sales force organisation

Question 1

different possible sales force structures

Answer 1

• Geographical
• Product specialisation
• Market-centred
• Account-size
• New/existing account
• Mixed

Question 2

geographical structure

Answer 2

Each sales person is assigned a
territory

Strengths
• Simplicity
• Relatively low cost

Weaknesses
• Difficulty in selling a wide product range
• Lower understanding of complexity of
buyer behaviour
• Poorer in reporting changes in the market-place

Question 3

product specialisation structure

Answer 3

Sales people specialise in individual product categories or new/existing
products

Strengths (org. by product line)
• Good product knowledge

Strengths (org. by new/existing products)
• Specialisation of selling skills
• Greater attention given to new products
• No competition between selling of new and existing products

Weaknesses
• Route duplication
• Relatively high costs
• Bigger territories

Question 4

market-centered structure

Answer 4

Sales people specialise in the type of market served

Strengths
• Good customer knowledge
• Good for monitoring changes and trends within markets/industries

Weakness
• High cost

Question 5

account-size structure

Answer 5

Sales people specialise in different types of accounts

Strengths
• Allocation of sales force resources
linked to customer value
• Benefits we discussed in the KAM lecture

Weakness
• Servicing key accounts is very expensive

Question 6

new/existing account structure

Answer 6

Sales people specialise in new or existing accounts

Strengths
• Ensures enough attention is paid to new accounts
• Specialisation of selling skills
• No competition between existing and new accounts

Weaknesses
• Expensive
• Potential discontinuity when new account is passed on to existing account team once account is established

Question 7

mixed organisation

Answer 7

• “Mix and match” of different structures
• Allows to tailor the structure to the needs of the organisation
• Can be challenging to accurately assess the different options
• Balance act between customer and organisational needs

Question 8

what are the different types of sales people with regards to compensation

Answer 8

1. Creatures of habit: try to maintain standard of living
2. Satisfiers: performa at a level just sufficient to keep their jobs
3. Trade-off-ers: strive for personally determined work/life balance
4. Goal oriented: strive for achievement. Money is seen as recognition
5. Money oriented: aim to maximise their earnings

Question 9

what does the underlying motivation of sales people determine with regards to compensation?

Answer 9

what type they prefer and what type is most efficient from the seller’s perspective

Question 10

three types of compensation plans

Answer 10

1. Fixed salary
2. Commission only
3. Salary plus commission

Question 11

fixed salary

Answer 11

Strengths
• Provides salespeople with security
• Increases likelihood that sales people engage in important noncommission related activities (e.g., tech support, reports, …)
• Straight forward administration

Weaknesses
• No incentive to do particularly well/ stand out
• Not attractive for high achievers
• No monetary flexibility in case of sales decline

Question 12

commission only

Answer 12

Strengths
• Directly financing costs automatically
• Gives management a means to control sales in desired direction

Weaknesses
• Sales people might focus on short term goals only
• Focus might only be on selling and not on other tasks
• No security for sales people
• Pressure to sell might damage relationships with customers
• Discourages team work

Question 13

salary plus commission

Answer 13

Strengths
• Combines benefits of previous approaches
• Security for sales people
• More control for management via commissions
• Attractive to ambitious sales people

Question 14

multichannel selling

Answer 14

process of selling your

products on more than one sales channel

Question 15

direct marketing

Answer 15

Direct acquisition and retention of customers without the use of an intermediary
• Direct mail
• Telemarketing (in- and outbound)
• Catalogue marketing
• Social media marketing

Question 16

direct selling

Answer 16

selling direclty to consumers (no intermediary) (Ex. Microsoft selling through their own stores rather than on amazon)

Question 17

drivers of direct marketing development

Answer 17

• Increased use of segmentation to target specific groups
• Growth of communication channels and information technology
• Development of large databases

Question 18

targeting

Answer 18

• Direct marketing often relies on targeted communication
• Aims to deliver messages that are believed to be relevant to the consumer
• Via different channels
• Based on consumers’ previous behaviour (e.g., online search, browsing, online shopping, social media behaviour, etc.)

Question 19

what does mobile targeting use?

Answer 19

real-time bidding (RTB)

–> advertisers bid for space to determine which ads will be served to which customers

Question 20

how can we infer consumers’ locations?

Answer 20

•Language
•Demographics
•Behavioural Patterns
•IP
•GPS (Geo-Fencing)
--> create artificial parameter/radius on map, if person enters radius, ad is shown
•iBeacons