Professional Selling Overview

Contact Email Design Copyright 1994-2013 © OxfordCambridge.OrgBusiness Skills - Selling (This picture: Trinity College, Cambridge)
Professional Selling Overview

Professional Selling Overview
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Aim of publication
To introduce the reader or the learner to the
fundamentals of professional selling.

After developing the KeyPoints outlined in this publication, you should
mainly be able to:
☺ explain the scope of selling
☺ describe what sales staff do
☺ explain how companies communicate
☺ identify the needs of different types of customers
☺ explain the steps involved in an organisational buying process
☺ identify different types of buying decisions
Learning Objectives

After developing the KeyPoints outlined in this publication, you should
mainly be able to:
☺ respond to different types of organisational buyers
☺ explain buying motives
☺ explain how needs develop
☺ deduce what a buyer can afford
☺ begin a relationship properly
☺ deal effectively with grievances
☺ know how to build trust
Learning Objectives

☺ Defining Personal Selling
☺ Buying Processes
☺ Customer Needs
☺ Cultivating Relationships
Effective Business Meetings - Sections list

☺ Scope of selling
☺ Sales activities
☺ Communication
Defining Personal Selling
To explain what personal selling is.

Contact Email Design Copyright 1994-2013 © OxfordCambridge.OrgBusiness Skills - Selling (This picture: Harcourt Hill, West Oxford)
Defining Personal Selling - Highlights
☺ After going through these KeyPoints you
should be able to:
• discuss the changing role of the
salesperson
• discuss organisational learning
• describe the activities common to all
types of sales jobs
• discuss the changing role of the sales
force
• discuss organisational change
• outline the different methods that
organisations use to communicate with
customers
• discuss the strengths and weaknesses
of different communication methods

Defining Personal Selling - Summary
☺ Personal selling is an interpersonal
communication process, that involves
satisfying the needs of customers and
building long-term, mutually beneficial
relationships with them.
☺ Sales personnel should be able to analyze
customer needs and effectively explain
these needs to the organisation.
☺ Adaptive learning occurs when an
organisation uses knowledge acquired from
the sales force to improve its current
activities.
☺ Generative learning, on the other hand,
occurs when an organisation uses this
knowledge to develop new products.
☺ Sales personnel are involved in finding new
customers, increasing sales to existing
customers, demonstrating products,
negotiating, and writing orders.

☺ Sales personnel work with other company
employees to make sure that the product
meets the customer's demands.
☺ Because the role of the sales force is
changing to accommodate long-term
relations with customers, organisations are
changing their structures.
☺ Hierarchies structures tend to be
replaced with flatter, more efficient ones
that focus on core processes such as
customer relations, and multifunctional
teams are becoming more important in
organisations.
☺ Sales personnel work with other company
employees to make sure that the product
meets the customer's demands.

☺ Because the role of the sales force is
changing to accommodate long-term
relations with customers, organisations are
changing and will change their structures.
☺ Hierarchies structures tend to be
replaced with flatter, more efficient ones
that focus on core processes such as
customer relations, and multifunctional
teams are becoming more important in
organisations.
☺ Organisations use marketing
communications to provide customers with
information about a product and how it
can be purchased.

☺ The main methods of marketing
communications are personal selling,
advertising, sales promotion, publicity, and
word of mouth.
☺ The methods differ in terms of the
control, flexibility, and credibility they
offer, and in terms of their cost to the
organisation.

☺ Types of customers
☺ Organisational buying concept
☺ Organisational buying decisions
☺ Selling to organisations
Buying Processes
To explain how buying decisions are made in organisations.

Buying Processes - Highlights
☺ After completing these KeyPoints you
should be able to:
• describe the role of customers who are
producers and re-sellers
• describe customers from government
agencies and institutions as well as the
general consumer
• describe how Sales personnel negotiate
with customers
• describe the buying process
• describe new-task decisions
• describe straight and modified re-buys
• identify the strategies required in
organisational selling

Buying Processes - Summary
☺ Customers that Sales personnel encounter
include producers, resellers, government
agencies, institutions, and consumers.
☺ Producers can act as original equipment
manufacturers (OEMs) or as end-users
and resellers.
☺ Government agencies and institutions such
as churches, hospitals, and colleges have
intricate purchasing procedures that Sales
personnel need to acquaint themselves
with before negotiations can begin.
☺ Selling to an organisation requires more
skill than selling to ordinary consumers
because negotiations are more complex.
☺ Sales personnel need to interact with a
wide variety of people in the customer's
company and coordinate various
departments in their own companies.

