Chapter 9 Professional Selling Chapter Outline How Professional

Chapter 9 Professional Selling

Chapter Outline • How Professional Business Selling Differs from Personal Selling to Consumers • Profile of a Professional Salesperson • The Cost of Professional Selling • Understanding Buyer Behavior: A Seller's Perspective • The Importance of Planning • Sales Presentation Approaches • Selling Styles and Sales Tasks in the Business Market • The Professional Selling Process • Contemporary Trends in Business Selling

Characteristics of Top Business Sales Performers • • • Goal-Setting Vision Passion Communication Skills Commitment • • Efficiency Readiness to Learn Helping People Integrity A salesperson for XYZ Corp. discovers a new potential customer. A sales call confirms that the company purchases millions of dollars of products from XYZ’s competitor. The buyer makes it clear that they are very satisfied with their current sources and have no need for XYZ Corp. The salesperson’s report suggests little chance to become a supplier, but the salesperson will check in with the company every six months in case anything changes. What time is it? It’s time for a new salesperson.

The Personal Selling Process: A Business Salesperson’s Perspective • Preliminary Activities • Face-to-Face Activities • Follow-Up Activities

Professional Buyers Barriers to overcome: • I don’t know who you are. • I don’t know your company’s product. • I don’t know what your company stands for. • I don’t know your company’s customers. • I don’t know your company’s record. • I don’t know your company’s reputation. NOW, What was it you wanted to sell me?

Methods Used to Uncover Important Buyer Needs • Ask questions: Questions often can bring out needs that the prospect would not reveal or does not know exist. • Observe: Successful salespeople are particularly sensitive to customer expressions and body language. • Listen: Salespeople must remember that telling is not selling. The instant a salesperson asks a question and waits quietly for an answer, the prospect’s entire attention is focused on the salesperson. Thus, a basic rule of selling is, never to say something if you can ask it.

Planning a Sales Call • Planning is valuable to focus thinking and prepare the salesperson for what is expected. • Typical planning process involves: – Setting objective – Preparing an opener – Preparing qualifying questions – Listing main features and advantages of product/service – Listing main benefits of product/service – Listing support to substantiate benefits – Listing expected buyer’s objections and salesperson’s responses – Planning the close

Salespeople Expect— and Even Like—Objections • Handling objections correctly will lead to your close. • Well-handled objection is a positive buying signal. – Ask for the order – Ask for the trial – Ask for action

Handling Sincere Objections • Find out what the objection means—ask questions and listen. What does “it costs too much” really mean? • Restate objection as you understand it. • Get in step—agree that it is a wise concern. Never say, “You’re wrong. ” • Answer objection by – Offsetting with other benefits – “Boomerang method”—converting objections into a benefit – Converting objection into question so it becomes a request for further information

Closing the Sale • Closing is simply asking for the order. A professional salesperson knows several closing techniques from which to choose, based on prospect and setting. • When to close: – After a positive buying signal – After a successful answer to an objection – At the end of the presentation • Types of closings: – Direct: Can we write up the order? – Alternative proposal: Do you prefer truck or rail shipment? – Assumptive: We can ship tomorrow if you’ll sign here. – Minor decision: Takes customer through decision-making process— either/or, step by step, open-ended questions, summary, balance sheet

Do You Have These Salesperson Characteristics? • • Is detail oriented Likes to meet new people Manages multiple things Appearance oriented Good listener Gets involved Encourages harmony, agreement • Has good communication skills • Has good intuition • Enjoys discussing events and news • Keeps in touch • Has sense of responsibility • Has organizational skills

Chapter 10 Business Sales Management

Chapter Outline • • Sales Management: A Leadership Challenge Differences Between Sales Managers and Salespeople Basic Types of Sales Organizations Staffing a Sales Force Recruiting and Selecting a Sales Force Training and Developing a Sales Force Directing and Motivating a Sales Force Analyzing and Evaluating a Sales Force

Business Sales Management: A Leadership Challenge • The first qualification for a sales manager is leadership. • Leading, managing, facilitating, and inspiring activities of salespeople is important because salespersons work at the boundaries of organizations where oversight and supervision are difficult. • Organizations are constantly faced with the challenge of finding ways to improve sales force performance.

