Chapter One
Introduction To
Personal Selling:
It’s a Great Career!
PowerPoint presentation prepared by
Dr. Rajiv Mehta
Chapter Outline
• Marketing and personal selling: changing with the times
• Personal selling: a fresh look
• What is a customer?
• What is a product?
• Diverse roles of the professional salesperson
• What does a professional salesperson do?
• Using technology to sell better
• Benefits of professional personal selling as a career
• Careers for different types of individuals
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Chapter 1 | Slide 2
Learning Objectives
After reading this chapter, you should understand:
• How the concept of marketing is
evolving.
• Why and how salespeople are being
empowered.
• The differences between yesterday’s
salesperson and today’s professional
salesperson.
• What roles professional salespeople
play in providing customer satisfaction
within the framework of the marketing
concept and customer-oriented selling.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 3
Learning Objectives cont’d
After reading this chapter, you should understand:
• Many of the opportunities and
advantages offered by a
professional sales career.
• How telecommunications
advances can help salespeople.
• The multiple career paths
branching out from an initial job
in personal selling.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 4
Marketing and Personal Selling:
Changing With the Times
The older, official AMA definition of marketing was:
“The process of planning and executing the
conception, pricing, promotion, and distribution of
ideas, goods and services to create exchanges that
satisfy individual and organizational objectives.”
•
Marketing was largely viewed from the seller perspective
by emphasizing management of the marketing mix and
creating exchanges.
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Marketing and Personal Selling:
Changing With the Times cont’d
The new official definition of marketing approved by the
AMA in 2004 is:
“Marketing is an organizational function and a set of processes for
creating, communicating, and delivering value to customers and for
managing customer relationships in ways that benefit the
organization and its stakeholders.”
• Marketing is moving from a transaction-orientation to a customerrelationship-building orientation.
• New AMA definition shifts the perspective more to the customer side by
focusing on delivering value and managing customer relationships.
Chapter Review Question:
How does the new concept of marketing differ from the old one?
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Chapter 1 | Slide 6
Empowerment of Salespeople
Personal selling is evolving owing to innovations in telecommunication
technologies.
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•
Are becoming increasingly empowered
and can access up-to-the-minute
information that customers want
•
Are moving away from “selling” toward
“serving” customers by becoming more
like customer consultants and business
partners
•
Think beyond a single sales
transaction to building long-term
relationships and partnerships with
customers
Chapter Review Question:
Why and how are salespeople
being empowered?
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Chapter 1 | Slide 7
Personal Selling: A Fresh Look
Personal selling offers an exciting, challenging, rewarding, and dynamic
career.
Without salespeople
no organization could
survive for long!
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•
Are highly paid and among the most likely to be
promoted to senior management
•
Serve as “boundary spanners” who facilitate
transactions, and relationships between buyers
and sellers
•
Use the latest technology, make effective sales
presentations and demonstrations, negotiate “winwin” agreements
•
Build profitable long-term relationships based on
customer satisfaction and loyalty
•
Focus on business-to-business selling where
potential earnings and career opportunities are
virtually unlimited
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Chapter 1 | Slide 8
Personal Selling: A Fresh Look cont’d
Professional salespeople:
•
•
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•
Are well-educated, highly trained, customerrelationship-oriented career professionals
Understand the
“lifetime value” of loyal
customers, so they
focus on long-run
relationships -- not
single-transaction
profitability
Understand that keeping current customers loyal is
even more important than attracting new
customers: nearly 70% of sales for most companies
come from the repeat purchases of loyal customers
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Chapter 1 | Slide 9
Customer Loyalty
Loyal customers usually are the most profitable as they:
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• Buy the largest dollar volume.
• Cost less to serve because they are further up
the relationship learning curve with your
company.
• Refer other customers and generate positive
word-of-mouth promotion for your products and
services.
• Readily purchase new products introduced by
your company.
• Are receptive to up selling (buying higherpriced versions of products) and cross-selling
(buying other types of products).
• Are the most forgiving when problems occur.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 10
Personal Selling: A Fresh Look
What’s Nearly
sold?
everything!
