Chapter 16 – Selling and Sales Promotions
Learning Objectives:
1. Discuss the role of a company’s salespeople in creating value for customers and building
customer relationships
2. Identify and explain the six major sales force management steps
3. Discuss the personal selling process, distinguishing between transaction-oriented
marketing and relationship marketing
4. Explain how sales promotion campaigns are developed and implemented
Personal selling
Rather than selling to potential buyers, savvy marketers stress building relationships
The nature of personal selling
Personal selling: personal presentation by the firm’s sales force for the purpose of
making sales and building customer relationships
Today most sales people are well-educated, well-trained professionals who add value
for customers and maintain long-term customer relationships
Salesperson: an individual representing a company to customers by performing one or
more of the following activities: prospecting, communicating, selling, servicing,
information gathering, or relationship building. Salespeople can be order takers,
standing behind the counter, or order getters, whose positions demand creative selling
and relationship building
The role of the sales force
Advertising consists largely of nonpersonal communication with target consumer
groups. In contrast, personal selling involves interpersonal interactions between
salespeople and individual customers
Linking the company and its customers
o Salespeople serve both masters: the seller and the buyer
o They represent the company to customers. They find and develop new
customers and communicate information about the company’s products and
services. They also represent as champions who understand the customers’
interests and managing the buyer-seller relationship
Coordinating marketing and sales
o Sales and marketing should be working together