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1. Introduction The history of salesmanship is as old as the human civilization itself. R.L .Stevenson had once famously remarked “everybody is surviving on selling something to someone”. The salespeople in the past were not held in high esteem by the society. The Roman equivalent of the word salesperson is cheater. Today, however, an organization relies heavily on its salesperson, that is, its sales force. This is so because of the increasing importance of selling. Today’s selling approach also includes maintaining good customer relationship, managing the profitability of a firm, managing customer complaints and building brand value in the eyes of the customer. As such, the concept of sales force management becomes central to the growth of a sales organization. This, if seen in the light of the world average attrition rate, which continues to shift between 30% - 40%, becomes even more significant. The objectives of the project are To understand the concepts of sales organization Organizing and staffing of the sales force Performance management and reward system used 1.1 Methodology Sales Planning and Operations Page 1
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1. Introduction

The history of salesmanship is as old as the human civilization itself. R.L .Stevenson had

once famously remarked “everybody is surviving on selling something to someone”.

The salespeople in the past were not held in high esteem by the society. The Roman

equivalent of the word salesperson is cheater. Today, however, an organization relies

heavily on its salesperson, that is, its sales force. This is so because of the increasing

importance of selling. Today’s selling approach also includes maintaining good customer

relationship, managing the profitability of a firm, managing customer complaints and

building brand value in the eyes of the customer. As such, the concept of sales force

management becomes central to the growth of a sales organization. This, if seen in the

light of the world average attrition rate, which continues to shift between 30% - 40%,

becomes even more significant.

The objectives of the project are

To understand the concepts of sales organization

Organizing and staffing of the sales force

Performance management and reward system used

1.1 Methodology

The report requires the information to be collected mainly by interacting with the sales

managers, the HR managers and the salespeople of the respective companies. As of now,

the information that has been collected by interacting with them has been put up in this

report.

1.2 Limitations of the project

The sales managers and HR managers who were contacted for the purpose cannot divulge

much information as it is against the company policy. So some generic information and

little specific information could be taken from them so far.

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2. Corporate information of the organizations

2.1 Dhivehi Raajjeyge Gulhun Private Limited (Dhiraagu)

Dhiraagu is a joint venture company 55% owned by the Government of the Maldives and

45% by Cable and Wireless. They began their operations in 1988 as the national

telecommunications carrier of the Maldives. Since that time Dhiraagu satisfaction has

rapidly built a sound, financially strong business based on a commitment to providing

innovative products and services and a philosophy that places high value on customer.

Their goals are in line with the Government's vision for the development and growth of

the telecom sector in the country. Their latest venture involved the provision of

broadband Internet Services to the Atolls, and the linking of the Maldives to the global

information highway, with the help of a state of the art fiber optic submarine cable

network. They have a well-established relationship and a proven record in providing

corporate customers with reliable network solutions and superior account support in the

rapidly changing corporate market place.

2.1.1 Vision

Our vision is to be leading communication service provider in South East Asia.

2.1.2 Mission

Their mission is “To lead the Information communications market through excellence in

quality, value & customer service”.

2.1.3 Values

We have adopted a system of values that must continuously represent the behavioral

reference point for all the people working in the Company, thus creating a cohesive

belonging to an industry enterprise.

2.1.4 Our role in community

Dhiraagu takes pride in active involvement in the community in which we serve. As a

truly Maldivian company, we strongly identify with the community and regularly

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contribute to worthy causes such as education, health and children's development. We

also actively support the island communities in their social activities.

2.2 Laugf (Sunup Supermarket pvt ltd )

The Sunup Super market has been tagged as the “Super that never sleeps”. Justifiably

living up the title, Sunup was the first to introduce the 24 hour retail concept to Sri

Lanka. It’s also the first convenient store to jointly operate with a fuel ret outlet. All these

innovations have taken Sunup to a step ahead of the rest. Operating since February 2001,

the super market chain has a proud reputation for the most diverse and the product range.

We target not only the individual retail customer but also bulk sales as in general trade.

2.2.1 Vision

To be favorite local grocer that provides friendly, helpful service; and abundance of

quality products – many sourced locally; competitive price and strong community

leadership.

2.2.2 Mission

To operate customer driven competitive and profitable food stores that support the

community, local suppliers and sustainable growth that will benefit employees and

islanders for many years to come.

