Personal selling can be defined as follows:
Personal selling is oral communication with potential buyers of a product with the intention of making a sale. The personal selling may focus initially on developing a relationship with the potential buyer, but will always ultimately end with an attempt to "close the sale"
Personal selling is one of the oldest forms of promotion. It involves the use of a sales force to support a push strategy (encouraging intermediaries to buy the product) or a pull strategy (where the role of the sales force may be limited to supporting retailers and providing after-sales service).
What are the main roles of the sales force?
Kotler describes six main activities of a sales force:
(1) Prospecting - trying to find new customers
(2) Communicating - with existing and potential customers about the product range
(3) Selling - contact with the customer, answering questions and trying to close the sale
(4) Servicing - providing support and service to the customer in the period up to delivery and also post-sale
(5) Information gathering - obtaining information about the market to feedback into the marketing planning process
(6) Allocating - in times of product shortage, the sales force may have the power to decide how available stocks are allocated
What are the advantages of using personal selling as a means of promotion?
• Personal selling is a face-to-face activity; customers therefore obtain a relatively high degree of personal attention
• The sales message can be customised to meet the needs of the customer
• The two-way nature of the sales process allows the sales team to respond directly and promptly to customer questions and concerns
• Personal selling is a good way of getting across large amounts of technical or other complex product information
• The face-to-face sales meeting gives the sales force chance to demonstrate the product
• Frequent meetings between sales force and customer provide an opportunity to build good long-term relationships
Given that there are many advantages to personal selling, why do more businesses not maintain a direct sales force?
Main disadvantages of using personal selling
The main disadvantage of personal selling is the cost of employing a sales force. Sales people are expensive. In addition to the basic pay package, a business needs to provide incentives to achieve sales (typically this is based on commission and/or bonus arrangements) and the equipment to make sales calls (car, travel and subsistence costs, mobile phone etc).
In addition, a sales person can only call on one customer at a time. This is not a cost-effective way of reaching a large audience.
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Pros and Cons of Entrepreneurship
To everything in life there are advantages and disadvantages; entrepreneurship is no exception. As a matter of fact, entrepreneurship involves a lot of risk taking. Yet, it can pay off very nicely as well, with rewards such as profits and the opportunity to be your own boss and make your own decisions.
Here are some pros and cons to consider:
Pros
• Excitement: Due to its high capacity for risk, there is a lot of adventure.
• Rules and regulations: Work in a current job is difficult to do because of all the "red tape" and consistent administration approval needed.
• Originality: Some people feel that they can offer a new service/product that no one else has offered before.
• Competition: Employees feel they can offer their current company's product/service at a lesser expense to the public.
• Independence: Some people wish to be their own boss and make all the important decisions him/herself.
• Salary potential: Generally, people want to be paid for the amount of work they do in full; they do not want to be "short-changed."
• Flexibility: Entrepreneurs can schedule their work hours to spend quality time with family or any other reason.
• Rational salary: They are not being paid what they're worth and would rather work on their own and earn the money they should be earning for their efforts.
• Freedom: Entrepreneurs can work whenever they want, wherever they want, and however they want.
Cons
• Salary: Starting your own business means that you must be willing to give up the security of a regular paycheck.
• Benefits: There will undoubtedly be fewer benefits, especially when considering that your business will be just starting off.
• Work schedule: The work schedule of an entrepreneur is never predictable; an emergency can come up in a matter of a second and late hours will have to be put in.
• Administration: All the decisions of the business must be made on your own; there is no one ranked higher than you on the chain of command in YOUR business.
• Incompetent staff: Often times, you will find yourself working with an employee who "doesn't know the ropes" as well as you do due to lack of experience.
• Procedures: Many times during your entrepreneurial life, you will find that many policies do not make sense, nor will they ever make sense.
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