Buying Processes - Summary
☺ The buying process involves recognizing
the need for a product; defining and
specifying the product; soliciting,
analyzing, and evaluating proposals from
suppliers; placing the order; and
evaluating performance.
☺ It is in the interests of the salesperson
to be involved in the early stages of the
buying process and to stay involved in the
evaluation of a product for future
business opportunities.
☺ A customer makes new-task, straight re-
buy, or modified re-buy decisions for
different types of products at different
stages of a company's life.
☺ These decisions focus on different areas
of the buying process and entail different
strategies on the part of the salesperson.

☺ Defining needs
☺ How needs develop
Customer Needs
To differentiate between types of buying needs and their roles in large and small
sales.

Customer Needs - Highlights
☺ After developing these KeyPoints you
should be able to:
• differentiate between business needs,
personal needs, and task needs
• describe rational and emotional motives
for buying and how they relate to
product attributes
• describe the differences in customer
needs development in small and large
sales
• explain the value of implied and
explicit needs as buying signals in small
and large sales
• discuss the effect of the value
equation on customers' buying decisions

Customer Needs - Summary
☺ The awareness of a lack of something
provides the initial stimulus to buy. This
lack or shortage - whether tangible or
intangible - is called a need.
☺ It is often useful to differentiate
between needs and wants - a want arises
from a need.
☺ Personal needs satisfy basic human
behavioral needs, while business needs are
the goods and services required for
conducting a business.
☺ Task needs are tools and resources that
enable people to do their work.

☺ Customers base their buying decisions on
rational or emotional buying motives, or on
a combination of these.
☺ Sales personnel need to relate their
products to the rational and emotional
needs of customers at the levels of
product features, advantages, and
benefits.
☺ Needs develop differently in large and
small sales.
☺ For example, in large sales, customers
consider more closely the risks of wrong
buying decisions.
☺ They also must justify their purchases
rationally and tend to involve others in
their buying decisions.

☺ Implied needs are expressed in the form
of problems or difficulties, while explicit
needs are stated as wants or desires.
☺ Small sales become more likely when
customers express many implied needs.
☺ To increase the likelihood of large sales,
however, Sales personnel need to
encourage their customers to voice as
many explicit needs as possible.
☺ The value equation - or "value for money"
- compares the seriousness of a problem
to the cost of its solution.

☺ Beginning the relationship
☺ Dealing with grievances
☺ Handling customer complaints
☺ Building trust
Cultivating Relationships
To demonstrate how sales personnel cultivate relationships with customers and
clients.

Cultivating Relationships - Highlights
☺ After developing these KeyPoints you
should be able to:
• describe the value of satisfied
customers
• explain how to build a relationship
properly
• discuss good after-sales service
• discuss how to deal with grievances
• explain techniques for establishing the
facts of a customer's claim
• identify solutions that Sales personnel
can offer customers
• discuss the importance of following
through with action

Cultivating Relationships - Highlights
• discuss ways sales staff can
demonstrate dependability
• explain how sales staff can prove
competence and customer direction
• describe how sales professionals can
demonstrate honesty and geniality

Cultivating Relationships - Summary
☺ Successful companies can maintain a
competitive edge by developing
partnerships with customers.
☺ When customers need to make buying
decisions, they are more likely to return
to companies with whom they have a good
relationship.
☺ When establishing a good customer
relationship, the salesperson should set
realistic expectations, monitor order
processing, and ensure proper use of the
product.
☺ The salesperson may need to provide
technical assistance or training to make
sure that the customer is able to use the
product effectively.
☺ Successfully handling complaints at the
beginning of the buyer-seller relationship
is particularly important.

☺ The salesperson should encourage the
customer to present his or her problem in
detail so that the grievance can be fully
understood.
☺ Once the nature of a customer's problem
has been established, the salesperson
should put forward a solution and explain
the reasons for the action.
☺ Following through with action improves
customer satisfaction and supports the
salesperson's previous assurances that the
company is dedicated to customer service.
☺ Trust develops from a combination of five
factors - dependability, competence,
customer direction, honesty, and geniality.

☺ Dependability refers to the customer's
perception of whether or not the
salesperson, the product, and the
company will meet expectations.
☺ Sales personnel can demonstrate
dependability by fulfilling their promises.
☺ Sales personnel demonstrate competence
by showing that they know what they are
talking about and can carry out their
tasks quickly and efficiently.
☺ Customer orientation describes the way in
which a salesperson places the customer's
needs above the need to make a sale.
☺ Honesty is related to dependability and
competence; customers tend to rely on
Sales personnel who are truthful and know
what they are talking about.
☺ Geniality is conveyed by pleasant and
friendly communication.

Professional Selling Overview

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