2.3 Agora group of companies

Agora is one of the largest supermarket chains in the Maldives today.  Its first branch,

Agora Supermarket Majeedhee magu, opened in 2000. Today, it has 03 branches across

the Male’, Maldives.

Agora Supermarket seeks to educate and empower its customers on their choice of foods

and products to promote healthy living and proper nutrition.  Its slogan, “Eat Well Spend

Less”, captures this philosophy. It also offers a wide selection of meats, seafood’s, fruits

and vegetables and organic produce in its Fresh section.

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This unique philosophy is complemented by well-designed stores that offer convenience

and good service.  Agora Supermarket features a wide variety of merchandise that allows

shoppers to complete their grocery shopping under one roof.

2.3.1 Vision

Our vision is to be the leading supermarket operators in Asia.

2.3.2 Mission

Our Mission is to develop and manage supermarket operations which are characterized

by a commitment to customer satisfaction, loyalty to our employees, ethical treatment of

our suppliers, an equitable return for our investors, and active support of our

communities. Above all else, we want to treat everyone the way we would want to be

treated.

3. Promotional Mix

It is not enough for a business to have good products sold at attractive prices. To generate

sales and profits, the benefits of products have to be communicated to customers. In

marketing, this is commonly known as "promotion".

A business total marketing communications programme is called the "promotional mix"

and consists of a blend of advertising, personal selling, sales promotion and public

relations tools. In this section, we describe the four key elements of the promotional mix

used by the selected organizations and how they use each method.

3.1 Advertising

Any paid form of non-personal communication of ideas or products in the "prime media":

i.e. television, newspapers, magazines, billboard posters, radio, cinema etc. Advertising is

intended to persuade and to inform. The two basic aspects of advertising are the message

(what you want your communication to say) and the medium (how you get your message

across).

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3.2 Personal Selling

Personal Selling is an effective way to manage personal customer relationships. The sales

person acts on behalf of the organization. They tend to be well trained in the approaches

and techniques of personal selling. However sales people are very expensive and should

only be used where there is a genuine return on investment. 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 a promotional method in which one party (sales person) uses skills and

techniques for building personal relationships with another party (those involve in the

purchase decision) that result in both parties obtaining value. In most cases the “value”

for the sales persons is realized through the financial rewards of the sale, while the

customer’s “value” is realized from the benefits obtained by consuming the product.

However, getting a customer to purchase a product is not always the objective of personal

selling. For instance selling may be used for the purpose of simply delivering

information.

3.3 Sales Promotion

Providing incentives to customers or to the distribution channel to stimulate demand for a

product.

Sales promotions tend to be thought of as being all promotions apart from advertising,

personal selling, and public relations. For example the BOGOF promotion, or Buy One

Get One Free. Others include couponing, money-off promotions, competitions, free

accessories (such as free blades with a new razor), introductory offers (such as buy digital

TV and get free installation), and so on.

3.4 Public Relations (PR)

Public Relations is defined as 'the deliberate, planned and sustained effort to establish and

maintain mutual understanding between an organization and its publics' (Institute of

Public Relations). It is relatively cheap, but certainly not cheap. Successful strategies tend

to be long- term and plan for all eventualities.

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4. The use of promotional mix in each organization

Advertising is the life blood of any business, no matter how big or how small. All the

organizations do advertising in more than one form.

Form of Advertising Dhiraagu Sunup Agora

TV

Radio

Community involvement

News paper

Yellow pages

Direct mail

Magazines

Business cards

Vehicle advertising

News letters

Posters and bulleting

Online discussion groups/chat

rooms

Press release

Public announcements

As you can see from the above table, there are common methods of advertising followed

by all three organizations, such as TV, radio, news paper and Poster bulleting. This is

because it’s easy to reach a mass population at the same time and it’s cost effective. Out

of which Dhiraagu uses more intensive marketing strategies where they use almost all the

types of advertising. The reason behind this is that the telecommunication industry of

Maldives is a growing industry where the competition is intense. Dhiraagu has been the

monopoly for the past few years until the Wataniya group comes. Wataniya came and

with their new marketing strategies, they grab very high percentage of of the Dhiraagu

customers. Therefore, it is very essential for them to foothold the rest of their customers

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and attract new customers. So Dhiraagu solely uses online discussion groups/chat rooms,

press release, yellow pages, direct mail, news letters and public announcement.