Leadership • Leadership is difficult to define and teach, but we know it when we see it. • A leader brings out the best in us and knows that we can be successful even before we do. A Leader… • • • Creates shared vision and purpose. Empowers through confidence and trust. Is a role model. Facilitates, encourages, and supports. Serves the needs of the team. Creates a team of leaders.

Managerial Leadership* Research shows that even when managing a group of individual contributors, effective leaders: – Create self-confidence in individuals by clear and sincere supporting messages. Self-confidence leads to more innovation, empowerment, and success. – Use communication and interactions to increase individuals’ feelings of being part of a greater whole, working together toward a worthy vision. – Are perceived as honest, caring, trusting, respecting, and consistent. – Encourage and literally support the highest levels of achievement (results that individuals can take pride in). – Build group culture that all are glad to be a part of. – Provide constructive feedback and encourage individual professional growth to help each person be all that he/she can be. * Based on Gomes-Knowles Model (JME, vol. 21, no. 3 [1999], 164 -174. )

Selecting the Sales Manager • Selling skills and leadership/management skills are different. Not all good salespeople make good managers, yet firms still tend to promote this way. • To be a successful manager, it is important to adopt different: – Perspectives: Must consider whole sales team and organization rather than just self as salesperson. – Goals: Must be concerned with organization’s, not individual’s, goals. – Responsibilities: Must recognize necessity of making a sale at profit and monitoring customer satisfaction with both products and salesperson service. (continued)

Selecting the Sales Manager – Satisfaction: From seeing salespeople succeed, not from making the sale. – Job skill requirements: Must have product and selling knowledge, but also leadership skills—communicating, delegating, planning, managing time, motivating, and training. – Relationships: Must be developed with sales force and internal area managers, as well as customers. • Those who aspire to be sales managers should make it apparent that they have these qualities.

Basic Types of Sales Organizations • • • Line and staff Functional Centralized vs. decentralized By specialization – Geographic – Sales activities – Product specialization – Customer specialization – Combination

Determining Sales Force Size • Workload method: – Frequency of sales calls to given customers – Time intervals between sales calls – Travel time around the territory – Nonselling time • Sales potential method: Yearly sales volume divided by expected volume of each salesperson • Incremental method: Profit contributions from an additional salesperson’s sales versus costs of hiring that person

Staffing the Business Sales Force • Conduct a job analysis. • Prepare a written job description. • Develop sales job qualifications (specifications).

Training and Developing the Business Sales Force • • • Company knowledge Product knowledge Selling techniques Customer knowledge Competitive knowledge Time and territory management

Sales Training Evaluation • Set objectives (overall and specific) for company sales training program. • Determine whether objectives as set are being met or already have been met. • Try to measure the effect of training on profitability.

Directing and Motivating the Business Sales Force • Providing leadership • Sales quotas: – To provide incentive – To provide a basis for compensation – To evaluate a person’s performance • Compensation

Analyzing and Evaluating a Sales Force • To determine areas where each salesperson needs improvement • To assess the validity of the standards used • To spot people who are ready for promotion, salary raises, or assignment to new territories and responsibilities • To supply evidence about salespeople who should be disciplined or terminated • To check the effectiveness of the sales compensation plan, training, supervision, recruitment, territory assignments, and operating procedures (continued)

Analyzing and Evaluating a Sales Force • Whether sales force is organized around team selling or individual contributors, managing salespeople is somewhat different than managing groups in internal parts of organization. • An entry-level professional in operations, personnel, or accounting may be motivated by the goal of some day progressively advancing through the ranks, but many in sales would not find that attractive; they get great satisfaction (and remuneration) just remaining a territory salesperson. • Commission is a powerful incentive, and managers must be sure compensation plan is consistent with objectives. If there are problems with sales results, be sure you understand sales force reward system.

