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?

2

“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

4

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.

5

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
6
(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.
7

Technologies used by Sales Force

8

Personal Selling
 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 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
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.

10

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

11

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

12

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.

13

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 o
the customer
 The two-way nature of the sales process allows the sales
team to respond directly and promptly to customer
questions and concerns
 Personal 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 14

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.

15

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

16

Strengths and Weaknesses of
Communication Methods
Communication Credibilit
Control Flexibility Cost
Method y
Personal selling M to H H L H
Internet website H M to H L M to H
Mass media
H L L M
advertising
Publicity L L H L to M
Word of Mouth L L H L

M = Moderate, H = High, L = Low
18

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

19

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

20

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

21

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

22

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

23

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

24

Salespeople are made not born
 They are made with Concentrated attention
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.

25

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.

26

Activities of Salespeople
 Selling
 Servicing Customer
 Reporting

27

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

28

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

29

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

30

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…..

33

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

Selling and Distribution Channels

Business-to-business channels

Selling and Distribution Channels
(continued)

Consumer channels

1-36

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 Customer is at the Center of the
Sales System

43

Major Reasons For Choosing A Sales
Career

44

PERSONAL SELLING Definition

45

A Sales Personnel Career Path

46

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.

47

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

49

DISADVANTAGES OF A SALES
CAREER

 Variable income
 Long hours
 Travel

Success of Selling
S

S U

Ssuccess
S S C

E C
51

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

52

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

54

The Building Partnerships
Model

Summary
 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.

Personal Selling: Chapter 1

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Editor's Notes