Who Virtually
sells? everyone!
• New professionalism required:
negotiating “win-win” agreements.
• The “born salesperson” is a myth!
• Salesperson is committed to satisfy
customers
• The marketing concept and customeroriented selling: focusing on needs
and wants of target markets and
delivering the desired satisfactions
more effectively and efficiently than
the competition
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Chapter 1 | Slide 11
What Is a Customer?
Types of organizational markets:
Categories of customers:
1. Consumers
1. Profit-oriented
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2. Organizations
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Images
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Images
2. Nonprofit organizations
Organizational Markets
Producers
Resellers
Governments
Chapter Review Question:
List and briefly describe the three kinds of profit and nonprofit
organizational markets
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Chapter 1 | Slide 12
What Is a Product?
Three Concepts of Products
1.
Core Product: what a
customer actually
seeks in terms of a
problem-solving benefit
3.
2.
Tangible Product: the
combination of a core
product and its product
characteristics
Augmented Product: core
product, product characteristics,
and supplemental benefits and
services
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Chapter Review
Question:
What is a
product? How
do core
products,
tangible
products, and
augmented
products differ?
Chapter 1 | Slide 13
Diverse Roles of the
Professional Salesperson
Selling roles vary across organizations such as:
1. Retailers
2. Wholesalers
3. Industrial distributors
4. Manufacturers
5. Service firms
6. Nonprofit organizations
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Diverse Roles of the
Professional Salesperson cont’d
Three basic selling roles:
1. Order taking
2. Order supporting
3. Order creating
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Diverse Roles of the
Professional Salesperson cont’d
1. Order taking primarily requires response
selling
– Responds to customer requests to
purchase a certain product. This is the
typical role of most retail store
salespeople.
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2. Order supporting primarily requires
missionary selling
– Educates, builds goodwill, and
provides service to customers.
Furnishes information about products
to middlemen who, in turn, recommend
or sell the products to their own
customers.
Chapter 1 | Slide 16
Diverse Roles of the
Professional Salesperson cont’d
3. Order creating includes:
a)
Trade selling:
– Salesperson responds to customer requests
– Field service, such as monitoring product inventory and setting up
special displays, is more important in trade selling to retail stores,
wholesalers, and distributors
b)
Technical selling:
– Technically trained salesperson (sales engineer)
helps customers solve their problems, often
through complex product systems
c)
Creative selling:
– Salesperson stimulates demand among present
and potential new customers for a product
– Includes sales development and sales
maintenance
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Chapter Review
Question:
Name the three
basic selling
roles, and
describe the
continuum of
sales jobs ranging
from simple
response selling
to complex
creative selling.
Chapter 1 | Slide 17
The Personal Selling Process (PSP)
There are 7 interacting, overlapping steps in the professional
personal selling cycle
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Chapter 1 | Slide 18
The Personal Selling Process (PSP) cont’d
1. Prospecting and qualifying
•
Prospects: potential new customers
•
Leads: the name and address or
telephone number of a person or
organization that may have a need for
the company's product or service
•
To become a prospect, a lead
must be qualified in terms of:
1. Need or want
2. Authority to buy
3. Money or ability to buy
4. Eligibility to buy
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Chapter 1 | Slide 19
The Personal Selling Process (PSP) cont’d
•
An easy way to remember the qualifying process is the acronym -NAME
–
Need
–
Authority
–
Money
–
Eligibility
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The Personal Selling Process (PSP) cont’d
2. Planning the Sales Call (Pre-approach)
•
Salesperson obtains detailed information about the prospective buyer and
the buying situation, then develops a strategy for ensuring a favorable
reception
3. Approaching the Prospect
•
Salesperson makes the initial contact and the vital first impression
4. Making the Sales Presentation and Demonstration
•
Sales presentation strategy combined with a convincing product
demonstration is selected and tailored to the prospect to favorably
influence the outcome of the sales call
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Chapter 1 | Slide 21
The Personal Selling Process (PSP) cont’d
5. Negotiating Sales Resistance or Objections
•
Objections or resistance can be viewed as oblique requests for more
information so that the prospect can justify a purchase decision
6. Confirming and Closing the Sale
•
The close may happen at any time during the sales
process. Trial close: any well-placed attempt to close
the sale
7. Follow-up and Servicing the Account
•
Servicing the account before, during, and after the
sale furthers the "partnership" or long-term
relationship with the customer
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Chapter Review
Question:
Describe the seven
stages in the
professional
personal selling
process (PSP). Why
do we depict it as a
wheel?