Chapter 11 Advertising and Sales Promotion Strategy

Chapter Outline • • • The Role of Promotion in Business Marketing Setting Objectives for a Promotional Plan Developing the Promotional Budget Developing and Implementing the Promotional Mix Measuring the Effectiveness of the Business Promotion Campaign Following Up and Making Necessary Changes

Marketing Mix = Product, Price, Promotion, Place Advertising, publicity, and sales promotion are communication methods used by marketers to remind, inform, interest, or persuade existing and potential customers In the business market, advertising, publicity, and sales promotion pave the way for the sales call (Personal Selling, Chapter 9). Promotion Mix = Advertising, Publicity, Sales Promotion, Personal Selling

Business-to-Business Promotion • • Marketing professionals are responsible for strategically setting marketing mix (4 Ps), and that includes details of each element. In the case of promotion “P, ” that responsibility includes setting details of promotion mix. As presented in Chapter 9 (Selling), business-to-business promotion relies heavily on personal selling. Why is that? The majority of our efforts and resources for business-to-business promotion typically go to personal sales. Some of the reasons include: – Need to develop personal relationship and trust. – Complexity of product or service. – Need for early supplier involvement in development stage. – Great importance of customer satisfaction. – Continuous need for customer-need monitoring and communication. (continued)

Business-to-Business Promotion • • But business marketers do utilize other promotion mix elements, often to support personal selling. Advertising, publicity, and sales promotion support personal selling by: – Creating awareness – Generating leads – Reinforcing company image – Creating interest – Reaching buying center influencers previously unidentified or inaccessible to salesperson It is probably fair to say that most business-to-business marketers are more expert with personal selling element of promotion mix than with its advertising, publicity, and sales promotion elements. That makes this chapter all the more important!

Steps in Creating a Promotional Plan • • • Setting objectives Developing promotional budget Developing and implementing promotional mix Measuring effectiveness of promotional program Following up and modifying promotional campaign, if necessary Effective promotion helps sales; ineffective promotion can waste money and even damage company image.

Common Budget-Setting Techniques • • Percentage of anticipated sales Affordable/Arbitrary (most common) Competitive parity/Market share Objective-and-task (most common)

Winning Sales through Cooperative Promotion At Montana State University, Pepsi is out and Coke is in. In a competitive bid, Coca-Cola has won the five-year contract to be the exclusive soft drink supplier for the entire MSU campus. To win the contract, Coke offered the school a combination of cash payments and value through cooperative promotion. These promotions included: – $250, 000/year payments plus a commission on sales – Cooperative marketing program including radio advertising – New soccer field scoreboard and ice machine – Coke cans across the region to carry MSU logo – Off-campus vending machines with MSU logo, plus commission on those sales (From Marketing News, November 8, 1999, p. 9. )

Advertising • A good ad often is similar to a sales call— – Opener (headline) to catch interest – Body to convey information and benefits – Call for action to close • Ad’s connection to customer’s buying and adoption process should be clear. • A good ad: – Is memorable – Is consistent with company’s image – Interests the right target audience – Is easy to read – Provides evidence of customer value – Motivates reader to want to learn more – Provides easy way for reader to learn more

Print Media Publication Type Examples Horizontal Design Engineering, Purchasing Vertical Chemical Industry News, Mechanical Contractor Professional Architectural Digest, Dental Technology Industrial Thomas Register of American Manufacturers General Business Fortune, Business Week

Broadcast Media • Radio and TV are sometimes used where market is highly geographically concentrated and product is of interest to broad range of business users. – A roller bearing company in Ohio may use radio ads during morning commute in highly industrialized city to reach buying center influencers in local industries where roller bearings are used. – IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Xerox, or Fed. Ex may use TV spot during “Dilbert, ” which is watched by professionals from a wide range of industries, i. e. , potential customers. • Broadcast media would not be likely vehicle if products were only used by a few companies in target area (which is often the case).

