Sales management involves planning, directing, and controlling a company's personal selling activities. The sales manager is responsible for recruiting, selecting, training, and motivating the sales force. They also set sales targets and budgets. Effective sales management ensures the marketing plan is implemented through the sales team and that customer needs are satisfied. An integrated sales process management system allows companies to track pipeline sales, retain customer information if salespeople leave, and adapt sales processes as needed.

1. Sales management<br />Introduction:<br /> Sales management is generally acknowledged to be backbone of marketing. The overall management of sales and it refers to only a specialized application of the process of management as a whole. The planning, direction and control of the personal selling activities of a business unit include recriting, selecting, training, assigning, rating, supervising, paying and motivating as these tasks apply to the Personal sales force. The ultimate objective of sales management is to influence the consumers of the target market to get sales orders.<br />Sales management:<br />Sales management is a vital sub-system of marketing management. It will continue an indispensable part of marketing management as long as sales people are required to interact with customers, influence them and win them. In reality, marketing plans, strategies and policies are implemented through sales management. Modern sales management is not only profit-oriented but also customer-oriented<br />Role of sales management:<br /> Marketing stresses the importance of satisfying customer needs and wants through a process of exchange. The advertising and marketing magazine defining “business is marketing “marketing and selling are directly relating to each other.<br />As consumers of goods and services, we all participate in the marketing process many times each a day. Many scholars characterize today’s trend setting sales people in this way<br />They work in teams;

2. The computer is their primer sales tool;

3. They do not sell to customers; rather they partner with them;

4. The term salespeople are out, relationship manager is in.

5. Sales management plays an important role in marketing, especially for firms in business-to-business market.Sales manager’s duties and responsibilities: <br />The sales manager is the most important person in a sales organization. All activities are based on his functions and responsibilities.<br />Physical distribution:

6. He is responsible to look after all aspects of physical distribution, particularly order processing, packaging, transport and warehousing.

7. Sales planning

8. He has to formulate sales plans, sales policies and sales programmes including the sales budget every year.