Chapter 1 | Slide 22
Using Technology To Sell Better
•
Salespeople can enhance their productivity by using telecommunication
tools
Intranets
Computers
Extranets
Fax Machines
Pagers
Chapter Review Question:
Give some examples of how
salespeople can use different
technologies to improve their
efficiency and better serve
prospects and customers.
Cell phones
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Chapter 1 | Slide 23
Benefits of a Professional
Personal Selling Career
What does a sales career offer?
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•
Financial rewards
•
Perks
•
Route to the top
•
High demand and mobility
•
Job freedom and independence
•
Adventure and satisfaction
•
Objective performance evaluation
•
Contribution to society
Chapter Review Question:
Discuss the benefits and drawbacks of a career in
personal selling.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 24
Careers for Different
Types of Individuals
•
Many companies offer three paths to newly hired salespeople branching
out into multiple career opportunities:
1. Professional Selling
2. Sales Management
3. Marketing Management
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Chapter 1 | Slide 25
Multiple Career Paths in
Personal Selling
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Chapter 1 | Slide 26
Multiple Career Paths in
Personal Selling cont’d
Professional Selling
•
Sales Representative
•
Senior Sales Representative
•
Master Sales Representative
•
National or Key Account Sales
Representative
Lower
Hierarchical
Level
Upper
Hierarchical
Level
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Chapter 1 | Slide 27
Multiple Career Paths in
Personal Selling cont’d
Sales Management
•
Branch Sales Manager
•
District Sales Manager
•
Zone, Division, or Regional Sales Manager
•
National Sales Manager
•
Vice President Of Sales
Lower
Hierarchical
Level
Upper
Hierarchical
Level
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Chapter 1 | Slide 28
Multiple Career Paths in
Personal Selling cont’d
Marketing Management
•
Product or Brand Manager
•
Director of Product Development
•
Vice President of Marketing
•
Senior Vice President
•
President
•
CEO
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Lower
Hierarchical
Level
Upper
Hierarchical
Level
Chapter 1 | Slide 29
Key Terms
• Customer-Oriented Selling
– Focus on identifying customers’ needs and engaging in selling and servicing
behaviors that help build and maintain a high level of customer satisfaction
and loyalty in the long run.
• Professional Salesperson
– Salesperson who sees a sales career as a true profession for which he or
she must be well educated, well prepared, and thoroughly professional in
order to negotiate successfully with professional buyers.
• Augmented Product
– Complete bundle of benefits offered by a product, including its core function,
various enhancing characteristics, and supplemental benefits and services.
• Missionary Selling
– Educating, building goodwill, and providing services to customers (e.g.,
doctors and dentists) by giving them samples and information about
products and services (such as new pharmaceuticals and medicines to
prescribe or recommend for their patients).
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Chapter 1 | Slide 30
Key Terms cont’d
• Trade Selling
– Creative field service to wholesale and distributor customers, such as
expediting orders, taking reorders, restocking shelves, setting up displays,
providing in-store demonstrations, and distributing samples to store
customers.
• Order Taking
– Processing routine orders or reorders for products that have been sold
previously to the buying firm.
• Order Supporting
– The process of having minimal involvement in sales generation but instead
serving as an assistance-provider to customers.
• Order Creating
– The process of identifying prospective buyers, providing them with
information, motivating them to buy, confirming the sale, and following up
after the sale has been made to ensure customer satisfaction. Trade,
technical, and creative salespeople all do order creating in varying degrees.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 31
Key Terms cont’d
• Extranets
– Corporate networks that allow communication between a company and
selected customers, suppliers, and business partners.
