Sales Management: Difficulties Encountered by Managers - Assignment Example

Sales Management Question1: Difficulties Encountered by Sales Managers The duties and responsibilities of sales manages are very challenging. Sales managers are faced with the challenge of aggressively exploiting new market niches while improving profit margins. As the market improves, sales managers have to increase sales and profit margins. This may, however, be difficult because companies have to face of with competitors willing to maintain low prices in order to capture a wide market (Lamb 2011, 311). As such, while sales managers may be geared towards increasing both sales volume and profit margin, the competitive environment may not allow that objective to be achieved with ease. In many organizations, sales managers are faced with the challenge of improving a company’s market presence under limited budget. Essentially, limited resource has been cited as one of the most important challenges in sales management (Ingram 2012, 98-99). This requires sales managers to not only cut extraneous activities but to also concentrate on finding and connecting with quality marketing prospects. Sales managers are also faced with the ever-increasing challenge of encouraging their sales teams to revisit their customers and seek referrals. Seeking referrals is not only the most cost-effective selling strategy but also helps improve market penetration at minimal cost. The issue of working with remote or tele-working sales people is another important challenge that sales managers have to contend with. The ever-growing use of technology has created opportunities for companies to hire salespeople who work remotely from home and come to office only occasionally (Lamb, 2011; 149). Cultivating personal relationships with these salespeople has been a difficult task for sales managers and continues to be a major challenge as remote selling grows in acceptance. Ingram (2012, 98-99) has noted that whether the salespeople are housed in the office or operate remotely, coaching and mentoring them is an important responsibility of sales managers. This requires sales mangers to understand the weaknesses ad strengths of the salespeople and to consistently communicate with them. In today’s marketing environment where customer demands is a predominant issue because of increasing competition and globalizations of economic systems, sales managers must be ready to accommodate changing customer buying trends. Many businesses have in the recent years faced tectonic shifts because their marketing strategies do not met the needs of demanding customers. According to Mathur (2008, 121-123) in today’s industrial era, marketing situations are characterised by large and highly complex purchasing organizations. There is little real product differentiation and increasing buyer risk, all of which are major challenges that sales managers have to address. Increasing competitive intensity in both domestic and international markets and customer sophistication has forced sales mangers to approach the sales process in different ways. Upholding sales accountability is also another challenge that sales managers have to address. Occasionally, there are times when sales representatives fail in their duties regardless of the training and support that they receive and failure to meet performance targets is often blamed on competition, poor state of the economy and poor market conditions. Sales managers have to be held responsible for poor performance (Calvin 2007, 69-72). Question 4: Does Money Influence Motivation? Money is a major motive for work since no one works for free. Although pursuing money based on positive motives can lead to improved psychological wellbeing, this is not necessarily the same as pursuing money to provide comfort and security to oneself (Diener & Biswas 2002, 123). Obviously, workers want to earn fair salaries and wages and employers want their workers to feel that what they are getting is directly related to the work that they do. Research studies have, however, shown that monetary incentives in the workplace only improve workplace motivation to a limited extent (Srivastava, Locke & Bartol 2001, 965). It has to be acknowledged that giving sales people more money will moderately or significantly improve their task performance but the effectiveness will largely depend on organizational conditions. Indeed, differences in organizational arrangements and workplace culture contribute to the effectiveness and feasibility of various monetary incentives, which in turn translate into differences in employee preferences for financial incentives. Diener and Biswas (2002, 128) have concluded from his research study that certain non-financial incentives such as employee recognition and appreciation, ease of promotion and career growth and work flexibility are strongly related to job satisfaction and hence motivation than financial incentives such as hard cash. Use of monetary incentives to reinforce motivation in the workplace derives from the reinforcement theory. This theory focuses on relationship between behaviours and their consequences such as how workplace performance is influenced by pay. The theory holds that the motives that drive people to focus on money are more important than the focus itself. This implies that employees are likely to view monetary incentives as a means of attaining personal goals and satisfaction than as a way of improving workplace performance (Stajkovic & Luthans 2003, 156-157). Srivastava, Locke and Bartol, (2001, 971) have explained that money works best to motivate employees when companies offer trust and honest to employees. This is in essence a cost-free method of inspiring employees to increase their productivity. Honest and trust motivates workers in that they lead to mutual understanding between employees