Key Account Manager - South Africa

As a Key Account Manager at Pinewood.AI, you’ll be building powerful, long-term relationships with our most valuable customers and making them feel part of the wider Pinewood community.

If you love solving business problems, creating meaningful connections, and bringing ideas to life, this is the opportunity to do your best work. You’ll own the responsibility of not just hitting, but surpassing your annual customer satisfaction and revenue targets across your key accounts. At the core of your role is the ability to drive the sales funnel end-to-end: spotting opportunities early, qualifying them effectively, creating high-impact proposals, and delivering solutions that solve real problems and advance your customers’ business goals.

In this role, you won’t just manage accounts, you’ll own strategic partnerships, drive commercial success, and help customers unlock the full value of our Automotive Intelligence Platform.

Key responsibilities:

• Take full ownership of assigned dealer group and OEM relationships and be their trusted partner, advisor, and Pinewood.AI champion.
• Build strong, lasting relationships with key decision-makers and confidently communicate how Pinewood.AI drives measurable business impact.
• Collaborate across the organisation to maintain clear, proactive communication between customers and internal teams.
• Act as the voice of the customer, influencing product, delivery, and senior leadership decisions to ensure we always deliver value.
• Lead the resolution of escalations, commercial risks, and critical issues with calm, clarity, and ownership.
• Ensure every customer achieves clear, measurable business outcomes from our solutions.
• Manage every stage of the sales funnel- prospecting, qualifying, proposing, and closing solutions that genuinely meet customer needs.
• Deliver year-on-year growth in customer satisfaction and revenue across your account portfolio.
• Develop multi-year strategic account plans aligned with customer priorities and Pinewood.AI goals.
• Work closely with Project Managers to ensure seamless delivery of agreed plans- on time, on budget, and with the right expectations set.
• Maintain accurate, real-time updates in Autotask or our chosen ERP tools to keep the wider business informed and aligned.

• Collaborate with the Sales Director to:

1. Strengthen sales funnel effectiveness and support closing high-value opportunities.
2. Deeply understand customer operations, dynamics, and growth plans.
3. Co-present account plans and contract renewals with the right Pinewood.AI representatives.
4. Review progress against targets quarterly and adjust strategy as needed.

• Working with the Finance Team on the following:

1. Manage and track budgets.
2. Maximise GP while ensuring commercial risks are managed effectively.
3. Understand debtor positions to maintain healthy commercial relationships.

Requirements

• Relevant tertiary education.
• Strong knowledge of the automotive industry and dealership operational workflows.
• CRM skills, forecasting ability, and data-driven decision making.
• A customer-centric mindset with strong commercial acumen.
• Proven ability to understand customer needs and develop tailored solutions.
• Exceptional communication and relationship-building skills.
• A collaborative, proactive, and people-focused leadership style.
• High levels of accountability, organisation, and execution capability.
• Strong problem-solving skills and the ability to operate confidently in ambiguity.
• Willingness to travel to customer sites when required.
• Solid project management capability. skills, able to collaborate effectively with colleagues and external advisers.
• Comfortable working in a fast-paced, growing international business environment.

Benefits:

• This is an excellent opportunity to join a forward-thinking, full-service technology partner and make a direct impact on our clients' experience. We offer lots of on-the-job training, a flexible work environment, and an opportunity to develop a long-term career.

You can also expect:

• A competitive salary
• Commission structure.
• Flexible mix of home and office working
• 15 days holiday
• Regular 1-2-1s and career development opportunities
• Regular social events

Why join Pinewood.AI?

Pinewood.AI is a growing technology business at the centre of the automotive retail industry, helping retailers and OEMs operate more efficiently and make smarter commercial decisions through our Automotive Intelligence Platform.

As a Key Account Manager, you’ll play a pivotal role in strengthening strategic partnerships with some of the industry’s most influential dealer groups and OEMs. You’ll work closely with all levels of stakeholders, helping them solve real business challenges while ensuring they gain maximum value from our technology.

This is an opportunity to be part of a growing global technology business while helping shape the success and expansion of Pinewood.AI in the South African market.

About Us

Our story began more than 20 years ago, but right from the start, it has been rooted in the specific needs of the automotive industry. As automotive professionals as well as technologists, we wanted to build practical technology solutions that were designed around how automotive businesses work, recognising what makes them different. Pinewood.AI is an unparalleled Automotive Intelligence Platform that enables automotive retail customers and OEMs to drive growth and profitability throughout every aspect of their business.

Pinewood’s cloud-based, secure end-to-end ecosystem unlocks the value of every customer. Our vision is to be the full-service technology partner that helps automotive retailers and OEMs run more efficiently and increase revenue by making better commercial and business decisions more easily.