Are sales as we know it dying … or merely transforming?

The world of sales research continues to transform as we move more into the world of social media. This article briefly examines a historical examination of sales research by decade and then presents a model of sales research needs going forward based on how social media is being implemented by selling and buying organizations. The model assumes that the selling process is incorporated within a social media world and elements within the model include the salesperson and sales center, the buyer and buying center, the use of artificial intelligence, the teleselling unit, the interaction between marketing and sales departments, and the methods of selling. Discussion follows the model, focusing on how social media is being used among and between units in the selling process. The discussion unfolds on three key parts of the sales equation: (1) the sales organization, (2) the buying organization, and (3) the interaction between marketing and selling departments. Research questions follow each of the three discussion sections.     

Call for Papers: National Conference in Sales Management

This article combines a constructivist grounded theory approach with a focus on structuration theory to propose a new mental model for understanding motivation in the context of solving complex problems in contemporary business-to-business (B2B) settings. This study uses the interpretative tradition of qualitative research to conduct in-depth interviews of 24 B2B sales professionals and subsequently analyze their lived experiences. Findings indicate that intrinsic motivation stems attitudinally from a need to foster an identity of helping customers, introducing a concept called “interpersonal identification” with customers. That identity motivates the development of more cognitively intense sales proposals using a more holistic proposal development process – referred to herein as “systems-savvy selling.” While interpersonal relationships have long been components of B2B relationships, this study challenges laypeople’s stereotypes of salespeople who use interpersonal relationships to improve business outcomes. Instead, systems-savvy selling helps salespeople build interpersonal relationships and use business outcomes as feedback to strengthen interpersonal relationships and their identification with customers. Unexpectedly, it also finds that dual-role sales managers, who have roles both in selling and managing, confront a paradox of self versus others when managing systems-savvy selling processes. By sampling within an industry in which the research team benefits from significant expertise, the constructivist grounded theory approach relying on semistructured, in-depth interviews used herein leverages the research team’s expertise while controlling for industry-level effects.     

Sales Training and Education: Tracking Academic Research in Selling and Sales Management: Authors,Authorships, Academic Institutions,and Journals

This study examines and tracks the extent of selling and sales management research from 1993–1997. Two hundred and sixty- six published journal articles representing sixteen journals are examined to identify where and when selling and sales management researchers received their doctoral training, their employment location at time of publication, regional trends in the location of these researchers, and a count by-journal of selling and sales management articles that have appeared during the time period. A total of 280 individual authors from 175 different colleges and universities are included in the study. Overall, the general trends for scholarly activity in selling and sales management appear to be robust when compared to prior studies of sales research productivity.     

What personal selling and sales management recommendations from developed markets are relevant in emerging markets?

As emerging markets continue to grow, research on personal selling and sales management in these settings is coming to the fore, as this special issue of Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management attests. With an in-depth review of extant research, this contribution addresses three key research questions. First, are there differences between established/recommended theories or styles or paradigms for effective personal selling and sales management in developed markets and emerging markets? The survey suggests there are. Second, are culture variables, traditionally used in extant research, sufficient to differentiate between developed and emerging markets? The presented analysis suggests that culture must be combined with economic variables to establish clear contexts that reflect developed and emerging markets. Third, what classification framework can serve to examine personal selling and sales management strategies in terms of their applicability in both developed and emerging markets? This article derives such a classification framework by organizing extant sales research into categories where either small differences in research findings between developed and emerging markets are expected, or where large differences in research findings are expected. Propositions for the category of selling process and technique are derived. Overall, these findings suggest the need for substantial research that examines the differences between developed and emerging markets, because of the vast implications for theory, research, and practice.     

Marketing Control and Sales Force Customer Orientation

This study is predicated on the premise that internal sales force control mechanisms are strategic and operational forces that directly affect the behaviors of the sales force and their accompanying orientation toward customers. Sales managers represent a very different component of the sales force than salespeople. Their motivations, interests, role, and methods of operations all represent different approaches than those embraced by their coworkers: salespeople. Yet, although sales managers operate under an outcome-based control system and can be expected, to some degree, to be motivated by selfinterest (Oliver and Anderson 1994), upper management expects managers to be directed by organizational needs. However, in a results-oriented environment, the foundation of many compensation systems, sales quotas can focus sellers and managers in a direction inconsistent with customer-oriented selling (particularly if this behavior is deemed necessary to achieve quota). Based on this premise, this study examines the influence of sales managers’ quotas on their response to salespeople’s unethical behavior and its resulting effect on the customer orientation of the sales force. To fully explore this condition, this study also examines the role of an important formal process control, the ethical climate (e.g., rules and regulations), in influencing customer orientation. Providing important implications to sales organizations, results indicat that sales quotas can negatively affect sales force customer orientation via their effect on sales managers’ responses to salespeople’s selling behaviors. Interestingly, however, the company’s ethical climate was found to positively influence sales force customer orientation.     

