Business Development Manager Explained

In the last six months you could have come across such a term as BDM or BizDev. Let’s explore together what role this manager plays in affiliate marketing and why the following position became popular overnight. We will also help you understand whether your team needs a specialist in this field and when it’s time to hire one.

BDM in affiliate marketing

First, we start with consulting the dictionary to get some clarity on this term. Business development is a mix of sales, marketing, negotiations, networking, project management and research. BizDev managers help to expand business by seeking new directions for development — markets, niches, partnerships and sales channels.

Let’s dive deeper and find out the significance of BDMs in affiliate marketing, what professional qualities they should possess and why they have an ability to solve various problems and tasks.

A good BizDev is not only about maintaining business relationships or account management. This position implies being some kind of a juggernaut who pulls your company forward and is always a few steps ahead.

The main goal is business / company / team development, constant search for better solutions and deals. It should be a person with an iron grip and healthy egoism, who doesn’t take no for an answer and goes all the way to improve company performance.

This job requires soft skills such as prudence, determination and ability to plan everything in advance.

We won’t be talking about big corporations where such a person is obviously needed, let’s focus more on what part these managers play in small and medium-sized teams.

When is it time to hire BDMs and which part of workload they can carry for top managers?

If we take a classic case of an average affiliate marketing team, sooner or later there comes a moment when it is too time-consuming to endlessly negotiate with advertisers and partners (maintaining document flow, monitoring and increasing rates, resolving approval and conversion issues, etc.)

If top managers shoulder all these responsibilities by themselves — stagnation becomes inevitable as all the efforts are directed to supporting the teamwork instead of scaling up the business. In order not to stand still and enable your team growth instead, it’s better to hire a specialist that you can delegate some tasks to.

While putting together a competent team (with a well-defined structure and a clear distribution of roles) every leader should consider adding a position for BizDev. This employee will partially relieve you of your tasks aimed at developing the business, organize and structure all the information, come up with problem-solving ideas and present it all to you in a brief summary which will save you a lot of time if you did this by yourself. Instead, you can address other important issues.

Many aspiring teams stall at the stage when their top managers stop being leaders and lean more towards being negotiators between advertisers and media buyers. As a result, they get absorbed in these tasks and leave no time for business expansion and implementation of new practices.

How to find a true BDM instead of rummaging through countless CVs that look like one?

Here are some optimal solutions to choose from:

• If you are experienced in business development and used to perform these duties yourself within your team, you can hire a junior manager and pass on your knowledge thus making this person grow up to the level of a fully-fledged BizDev.

• Another way is to find a skilled professional on the job market. Pay due attention to the interview of a potential candidate. Ideally, the applicant should have a network of contacts in this field or niche. Ask questions about tactics and development plans as good BDMs should be strategic thinkers and always have some aces up their sleeve. Simulate a real-life situation and offer to take part in a role-playing game — your goal here is to see how well the candidate can perform under pressure, improvise and come up with creative solutions to the given problems, which is a very important skill for a business development manager.

Conclusion

To sum it all up, a BDM is a strong bridge between advertisers and media buyers, a reliable support for a team leader and an engine pulling the whole train forward. It’s a very important and challenging role that’s why a person for this position should be chosen with great care.