13
Integrated Marketing
Communication: Personal Selling
and Direct Marketing
ROAD MAP: Previewing the Concepts
• Discuss the role of a company’s salespeople in
•
•
•
•
creating value for customers and building
customer relationships.
Identify and explain the six major sales force
management steps.
Discuss the personal selling process,
distinguishing between transaction-oriented
marketing and relationship marketing.
Define direct marketing and discuss its benefits
to customers and companies.
Identify and discuss the major forms of direct
marketing.
13-2
The Nature of Personal Selling
• Most salespeople are well-educated, well-
trained professionals who work to build
and maintain long-term customer
relationships.
• The term salesperson covers a wide range
of positions:
– Order taker: Department store clerk
– Order getter: Creative selling in different
environments
13-3
The Role of the Sales Force
• Personal selling is a paid, personal form of
•
•
promotion.
Involves two-way personal communication
between salespeople and individual customers.
Salespeople:
–
–
–
–
Probe customers to learn about problems
Adjust marketing offers to fit special needs
Negotiate terms of sales
Build long-term personal relationships
13-4
The Role of the Sales Force
Sales Force serves as critical link between
company and its customers
They represent the company to the customers
They represent the customers to the company
Goal =
Customer Satisfaction and Company Profit
13-5
Major Steps in Sales Force
Management
13-6
Sales Force Structure
Territorial: Salesperson assigned to exclusive area and
sells full line of products
Product: Sales force sells only certain product lines
Customer: Sales force organizes along customer or
industry lines
Complex: Combination of several types of structures
13-7
Inside Sales Force
• Conduct business from their offices via
telephone or visits from perspective
buyers.
• Includes:
– Technical support people
– Sales assistants
– Telemarketers
13-8
Discussion Question
• For what types of products or product
categories do you think inside selling
might be more effective than outside
selling?
13-9
Inside Sales Force
Experienced
telemarketers sell
complex chemical
products by
telephone at
DuPont’s Customer
Telecontact Center.
13-10
Team Selling
• Used to service large, complex
accounts.
• Can include experts from
different areas of selling firm.
• Pitfalls:
– Can confuse or overwhelm
customers
– Some people have trouble
working in teams
– Hard to evaluate individual
contributions
13-11
Recruiting and Selecting
Salespeople
• Key talents of salespeople:
– Intrinsic motivation
– Disciplined work style
– Ability to close a sale
– Ability to build relationships with customers
13-12
Recruiting Salespeople
• Recommendations
from current sales
force
• Employment
agencies
• Classified ads
• Web searches
• College students
• Recruit from other
companies
13-13
Sales Force Training Goals
Learn about and identify with the company.
Learn about the company’s products.
Learn customers’ and competitors’
characteristics.
Learn how to make effective presentations.
Learn field procedures and responsibilities.
13-14
Compensating Salespeople
• Fixed amount:
– Salary
• Variable amount:
– Commissions or bonuses
• Expenses:
– Repays for job-related expenditures
• Fringe benefits:
– Vacations, sick leave, pension, etc.
13-15
Supervising Salespeople
• Directing Salespeople
– Help them identify customers and set call
norms.
– Specify time to be spent prospecting
• Annual call plan
• Time-and-duty analysis
• Sales force automation systems
13-16
How Salespeople Spend Their
Time
13-17
Supervising Salespeople
• Motivating Salespeople
– Organizational climate
– Sales quotas
– Positive incentives:
• Sales meetings
• Sales contests
• Recognition and honors
• Cash awards, trips, profit sharing
13-18
Sales Force Incentives
Many companies offer
cash, trips, or
merchandise as
incentives. Marriott
suggests that companies
reward outstanding sales
performers by letting
them “spread their wings
and reenergize” at
fabulous Marriott resorts
worldwide.
