Personal selling is the personal presentation by the firm’s sales force for the purpose of making sales and building customer relationships.
There are two main parts of this definition Personal presentation and Customer relationships Salesforce goes to the customers: Salesforce goes to the customer by two ways.
In Person sales calls (Outbound) and Contact by mail or telemarketing (Inbound).
In Personal Sales Calls or Outbound
In this method sales force directly goes to the customer and built relationships by actually meeting them.
Contact by Mail or Telemarketing or Inbound
In this method sales force contact to the new, existing or former customers by telemarketing. It is cheaper than direct selling.
Business to Business Selling
Producers and wholesaler mostly sell their products to other businesses which are also known as business to business (B2B) selling.
But some producer and wholesaler directly sell their products to consumers by any means.
Personal Selling Contents
Human element
Customer confidence
Customer response
Customer needs
Human Element
As the term human element itself defines that person selling must involve the physical presence of sales person and customer.
Customer Confidence
Customer confidence means the customer must have decision power so that sales person do not feel that his/her efforts are going to be the waste.
Customer Response
Customer must have a response towards the offering either in positive or negative. It is necessary for personal selling because the main reason of personal selling is to get the customer response at the spot.
Customer Needs
Customer must have a specific need to be fulfilled. If the customer does not have a need there is no meaning of personal selling. It is nothing more than throwing the stone in the dark.
Changes In Personal Selling
As customers are changing, their needs and wants are also changing, by accounting this trend personal selling is also changing now Personal selling includes
- Marketing ConceptsTotal
- Quality Management (TQM)
Marketing Concept
1. Customer orientation
Now in changing trend customer is getting more sharp and knowledgeable in order to get the customer, organizations are identified the customer need by face to face dealing.
2. Coordination of customer related activities
Now organizations look upon customers activities i.e. spending pattern, background etc.
By analyzing this information they are able to identify right customer for their product and they can easily provide them customer care, partnering and after sale services etc.
3. Profit/ Loss
Organizations do all these activities for the sake of profit. And successful organizations decide their profit and go to next step.
Total Quality Management (TQM)
As the customer is changing and has more opportunities, information, substitutes, alternative products etc. It is difficult to retain customers for the lifetime.
For this purpose, organizations are more focused towards better quality and reduction of cost.
Organizations are trying to maintain quality in following fields:
- Customers
- Identify needs
- Product planning
- Design engineering
- Pricing
- Promotional planning
- Records orders
- Manufacturing
- Production
- Scheduling
- Shipping
- Warehousing
- Installation
- Service
It is necessary to maintain quality at each step because loosing quality at one step whether it is first or last can create a big difference between you and competitor.
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