Personal Selling - Chapter 1

Selling and Salespeople Chapter 1

Important Questions about Selling
What is selling?
Why should you learn about selling even if you do not plan to be a salesperson?
What is the role of personal selling in a firm?
What are the different types of sales people?
What are the rewards of a selling career?

“ Relationship building is definitely the key to business-to-business selling.”
~Jeffrey P. Lynn

Selling
The exchange of products for an agreed sum of money
Part of the process by which organisations persuade customers to purchase their goods and services
Selling is the process of helping someone discover something of value

Sales people
Nowadays buying the cheapest is not important to many companies, they prefer to develop relationships to be able to do business on ethical grounds. Sales people play a pivotal role here.
Sales people identify opportunities to create value and organise resources of their company that the company can exploit.

Why Learn About Personal Selling?
Time to knock at the door gone
The principles of selling are useful to everyone, not just people with the title of salesperson.
Sales means more to give potential solutions to the customers rather than beat the drum of what the company sells
Internet and other latest technologies involved in selling and all the possible resources of the company (support people etc)

Why Learn About Personal Selling?
Selling is a team activity
Rules of Selling are to be followed by all
Very much similar to convincing as we do in our daily lives (with the parents, teachers, employers and friends)
The term Selling was not taken to be a good one, while now every one tries to engage directly/indirectly business development personnel to flourish.
Developing mutually beneficial, long-term relationships is vital to all of us.
People in business use selling principles all the time.

Technologies used by Sales Force

Personal Selling Personal selling is a person-to-person business activity in which a salesperson uncovers and satisfies the needs of a buyer to the mutual, long-term benefit of both parties.
Personal selling is oral communication with potential buyers of a product with the intention of making a sale. The personal selling may focus initially on developing a relationship with the potential buyer, but will always ultimately end with an attempt to "close the sale"

PERSONAL SELLING Definition
Seeking out people who have a particular need.
Assisting them to recognize the existence of needs they have that could be met through your offering.
Demonstrating how your offering fills that need.
Persuading qualified prospects that your product will fill their needs.

Objectives of Personal Selling
Building Product Awareness
Creating Interest
Providing Information
Stimulating Demand
Reinforcing the Brand

Personal Selling Process
Prospecting
Making first contact
The sales call
Objection handling
Closing the sale to flourish

Comparison to other marketing communications tools
Use fewer resources
Products tend to be fairly complex (e.g. financial services or new cars).
There is some contact between buyer and seller after the sale so that an ongoing relationship is built.
Client/prospects need specific information.
The purchase tends to involve large sums of money.

Advantages of using personal selling
Personal selling is a face-to-face activity; customers therefore obtain a relatively high degree of personal attention
The sales message can be customised to meet the needs of the customer
The two-way nature of the sales process allows the sales team to respond directly and promptly to customer questions and concerns
P ersonal selling is a good way of getting across large amounts of technical or complex product information
The face-to-face sales meeting gives the sales force chance to demonstrate the product
Frequent meetings between sales force and customer provide an opportunity to build good long-term relationships

Main disadvantages of using personal selling
The cost of employing a sales force. Sales people are expensive. In addition to the basic pay package, a business needs to provide incentives to achieve sales
A sales person can only call on one customer at a time. This is not a cost-effective way of reaching a large audience.

Selling and Marketing
Marketing cycle is completed once the feedback is received and salespeople play an important role in bring the feedback
Efforts of the company to provide solutions to the people could be accomplished through sales people only
People are informed about the services and products of a company through the sales people only

Communication Methods

Strengths and Weaknesses of Communication Methods M = Moderate, H = High, L = Low Communication Method Control Flexibility Credibility Cost Personal selling M to H H L H Internet website H M to H L M to H Mass media advertising H L L M Publicity L L H L to M Word of Mouth L L H L

Integrated Marketing Communications
Many companies use a combination of various communication techniques to be able to communicate better and balance out the pros and cons of each communication technique

Sales people and Marketing Mix
Sales people are eyes and ears of a company in the marketplace
Learning organisations acquire information from the sales people about environment and make organisational decisions based on them

Types of Organisational Learning
Adaptive Learning To develop knowledge to do present activities better
Generative Learning To go beyond the present products, markets, policies and procedures to develop new insights
Sales people contribute to both by providing in critical information to the firm’s strategic system

Main Roles of the Sales Force
Prospecting
Communicating
Selling
Servicing
Information gathering
Allocating

Contribution from Sales people
Strategy development
New product development
Pricing
Channel management

Qualities of High Sales Performers
Sell to people
Know when to close
Exchange Information
Regularly establish trust
Engage in certain behaviors
Provide value added to the customer
Be perceived as a genuine advocates of prospects’ needs

Salespeople are made not born
They are made with Concentrated attention
repeated practice goal oriented direction
The skills required to be a successful salesperson can be learned.
Become a student of your profession
Learn throughout your career
Innate characteristics such as personality traits, gender, and height are largely unrelated to sales performance.
Companies spend billions of dollars each year on training.

