Whether you’re working with a handful of carefully chosen suppliers, or your supply chain is an incredibly intricate and complex element of your OEM enterprise, maintaining good relationships between yourself and your suppliers is vital for business success.

No business is an island, so to maintain profits and client satisfaction, your business needs to recognise the importance of nurturing these values and prioritising the relationships with its suppliers. Sourcing the goods and components you need, such as a fixed capacitor, is straightforward when you have a BOM tool at your side. However, despite the benefits of sourcing your electrical parts from reputable suppliers, businesses have the opportunity to grow and out scale their competitors simply by focusing on supplier relationship management.

Want to know why? Read on to discover why supplier relationship management is vital for your business success.

The Creation of an Effective Supply Chain

When relationships with your suppliers are non-existent, who do you turn to when there is an issue? Without a substantial effort in terms of relationship management, your suppliers have little or no loyalty to your satisfaction once your order has been shipped, so if that order is wrong, damaged, lost or delayed, you can expect communications to be at an all-time low.

Strong relationship management between you and your suppliers ensures that the lines of communication are kept open, streamlining your supply chain, and therefore making delays and issues much easier to resolve.  

Make Quicker Decisions and Have Them Actioned

Whether orders have been altered, you’ve ordered the wrong components or you’ve noticed potential improvements that could be made within your procurement process, when the relationships between you and your supplier are professionally managed, any decisions or alterations you make can be actioned quickly, without disrupting your business.

Reduced Costs

While new suppliers like to entice OEMs into the fold with low prices and incredible deals on their component parts, these prices don’t stay low for long, and businesses like yours can expect costs to spiral out of control once the honeymoon period is over. Instead of scouring the market looking for the next deal aimed at new customers, consider the benefits of nurturing the relationships with your current suppliers. Creating a good working relationship with your suppliers is a link in your supply chain of mutual benefit, over time you’ll be able to work closely with your suppliers and create cost-saving initiatives that benefit both parties.

Ongoing Improvement of Your End Product and Operations

Long term relationships that prioritise growth and mutual understandings will only propel your business success further than you ever thought possible. Creating a streamlined and effective supply chain is much more attainable when you focus on building stable, rewarding relationships with your suppliers. Giving each other feedback and keeping the lines of communication open can assist with product development, better supply chain management, and increased revenue.

Final thoughts…

Start prioritising supplier relationship management today and start reaping the rewards, consider the points above to get started.