and employers. This understanding reinforces the view that the company is organized under a shared culture wherein no party should deceive the other. Therefore, a positive work environment which supports honesty, fairness and integrity coupled with monetary incentives encourages employees to perform their duties as effective as required and allows companies to instill feelings of motivation besides contributing to fairness and equality in the workplace. In addition, monetary incentives help increase employee motivation when employees are given the freedom to do what they desire. Therefore, companies should reconsider their rules to decide which ones may be major barriers to employee freedom than are enhancement for increased efficiency. While numerous researches have consistently substantiated the effectiveness of monetary incentives on job performance and motivation, companies need to consider the issue of job quantity versus quality and to be aware of the limits of monetary incentives. According to Kasser and Kasser (2001, 693) employees can have different motives for acquiring wealth, which include using money to fulfill psychological satisfaction. Therefore, it is the case that monetary incentives alone are not an effective motivator of employees than when used alongside non-monetary incentives. Question Three: Why is Personal selling so important when Technology is Replacing People? Personal selling is the process of presenting goods to potential customers and or persuading hem to purchase them. The process involves face-to-face interaction between the salesperson and the customer as well as physical verification of the products. The objective of personal selling is not only to sell the product but also to make the customer a permanent customer (Rolph & Dubinsky 2004, 138). Despite the growing importance of technology as a tool for aiding selling, personal selling continues to be an important aspect of marketing in modern times. Part of this arises from the fact that personal selling is flexible and enables the sales person to explain features of the product to the potential customer and give demonstration of their use. Personal selling also enables the sales person to supply vital information to the potential customers about the availability of the product, special feature of the product and its uses and utility. As such, it is a highly educative process of selling (Lamb 2011, 198). Personal selling also helps companies to create or design new products based on customer feedbacks and suggestions, which are instant. This leads to improvement of the product. Essentially, when selling personally, the salesperson gets acquainted with the demands and choices of customers and makes suggestions to the company. To a greater extent, personal selling is extremely important as it helps increase sales by creating demand for products both existing and new ones. Personal selling can also be used to create new customers and also expand market for a company’s product. The process gives personalized opportunities for customers to know about new products introduce into the market by informing and educating consumers about new products (Marks 2006, 238-240). Despite its importance and use, there are certain conditions where personal selling is less relevant as it cannot provide easy and effective answers to multi-dimensional sales problems. For instance, personal selling cannot be used where there is a large market or where customers are spread throughout the market. In this case, other form of selling such as use of technology is appropriate. In situations where the product does not require personal demonstration, personal selling becomes quite irrelevant (Rolph & Dubinsky 2004, 162-163). An important advantage of personal selling over other selling techniques is the personalized selling pitch, which can be adjusted and individuals to suit the prospects of potential customers. Once the sales person determines the prospect’ needs, they can tailor the sales pitch. The process of personal selling is also important where the sale involves a great deal of money and prices have to be negotiated (Cant 2005, 314-316). Personal selling helps complement advertising. While advertising helps attract customers, doubts and questions about the product and its use are answered by salesmen through personal selling and in this way, personal selling complements the efforts of advertising. Moreover, the process involves minimal wastage of efforts since salesmen can select target markets and concentrate on selected prospective customers. Reference List Calvin, R. 2007. Sales Management Demystified. New York: McGraw-Hill Professional. Cant, M 2005. Personal Selling. New York: Juta and Company Ltd. Diener, E. & Biswas-Diener, R 2002. Will money increase subjective well-being? A literature review and guide to needed research. Social Indicators Research, 57, 119-169. Ingram, T 2012. Sales Management: Analysis and Decision Making. London: M.E. Sharpe. Kasser, T., & Kasser, V 2001. The dreams of people high and low in materialism. Journal of Economic Psychology, 22, 693-719. Lamb, C. W 2011. Essentials of Marketing Boston: Cengage Learning. Marks R. 2006. Personal Selling: A Relationship Approach. Boston: Cengage Learning. Mathur, U 2008. Sales Management. Sydney: New Age International. Rolph, E & Dubinsky J 2004. Personal selling: achieving customer satisfaction and loyalty. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Srivastava, A., Locke, E and Bartol, K 2001. Money and subjective well-being it’s not the money, it’s the motives. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80, 959-971. Stajkovic, A. D., & Luthans, F 2003. Behavioral management and task performance in organizations: conceptual background, meta-analysis, and test of alternative models. Personnel Psychology, 56, 155-194. Read More