13-19
Major Steps in Effective Selling
13-20
The Personal Selling Process
Prospecting
The salesperson identifies qualified potential customers
Preapproach
The salesperson learns as much as possible about a
prospective customer before making a sales call
Approach
The salesperson meets the customer for the first time
Presentation
The salesperson tells the “product story” to the buyer,
highlighting customer benefits
13-21
The Personal Selling Process
Handling Objections
The salesperson seeks out, clarifies, and overcomes
customer objections to buying
Closing
The salesperson asks the customer for an order
Follow-up
The salesperson follows up after the sale to ensure
customer satisfaction and repeat business
13-22
Owens-Corning Field Sales Advantage system gives salespeople
a constant supply of information about their company and the
people with whom they are dealing.
13-23
Direct Marketing
• Direct marketing consists of direct
connections with carefully targeted
individual consumers to both obtain an
immediate response and cultivate lasting
customer relationships.
• Click Here to Visit the Direct Marketing
Association's Website
13-24
The New Direct-Marketing Model
• Some firms use direct marketing as a
supplemental medium.
• For many companies, direct marketing
constitutes a new and complete model for
doing business.
• Some firms employ the direct model as
their only approach.
• Some see this as the new marketing
model of the next millennium.
13-25
Benefits of Direct Marketing
• Benefits to Buyers:
– Convenient
– Easy to use
– Private
– Ready access to products and information
– Immediate and interactive
13-26
Benefits of Direct Marketing
• Benefits to Sellers:
– Powerful tool for building customer
relationships
– Can target small groups or individuals
– Can tailor offers to individual needs
– Can be timed to reach prospects at just the
right moment
– Gives access to buyers they could not reach
through other channels
– Offers a low-cost, efficient way to reach
markets
13-27
Customer Databases
• An organized
collection of
comprehensive data
about individual
customers or
prospects, including
geographic,
demographic,
psychographic, and
behavioral data.
13-28
Forms of Direct Marketing
13-29
Telephone Marketing
• Accounts for more
•
•
than 36% of all
direct-marketing
sales.
Used in both
consumer and B2B
markets.
Can be outbound or
inbound calls.
13-30
Inbound Telephone Marketing
The Carolina
Cookie Company
urges, “Don’t
wait another day!
Call now to place
an order or
request a
catalog.”
13-31
Direct-Mail Marketing
• Involves sending an offer, announcement,
reminder, or other item to a person at a
particular address.
• Accounts for more than 31% of directmarketing sales.
• Permits high target-market selectivity.
• Personal and flexible.
• Easy to measure results.
13-32
Catalog Marketing
• With the Internet, more and more
catalogs going electronic.
• Print catalogs still the primary medium.
• Expected sales in 2008 = $176 billion.
• Harder to attract new customers with
Internet catalogs.
13-33
Direct-Response TV Marketing
Direct-Response Advertising
Infomercials
Home Shopping Channels
13-34
Infomercial
Ronco and Ron Popeil,
with his Veg-o-Matics,
food dehydrators, and
electric egg
scramblers, paved the
way for a host of
mainstream marketers
who now use directresponse ads.
13-35
Kiosk Marketing
• Information and
ordering
machines
generally found
in stores,
airports, and
other locations.
13-36
Interactive Student
Assignment
• Choose a partner and discuss some of the
products each of you has purchased as a
result of direct marketing. What were the
advantages for you when making your
purchases in this manner?
13-37
Integrated Direct-Marketing
• The use of
carefully
coordinated
multiple-media,
multiple-stage
campaigns.
13-38
Public Policy and Ethical Issues
in Direct Marketing
Irritation to Consumers
Taking unfair advantage of impulsive or less
sophisticated buyers
Targeting TV-addicted shoppers
Deception, Fraud
Invasion of Privacy
13-39
Rest Stop: Reviewing the Concepts
1. Discuss the role of a company’s salespeople in
2.
3.
4.
5.
creating value for customers and building
customer relationships.
Identify and explain the six major sales force
management steps.
Discuss the personal selling process,
distinguishing between transaction-oriented
marketing and relationship marketing.
Define direct marketing and discuss its
benefits to customers and companies.
Identify and discuss the major forms of direct
marketing.
13-40