Distinguishing Between the Roles of Customer-Oriented Selling and Adaptive Selling in Managing Dysfunctional Conflict in Buyer–Seller Relationships

A national random sample of industrial salespeople was surveyed to examine the relationships among selling behaviors, trust, conflict, and sales outcomes, such as performance and anticipation of future interaction. Results indicate that trust mediates the effects of selling behaviors on sales outcomes, and conflict moderates this mediating effect. While salespeople could use customer-oriented selling as an antidote for the ill effects of dysfunctional conflict on trust, adaptive selling only serves to enhance salesperson trust in customers. Thus, the results of the study distinguish between the roles of customeroriented selling and adaptive selling in relationship marketing. Furthermore, when salespeople perceive that their sales managers are highly customer oriented and highly adaptive, they themselves become more customer oriented and more adaptive. Thus, as role models, supervisory selling behaviors contribute to salespeople’s ability to leverage their trust in customers. Based on these results, the managerial implications for selling organizations are discussed.     

Sales profession and professionals in the age of digitization and artificial intelligence technologies: concepts,priorities, and questions

Recognizing the rapid advances in sales digitization and artificial intelligence technologies, we develop concepts, priorities, and questions to help guide future research and practice in the field of personal selling and sales management. Our analysis reveals that the influence of sales digitalization technologies, which include digitization and artificial intelligence, is likely to be more significant and more far reaching than previous sales technologies. To organize our analysis of this influence, we discuss the opportunities and threats that sales digitalization technologies pose for (a) the sales profession in terms of its contribution to creating value for customers, organizations, and society and (b) sales professionals, in terms of both employees in organizations and individuals as self, seeking growth, fulfillment, and status in the functions they serve and roles they live. We summarize our discussion by detailing specific research priorities and questions that warrant further study and development by researchers and practitioners alike.     

Key Accounts and Team Selling: A Review,Framework, and Research Agenda

As sales organizations increase their reliance on sales teams, they must learn how organizational and interpersonal relationships influence sales teams, how sales teams play a learning role for organizations, and what makes sales teams effective. Presenting a model of interrelationships among members of the selling firm and between the selling and buying firms, we identify five key team selling relationships between (1) members of the same team, (2) members of different teams within the firm, (3) the selling team and the buying center, (4) the selling team and other groups in the selling firm, and (5) the selling team and the firm’s strategy. This model leads to a conceptual framework highlighting relationship drivers, factors, and outcomes instrumental to team selling success. After presenting propositions for future research, theoretical and methodological suggestions are included to facilitate research in this area. We conclude with perspectives on the future of research and practice in key accounts and team selling.     

Selling and Sales Management in Action: The Role of Strategic Selling in the Company Turnaround Process

Despite the importance of marketing orientation to company profile and performance as presented in the literature, there has been little attention paid to the role of strategic selling in the company turnaround process in published studies. This article explores selling's contribution to company turnaround through a study of ailing and rejuvenated companies in the mature engineering industry. The development and implementation of sales strategies in successfully turned around and failed companies are compared. The role of strategic selling is broadened as new concepts are developed and explored.     

The good,the bad and the effective: a meta-analytic examination of selling orientation and customer orientation on sales performance

The concept of customer orientation (CO) is a focal construct in marketing and sales literature. Saxe and Weitz introduced CO to contrast the traditional high-pressure approach to sales (selling orientation). This study synthesizes empirical evidence from 1982 to 2013 to provide insight into the antecedents and consequences of both CO and selling orientation (SO). A conceptual meta-analytic model based on research into interpersonal motive models is proposed and tested using effect sizes from 126,790 salesperson survey responses to advance theory development on our understanding of how SO and CO behaviours affect organizations. Findings show that adaptive selling mediates the impact of both SO and CO which has important practical implications for hiring and training salespeople. Furthermore, this study shows that goal orientations are antecedents of SO and CO and that the impact of SO on job performance varies by customer type.     

An Assessment of the Use of Technology in the Direct Selling Industry

Although research exists on the use of technology in sales, very little addresses the adoption, use, and success of technology in the direct selling industry. In response to this dearth of knowledge, we conducted an exploratory study to examine how direct sellers use technology to link the firm to its customers and its sales force, as well as how technology is used to facilitate interactions between the sales force and customers. In an industry that has historically differentiated itself by face to-face, personal relationships, we explore the possibly new direct selling environment brought on by the technology revolution. Through in-depth, open-ended interviews, we provide the groundwork for understanding how direct selling firms use technology to develop a competitive advantage while still maintaining strong personal relationships with consumers.     

Evaluation of Selling Performance: A Study of Current Practices

Abstract

Performance evaluation of salespeople is particularly important in this era of escalating costs and concern with productivity. This study of 213 sales executives indicated that sales managers tended to rely on qualitative bases for evaluation, used only a narrow set of quantitative bases, and evaluated salespeople over only a narrow range of selling activities. Suggestions for improving performance evaluation are provided. Findings of the study indicate that salesforce evaluation procedures utilized in practice differ from those provided in the sales management literature.     