On the other hand, Agora, has been the market leader for a very long time and the

customers very well know the quality of their products. In Maldives, in terms of fast

moving consumer goods, the customers are more quality oriented then price. Agora

provides the best quality of goods for an affordable price. Therefore, they advertise the

most common methods of advertising which is TV, radio, news paper, magazines, vehicle

advertising and posters. TV ads, radio and news papers advertisements are for all over the

Maldives, where the mass audients is covered. Posters, magazines and vehicle

advertisements are conducted only in the capital city, where the target market lives.

Sunup also uses the most frequently used methods of advertising which is TV, radio,

news paper, magazines and posters.

There is no right or wrong method of advertising as long as you reach you target market.

Just because other organization uses different methods of advertising does not mean that

it should be followed. Advertising should be based on the capabilities and affordability of

the organization, where they do not exceed the forecasted budget. As far as the above

mentioned organizations are concerned, Dhiraagu is using wide range of different

advertising methods, which has the high probability of attracting new customers.

Therefore, out of three dhiraagu could be considered the best practice.

4.1 Sales promotion

Sales promotion is different promotion, Sales promotion refers to those marketing

activities other than personal selling, advertisement and publicity, which stimulate

consumer purchasing and dealer effectiveness, such as displays, shows and expositions,

demonstrations and various non-recurrent selling efforts not in the ordinary routine. Its

purpose is to increase the desire of salesman, distributors and dealers to sell a certain

brand and to make consumers more eager to buy that brand. This includes sales activities

which supplement both personal selling and advertising.

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Form of Sales promotions Dhiraagu Sunup Agora

Money off coupons

Competitions

Discount vouchers

Free gifts

Point of sale materials

Loyalty cards

Money off coupons is customers receive coupons, upon purchase of certain items that

enables them to buy the product next time at a reduced price. Money off coupons are

offered by Sunup and Agora. Dhiraagu does not practice this method.

Buying the product will allow the customer to take part in a chance to win a prize, which

creates competition. All the three organizations practice this method. This is a proven

method of motivating customers to buy more.

Free gifts such as buy one and get one free concept is being practice by all three

organizations. In Agora and Sunup when you buy one toothpaste and you get one free

brush free. In Dhiraagu buy a mobile phone and get connection kit free. While Discount

vouchers are given only by Dhiraagu and Agora. Point of sales materials – e.g. posters,

display stands – ways of presenting the product in its best way or show the customer that

the product is there.

Loyalty cards have recently become an important form of sales promotion. They

encourage the customer to return to the retailer by giving them discounts based on the

spending from a previous visit.

Loyalty cards are provided only in Agora, which can offset the discounts they offer by

making more sales and persuading the customer to come back. They also provide

information about the shopping habits of customers – where do they shop, when and what

do they buy? This is very valuable marketing research and can be used in the planning

process for new and existing products

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Agora provides wide range of sales promotions which customers are more likely to re

visit them because of the wide range of offers that they get.

4.2 Public relations

Media Relations: This is the most important tool to maintain public relations. It

includes giving out information about the company's products and services to the

press and media sector who publicize the information on the TV, radio, internet,

in newspapers and other publicity resources. PR professionals coordinate with

members from the press and media regarding legal or social matters of the

organization, products to be launched, and the company top management

information. This can be done effectively by modifying and presenting the matter

in such a way that it won't have an adverse effect on the company's image in the

business world. For making the media to publicize everything good about the

company, PR managers try their level best to maintain healthy relations with the

press, which may also be done by distributing some free gifts.

All the three organizations make sure that they perform this public relations method very

effectively. The above mentioned advantages can only be gained by the effective use of

this method.

Media Tours: Such type of tours is generally conducted when a manufacturing

company wants to successfully advertise and promote its newly launched product.

There can never be an effective way of product publicity other than using media

tours. In a media tour, the organization's spokesperson goes to other important

cities for introducing a new product or service. It may also include attending TV

and radio talk shows, and being interviewed by press and media newsmen. The

spokesman can be a company's representative or anyone hired or contracted from

outside. A celebrity also can be used for this purpose.

