual answers will be kept confidential. In return for your time, we'll send you benchmark data on your AI readiness, and an AI opportunity analysis upon your request. Take the survey.

Register now for NAW's Sept. 24 live webinar, "How Distributor Customers Will Use Technologies From Their Suppliers and Who Is Winning." Leading technology companies are offering customers new ways of ordering. Retailers and distributors are using AI-enabled business intelligence to understand customer needs better and are applying autonomous vehicles, including drones, for deliveries. Ian Heller and Jonathan Bein will delve into how important all of this is to distributor customers and whether distributors need to build technological capabilities to remain competitive.

The card brand's fee increases for 2020 and 2021 pose significant threats to wholesaler-distributors' already thin margins. Automated, compliant surcharge technology for B2B credit card acceptance passes processing fees on to customers who choose the convenience of paying with cards. Learn how in the on-demand webinar from Unified Payments and NAW.