THE SALES EDGE - EVERYBODY SELLS
Human relation skills are basic selling skills.
Skills are learned and practiced from birth.
Everyone has a base upon which to build their selling abilities.

Activities of Salespeople
Selling
Servicing Customer
Reporting

Selling
Prospecting for new customers
Increasing sales to existing customers
Making sales presentations
Demonstrating products
Negotiating prices and delivery terms
Writing orders and many more

Servicing Customer
To work with employees of other departments to make sure that the customers get full benefit of what they have bought
Coordinate during meetings to resolve the problems of the customers

Reporting
Time and money spent
Future schedules
Activities of competitors
Business conditions
Unsatisfied needs of the customers

What do Salespeople do?
Client relationship manager
Account team manager
Vendor and channel manager
Information provider to their firm

How Salespeople Spend Their Time Each Week

Types of salespeople
Selling products to the customers over the counter
Selling products to the customers in the showrooms
Selling parts to producers to make the products
Selling material to the producers to make parts this chain could be very long…..

Selling and Distribution Channels A distribution channel is a set of people and organizations responsible for the flow of products and services from the producer to the ultimate user.
Business to business
Direct sales
Sales through distributors
Business to customer
Direct sales
Sales through Retailers
Sales through Retailers and distributors

Selling and Distribution Channels
Business-to-business channels

Selling and Distribution Channels (continued)
Consumer channels
1-

CLASSIFICATION OF SALES JOBS
Trade selling
Missionary selling
Technical selling

Trade selling
Taking orders and field service.
Largely involves delivering orders and replenishing inventory.
Expected to persuade customers to provide additional shelf space or more favorable placement of stock.
Opportunity to increase sales comes most often through assisting the customer to move a larger volume of inventory.
Often actually set up product displays in retail stores

Missionary selling
Educate those who ultimately decide what product will be used by the consumer.
Often does not see immediate results from their efforts in the way of products sold.
Still accountable for sales.

Technical selling
Salespeople must also be competent in some technical specialty related to the products being sold.
Usually called in by another salesperson who has already contacted the prospect and stimulated some interest.
Often conducted by a sales team.
Still need real sales skills because their role is more than just explaining the technical aspects of the product.

The Sales Job Continuum

The Customer is at the Center of the Sales System

Major Reasons For Choosing A Sales Career

PERSONAL SELLING Definition

A Sales Personnel Career Path

Rewards in Selling
Independence and responsibility
Financial rewards
Management opportunities
Variety and Independence
No set routine
The variety of prospects and their needs.
Professional salespeople are never unemployed.

Average Annual Compensation for Salespeople and Managers Source: 2004 Salary Survey, Sales & Marketing Management, May 2004, p. 29.

Opportunity for Advancement
Advancement in Direct Selling
Entrepreneurship
Promotion to Sales Management
Involvement in Sales Training
Moving Into Top Management

DISADVANTAGES OF A SALES CAREER
Variable income
Long hours
Travel

Success of Selling S S U C C Ssuccess E S S

Characteristics of Successful Salespeople
Motivation
Dependability and trustworthiness
Ethical sales behaviour
Customer and product knowledge
Communication skills
Flexibility
Administrative Ability
Emotional intelligence
Enthusiasm
Sincerity
Goal Direction
Resourcefulness
Pleasant Personality
Initiative
Ability to Ask Questions

Other characteristics
Willing to do what it takes to attain goals.
Ability to find satisfaction in contributing to achievement of the goals set by their company.
Enjoy serving the needs of others.
Able to stay focused on daily activities.
Strong positive self image
High ethical standards
Sensitivity to the needs of others.
Able to win the trust of others

Personal Characteristics Needed to Sell for Building Long-term Relationships

The Building Partnerships Model

You should study personal selling because we all use selling techniques.
Salespeople play a vital role in business activities.
Salespeople engage in a wide range of activities.
The specific duties and responsibilities of salespeople depend on the type of selling position.
Research on the characteristics of effective salespeople indicates that many different personality types can be successful in sales.
Summary

End of Chapter 1

Thank you

Personal Selling - Chapter 1

by junaid khan on Oct 08, 2011

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