One manager is not an account
The hard part of a large client is getting in: a place on the supplier list, or a first placement with one manager who took a chance on you. Most agencies then keep working that single door. The manager who knows you hires a few times a year. The company hires in your discipline constantly, through people who have never heard of you, in divisions you did not know existed.
Agencies that turn a first placement into a key account do one thing differently. They treat the company as a market and map it: every unit that employs your discipline, who runs each one, who sits above them, and which of those people already know your name.
By hand that is a long slog through profiles, and the spreadsheet is out of date by the time it is finished. This play runs it as a structured sweep and keeps its evidence, so the map can be argued with and refreshed.
What you get back
A table grouped by division and location: name, title, seniority, LinkedIn, the unit they run, and a reports-to column that is filled only where an advert or a public source supports it, and otherwise marked as inferred. Beside each person, whether your CRM already holds them.
Above it: people found per unit, how many you already know, and the units where nobody was found. Your one warm contact is on the map too, which shows you exactly who they could introduce you to.
For the people you pick, a checked work email. Nothing is sent and nothing is written to your CRM.
Variations worth knowing
Build outwards from the people you know. Name your existing contacts and their units are mapped first. An introduction one desk along is the easiest way into a division you have not worked.
Prepare one conversation. Walk into a business development call with a one-page account brief covers a single meeting. This play covers the whole account.
Add timing afterwards. Know when a target account opens a role in your discipline tells you which mapped manager has a live need.
Where this goes wrong
Group structure. Subsidiaries trade under their own names and domains, and people list the parent, the division or a brand as their employer. A unit you did not name can be missed, which is why the list of units is confirmed first.
Dropping the title filter. On a large account that returns the whole workforce, charged per row, plus people who only claim the employer.
Inferred hierarchy read as fact. Titles suggest seniority, not reporting lines. A director in one division does not manage a head of function in another.
Stale profiles. Anyone found through a web result, not a profile record, is marked for you to confirm before you write.