Ethics Training,Ethical Context,and Sales and Marketing Professionals’ Satisfaction with Supervisors and Coworkers

Because organizational support for ethical conduct is valued highly in personal selling and sales management, ethics training, functioning through a company’s ethical values and culture, should prompt greater satisfaction with supervisors and coworkers because these individuals play a part in the ethical practices that impact job satisfaction in others. Using a national sample of 324 sales and marketing professionals representing a variety of organizations, this study examined the mediating role of perceived ethical context in the proposed relationships between hours of ethics training and satisfaction with supervisors and coworkers. The results indicated that the focal variables were indeed related, with either full or partial mediation identified, using two separate measures of perceived ethical context. Organizational leaders in the sales and marketing professions should consider using ethics training to institutionalize an ethical environment in sales organizations, as well as involving sales managers and other professionals in this institutionalization process. Such efforts could yield greater employee satisfaction for supervisors and coworkers.     

Personal selling and the purchasing function: where do we go from here?

The business-to-business selling function has changed over the years, with more informed and demanding buyers, prompting firms to move toward a more consultative, solution-selling approach. While these changes have been the focus of extensive research in the personal selling and sales management domain, the customer side of the interaction dyad requires more examination. Even within the context of the customer side, insufficient attention has been paid to the purchasing function in business-to-business (B2B) selling research. Given the increased importance in customer organizations of the purchasing function, this article presents a literature review that highlights the purchasing function's personal selling and sales management needs and argues that, as the purchasing function becomes more important and its needs evolve, personal selling and sales strategies also need to evolve. The article highlights areas for future research in this domain.     

Communication Media Preferences in Business-To-Business Transactions: An Examination of the Purchase Process

Although communication in marketing has been researched extensively, communication in buyer–seller exchanges during the sales process has received limited attention. This study examines the complexity of information interchange and buyers’ and sellers’ communication preferences for various media types during each stage of the purchase process. Findings reveal that, overall, buyers and sellers prefer face-to-face and telephone communications over other media types. For certain aspects of the sales process, computer-mediated communications, such as e-mail, serve an important role as a lowcost medium, whereas in other phases of the sales process, richer communication media are preferred by both buyers and sellers.     

Contextual Influences and the Adoption and Practice of Relationship Selling in a Business-to-business Setting: An Exploratory Study

Recently, a number of authors have argued in favour of a relationship approach to selling and sales management. Despite this call, there has been little in the way of research to identify the impact of adopting relationship selling at an organizational and tactical level. Based upon multiple in-depth interviews with experienced salespeople, we propose the conditions under which relationship selling is appropriate, and argue that relationships with customers evolve through a two-stage process that involves balancing short-term performance based behaviors with long-term relationship building behaviors. Findings cause us to argue that organizations adopting a relationship approach to selling require flatter organizational structures and need to foster more flexible organizational cultures.     

Differences In the Importance of Selling Techniques Between Consumer and Industrial Salespeople

Abstract

The techniques involved in the personal selling process have been well documented in numerous sources over the years, but little research-based guidance has been provided to aid professional salespeople in the implementation of such techniques. The purpose of this research study is to examine the importance of 84 selling techniques, and cite the similarities and differences between consumer and industrial salespeople. The results indicate that consumer salespeople tend to rely more on other people, community contact, and standardized sales presentations than do industrial salespeople, while the latter rely more on company-supplied resources and partially standardized presentation styles.     

Special Abstract Section: National Conference in Sales Management

Sales managers need a practical means for evaluating returns from investments in sales technology implementations (including sales automation and sales-based customer relationship management systems). This research proposes a behavioral process model approach that can be applied to evaluate sales technology implementations. We develop and test the model with data collected from the sales force of a major consumer packaged goods company. The results indicate that a salesperson’s technology orientation has a direct impact on internal role performance, and it affects performance with customers through a double-mediated mechanism involving the effective use of information and smart selling behaviors (planning and adaptive selling). Sales managers can influence sales technology orientation by providing better internal technology support, considering technology orientation along with customer’s approval of technology in account assignments, and understanding the probability of negative effects through a salesperson’s experience. In our sample, salesperson experience correlates with age, suggesting a “generation gap” effect on sales technology orientation.     

The Counselor Selling Method: Concepts and Constructs

The concepts, constructs and theoretical underpinnings of the counselor selling method are presented. The method is based on a contingency approach to selling and has three components—personality knowledge, microskills and strategies, and processes. Personality knowledge is based upon dimensional personality theory, transactional analysis theory and Berne's PAC model. Microskills and strategies are derived from work in the counseling field. Finally, the sales process is adapted from the Ivey and Matthews meta-model of counselor interviewing. The components are empirically tested and the implications are discussed.