• Intranets
– Internal corporate networks that allow salespeople and other employees
within a company to obtain information and communicate with each other.
• Personal Selling Process (PSP)
– The seven interacting, overlapping stages that every salesperson, no matter
what the product or service being sold, must carry out.
• Wheel of Personal Selling
– Depiction of the seven stages of the PSP as a continuous cycle or wheel
carried out by professionals in the field of sales.
• Prospecting
– First step in the PSP where salespeople find leads and qualify them on four
criteria: Need, Authority, Money, and Eligibility (NAME) to buy.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 32
Chapter Review Questions
1.
Describe the myth of the “born” salesperson.
2.
Explain the relationships among personal selling, the “marketing
concept,” and the “customer-oriented selling.”
3.
What types of creative salespersons are discussed in this chapter?
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Chapter 1 | Slide 33
Topics for Thought and
Class Discussion
1.
Have you ever known or met a person who appeared to be a
“natural-born” salesperson? What made you think he or she was a
good salesperson? Based on what you now know about
professional personal selling, do you think you could call this person
a truly professional salesperson? Why or why not?
2.
What kind of selling might you like to do? With what products and
what customers would you prefer to work? What do you think would
be some advantages and disadvantages of each kind of selling for
you personally?
3.
Think about why you would want a career in professional personal
selling. What would motivate you best? Money? The opportunity to
contribute to society? Job independence? Discuss your thoughts
and feelings with classmates.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 34
Internet Exercises
1. Assume that you are graduating from college soon with a dual major in
marketing and finance and that you are interested in learning about
different career opportunities for salespeople. Using your college’s
online database resources, develop general descriptions for sales jobs in
the following types of organizations (remember that “salesperson” may
not necessarily be the job title advertised). What are the similarities and
differences among the “sales” jobs?
•
•
•
•
Financial services firm (e.g., Fidelity or Merrill Lynch)
Food manufacturer (e.g., Pillsbury or Kellogg)
Not-for-profit institution (e.g., Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in
Philadelphia or a large private university)
Major sports team (e.g., Chicago Bears or Los Angeles Lakers)
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Chapter 1 | Slide 35
Internet Exercises cont’d
2. As a soon-to-be college graduate, you plan to start your career in sales,
and you have interviews set up with the four companies, named below.
Prior to the interviews, you feel that it would be to your advantage to talk
with the interviewer about the career advancement opportunities
available to those who start out in sales. To prepare for your interviews,
go to the websites for these four companies and anywhere else you can
think of to learn more about the career paths leading up from sales at
these companies:
•
•
•
•
Black & Decker
Kimberly Clark
Nestlé Foods
Xerox
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Chapter 1 | Slide 36
Projects for Personal Growth
1.
You have just inherited a pencil manufacturing business. Pencils are
hardly a glamorous product, but there is a large and competitive
market for them. See if you can develop a description of your product
that would help your sales staff sell the core, tangible, and augmented
product.
2.
Use what you have learned about what professional salespeople do to
sell one of your classmates something right there in the classroom—a
pen, chair, book, pair of shoes, whatever. Once you’ve successfully
sold to the classmate, try selling to your instructor!
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Chapter 1 | Slide 37
Case 1.1: Decisions! Decisions!
Which Career Path Should I Choose?
1.
Do you think John should declare a career path now? If not, why not?
2.
Taking into account John’s attitudes, strengths, and weaknesses, what
advice would you give John about each of the three career paths for
him?
3.
If forced to choose, which career path would be best for John? Explain
your answer.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 38
Case 1.2: What? You Want To Be a
Salesperson?
1.
Why do you think Paula’s parents are not happy about her going into a
sales career? What kind of misconceptions about personal selling do
they have?
2.
To convince her parents that sales is the right place to begin her
business career, what are the points Paula should make when she
calls her parents?
3.
If Paula cannot persuade her parents to see personal selling in a
positive light, what would you advise her to do?
Case 1.2 is found online at
http://college.hmco.com/pic/andersonps2e.
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Chapter 1 | Slide 39