Direct Marketing • Business-to-business direct marketing is big business— approximately $1 trillion/year. • Types – Direct mail – Telemarketing – E-mail/Internet

Advertising Agencies • • • Advertising agencies work on advertising strategy and campaigns, prepare copy and layouts, study markets, select media, and carry out actual physical production of advertisement and its placement in selected media. Agencies do not always understand technology and particular buying process in business markets. Even when using advertising professionals, marketer must assure ad strategy and content is appropriate and effective. How can you do that? When using an agency, marketer is responsible for: – Creating and measuring ad and campaign objectives. – Understanding target market’s adoption process. – Understanding how ad campaign fits into integrated promotion mix that moves potential buyer through each step in adoption process and supports continued customer satisfaction and repurchase. – Testing ads. (continued)

Advertising Agencies • Many business marketers don’t formally test advertising effectiveness (as strange as that may seem!). • Agencies are paid for their ad production costs, plus a percentage (~15%) of every media placement. If a marketer relies on the agency to recommend placements, there may be a conflict of interest. • Some marketers are asking agencies to accept payment based on ad and campaign performance (pre- and posttesting). Agencies are resisting.

Business Publicity • Publicity can: – Help build or add to company’s visibility or image. – Introduce a new product, service, or improvement. – Provide salespeople with easier entry into office of current or prospective customers. • Good publicity doesn’t just happen; it is managed. PR department will create relationships with appropriate media representatives and provide them with newsworthy information presented from the company’s perspective. If all goes well, that is how it will appear. • Because media are not paid to present publicity, there is little control over how it is presented. Marketers tend to have more influence with media outlets they regularly use to advertise. (continued)

Business Publicity • Techniques for getting in the news: – Press releases – Exclusive features – Press conferences – Press kits • Getting free publicity is nice, but it leaves you at mercy of poor placements, poor wording, or intentional negative spin. Use it with caution. (continued)

Business Publicity In a recent example of the lack of control over publicity, a university put out a news release concerning the student government’s new honor code. Acting on their own, the students created a set of honor standards and administration plan that are among the most rigorous in the nation. As a final step in the process, the faculty voted their support of the code. The news item was picked up by the region’s leading paper which ran the story under the bold headline: University Faculty Approves Cheating Plan At best, the headline is poorly worded. (continued)

Business Publicity Roger E. Axtell, a past Vice President of Marketing for the Parker Pen Company tells of one his first assignments with the company. He sent out a news release announcing a new company president and management team. The newspaper ran the item with the new management team’s pictures by the side of the article. Unfortunately, directly under the pictures the newspaper had placed an unrelated article with the headline: Local Men Arrested in Pig Theft Free publicity leaves you at the mercy of poor placements, poor wording, and even intentional negative spin. Use it with caution.

Trade Shows and Exhibits • Trade shows are often large component of total business marketing promotion budget allocation (behind personal selling and, possibly, trade journal advertising). • Trade shows (large and small, industry-specific and general) are regularly scheduled in cities all across the world. • COMDEX, the U. S. computer industry trade show, brings together 2, 200+ companies and 220, 000 attendees. (continued)

Trade Shows and Exhibits • Like all marketing expenditures, trade shows need to have measurable objectives and a budget. • Using your business judgment, estimate the costs for a company in your area to exhibit at the annual “Manufacturing Week” trade show in Chicago. Expenses include: – Space rental – Air travel for four – Hotel – VCR – Display booth – Meals – Shipping (2 -way) – Entertainment – Set-up/dismantle – Catalogs to pass out to attendees (union rate) – Chairs, tables, carpet rental (continued)

Trade Shows and Exhibits

Sales Promotion • Advertising specialty items: – Calendars – Desk clocks – Calculator notepads – Pens – Posters – Desktop business card holders – Tape measures – Travel alarm clocks – Mugs • If company name is on item that is handy to buying center influencers, is it effective as goodwill or as a reminder?