Out of which Dhiraagu is the only company who practice this method. They go all around

Maldives launching new services along with the celebrities. This enhances their bond

with the customers. the outcome of this has been very positive so far. The number of

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customers that they have lost due to the immense competition is recovering by using

media tours.

Newsletters: This process includes collecting contact information of consumers

or future customers, and sending newsletters to them which include the matter

intended to be known by the targeted audience. The targeted people could be

business marketers, end customers, middlemen, or traders. Newsletter may be

made available either through regular mail or email. Newsletters are certainly an

effective way to get in touch with the existing or future customers.

Out of all Dhiraagu is the only one who practices this method. This gives them the edge

of all.

Special Events: Reputed companies generally hold such events when they want

to launch their products with a bash. Special events can be organized to publicize

about the company and the product in a boastful way. In such special events, there

is an arrangement for a party, dinner, and a set of stunts to be performed. This

certainly attracts the attention of reporters and public media personnel, and the

company eventually gets good product coverage. PR managers effectively work

with event management professionals to ensure that the program goes along in a

well planned manner, and the intended message is reached to the public and the

media.

All the three organizations practice this method, they hold special events and also in

addition to that they give sponsorships for different event. In Maldives Dhiraagu is one of

the main body who almost sponsors all the events which involves youth and sports.

Basically their target is to attract youth and create a bond between them. Which infect is a

very good approach in public relations management.

When we take all the selling aspects of the three organizations into consideration, its been

noted that the promotional mix of Dhiraagu is very strong and the approaches that they

follow are extremely effective. The main reason behind this is that they use wide range of

promotional mix along with the strong public relation tools. Which has created a very

strong bond between the company the country’s youth.

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5. Roles of the sales force

The responsibilities of the sales rep are growing more disparate from company to

company. Gone are the days in which the salesperson was usually the sole instrument of

sales generation. Today, team selling, long-term agreements and the rise of the CSR have

affected the daily role of the salesperson.

According to Kotler (1990) the six main activities of a sales force are:

Prospecting - trying to find new customers

Communicating - with existing and potential customers about the product range

Selling - contact with the customer, answering questions and trying to close the

sale

Servicing - providing support and service to the customer in the period up to

delivery and also post-sale

Information gathering - obtaining information about the market to feedback into

the marketing planning process

Allocating - in times of product shortage, the sales force may have the power to

decide how available stocks are allocated

5.1 Roles of sales force of Agora

The role of sales personnel in Agora are as follows.

Plan allocation of their personal time and other available resources to optimize

performance against the expectations of their employer, their customers and their

suppliers.

Gather information from customers, suppliers and their own company regarding

independent needs and requirements. Needs would include organization, job and personal

needs within all three groups.

Continually gather information on threats and opportunities as well as emerging

trends within their industry and their customers industry from sources outside of their

customers, suppliers and their own companies.

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Analyze information from the three constituencies and outside sources to

formulate and develop solutions that increase economic value and improve upon all their

independent value propositions.

Plan, present, educate, persuade and implement identified solutions for their

customers.

Keep the company informed with respect to projects, activities, results, and work

in process, threats and opportunities.

Support the ongoing transaction management activity including pre-sell activity,

transaction activity and post-sell activity. As companies evolve, the role of field sales in

this activity shifts from primary to supportive. This means that all company resources

must be engaged and the value of 'Team Selling' is recognized and promoted.

Ensure that they maintain an ongoing training and development activity to

increase their knowledge and professional effectiveness. Self development is a key

responsibility of the sales representative.

5.2 Roles of sales force of Sunup.

The manager of the Sunup was very reluctant to give the information about their sales

team. He just highlighted the main responsibilities that they assign. Based on the

information given the following points is being mentioned.

Call prospective practitioners and schedule appointments for the outside sales

team

Prepare and send information packages to prospective buyers

Generate new leads through web research and networking on the phone

Create proposals and send to customers

Record all prospect interactions in the CRM tool

Report weekly sales activities to direct manager

Create intelligence reports on competitors and treatable conditions

Perform administrative duties as needed by the company

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5.3 Roles of sales force of Dhiraagu

The perceptions and feelings formed about an organization, its products / services, and its

performance is what is known as its “brand.” The Dhiraagu marketing department is

responsible for creating meaningful messages, ideas, images, and names that deliver upon

the promises / benefits an organization wishes to make with its customers. Furthermore,

the Dhiraagu marketing department is responsible for ensuring that messages and images

are delivered consistently, by every member of the organization.

Present and sell company products and services to current and potential clients.

Prepare action plans and schedules to identify specific targets and to project the

number of contacts to be made.

Follow up on new leads and referrals resulting from field activity.

Identify sales prospects and contact these and other accounts as assigned.

Prepare presentations, proposals and sales contracts.

Develop and maintain sales materials and current product knowledge.

Establish and maintain current client and potential client relationships.

Prepare paperwork to activate and maintain contract services.

Manage account services through quality checks and other follow-up.

Identify and resolve client concerns.

Prepare a variety of status reports, including activity, closings, follow-up, and

adherence to goals.

Communicate new product and service opportunities, special developments,

information, or feedback gathered through field activity to appropriate company

staff.

Coordinate company staff to accomplish the work required to close sales.

Develop and implement special sales activities to reduce stock.

Participate in marketing events such as seminars, trade shows, and telemarketing

events.

Follow-up for collection of payment.

Coordinate shipping schedules and delivery of merchandise and services.

Provide on-the-job training to new sales employees.

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As you can see the role and the responsibilities of the sales representatives in all the three

organizations are quite similar. None of the above organizations are willing to provide the

information as to how far their sale force is effective. Therefore, the effectiveness of the

sale force then is not measured. In this context they strongly requested not to ask any

further information. As per the obtained information Dhiraagu seems to have well

established roles for the sales representatives.

6. Prospecting for new customers

The most difficult thing for any salesperson is finding new customers. New customers

come to you two ways: They find you, or you find them. Weak salespeople wait for

customers to come to them. Average salespeople do some prospecting and then stop to

take care of a new customer. Great ones constantly prospect to keep appointments and

sales flowing.

To all the organizations, prospecting is important. The need for prospecting is to facilitate

the growth and expansion plans of the organizations. It also replace the lost customer

who, through retirement, death, liquidation, or who have moved to a competitor. From

the marketing effort these can be replaced.

A variety of ways exist to reach prospective customers, including stopping in

unannounced, direct mail, e-mail or the telephone. One of the most effective ways is the

telephone.

6.1 Cold Calls

Cold Calls in person are a highly effective method of prospecting, although most sales

representatives would rather not do them. There are several major advantages to

unannounced visits to the prospect's business location. You are able to evaluate the

prospect's business first hand, enabling you to tailor the presentation to his or her specific

needs. Your best results are very often face-to-face. Cold calling will prevent the ups and

downs that cut into your income.

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6.2 Direct Mail

Direct mail is very highly focused upon targeting consumers based upon a database. With

all marketing, the potential consumer is 'defined' based upon a series of attributes and

similarities.

6.3 Telephone Prospecting

The person-to-person contact afforded by the telephone allows for interaction between

you and the prospect, enabling you to qualify or reject them quickly.

Unfortunately, among the most dreaded aspects of sales for most is prospecting,

especially "cold-calling," contacting anyone and everyone and hoping he or she will have

some interest in your product. This strategy alone can be exhausting and self-defeating

without the proper mind-set and skills. The reason most salespeople hate cold-calling is

that they associate it with negative images such as rejection. Instead, they should

associate cold-calling with success, higher income and controlling destiny. That's called

"warm" calling, and it is far easier than cold-calling. It means finding people you have

some connection to or people you have a reason to think will benefit from the product.

In generating sales leads, doing it consistently is the rule. Whatever means you

implement in generating sales leads for your company, prospecting sales leads regularly

is very crucial to have a higher possibility of hitting your target customers. Therefore, all

three organizations use telephone, email, visits and direct mail to prospect. The process is

almost similar in all three organizations.

One of the main benefits of looking for prospects in a regular manner is that they are able

to test out methodologies in prospecting sales leads and the more they become successful

in it, the more they are motivated to do it. This will result in having more and more sales

leads for their business and this sort of psychological high is greatly rewarding for the

business owner.

The second benefit of prospecting sales leads regularly is they are motivated to be into

the success groove. Also, the confidence will soar in what they are doing. Eventually, this

will lead to more sales leads.

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Lastly, if they want consistent sales leads, there is a greater possibility for them to

develop established relationship with sales leads. This speaks very well if they often talk

to people they have never talked to before. Even if some prospects are not responding

quickly, it will be certain that they are noticing the messages that they would like to

deliver. After several calls, they will eventually lower their guard and feel more

acquainted.

Custom lead generation can also be of great help in doing this. Custom lead generation

pertains to those "customized connections" between their products or services and their

target customers. Aside from being a time-saver, this ensures that they are connecting to

the right persons that equate to higher sales for the business. With this type of lead

generation, the returns on investment will be really great.

Once they are convinced to do prospecting for sales regularly, it is also necessary that

they conduct lead generation tracking. Mostly done online, tracking where their leads are

coming from helps them in evaluating their performance. This can be the benchmark to

continue on existing strategies or generate new ideas to improve previous sales leads

efforts.

7. Maintaining the customer data base

No matter what the size of your company is and no matter how big or large your clientele

base is you should always be prepared to use a database to keep track of all of the

information.

For many businesses, logging, warehousing and processing information about

transactions is the lifeline of their corporate strategy and crucial to their profitability.

Important records detailing a company’s user history, product inventory and shipment

tracking, supplier information, configuration settings, or any other necessary collections

of information are most often stored in and retrieved from databases. Databases provide a

convenient means of storing vast amounts of information, allowing the information to be

sorted, searched, viewed, and manipulated according to the business needs and goals.

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Many companies rely so heavily on the functions of databases that their daily business

operations can not be executed if databases are unavailable, making database

management and maintenance a vital component of their business models.

Organizations such as Sunup, Agora and Dhiraagu are using databases to manage

customer relationships to increase both sales and customer satisfaction. Out of which

Dhiraagu heavily rely on their data base. All of them use database identify key trends and

important information such as most profitable customers and most potential customers

etc. in addition to that They will also be able to send personalized advertisements to the

customers. Get the most by sending them something that will have a better chance of

appealing to them. The mere fact that they can see you remember that much about them

is going to improve your standing with them. People like to feel special, and being

remembered certainly makes them feel special.

The need for database maintenance is unavoidable, so enterprise data availability

software solutions have been created to help businesses reduce downtime from hours or

days to mere minutes or even seconds. Effective database management applications can

reduce or eliminate downtime that renders a database unavailable, giving business owners

and developers a flexible and powerful tool to protect the performance of their valuable

business operations.

The marketing database contains some of the most important information on the most

valuable asset of the company – the customers and potential customers. It is therefore

surprising that so many companies put such little effort into nurturing, updating and

maintaining this vital aspect of their organization.

7.1 Importance of maintaining database

The following are the some of the reasons why is it necessary to maintain the database.

7.1.1 Professionalism

If your database is left to become out of date then each time you send out a mailing piece

you are risking the perceived professionalism of your company. Old contact names and

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inaccurate addresses on mailing pieces can quickly damage a reputation you have worked

hard to earn and will unnecessarily annoy those on the receiving end.

7.1.2 Cost

Direct marketing campaigns, particularly mailing pieces, can be expensive to create,

produce and post. Therefore you could be wasting a large percentage of your marketing

budget each year on campaigns that never reach the person you wanted them to.

7.1.3 Mail sort discounts

It is essential to have complete and correct address data on your database in order to

qualify for mailsort discounts. If your data is sorted beforehand and the addresses are

correct (i.e. 90% correct postcodes), this saves the mail a great deal of time and therefore

they can pass on postage discounts to you. It is possible to save up to 30% on standard

mail costs by doing some of the mail sorting yourself.

7.1.4 ROI (Return on Investment)

If mailings are not reaching the intended recipients then your response and conversion

rates will inevitably suffer.

Following are the most common problems that have been noted in the organizations.

Duplication

Truncated names

Inaccurate addresses

Invalid telephone numbers

Name splitting and salutation

Incomplete addresses

Out of date data

Inaccurate contact names

No casing or abbreviation standardization i.e. 'Rd' or 'Road', 'St' or 'Street'.

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7.2 Recommendations to over come the problems

The problems notified due to databases are similar in three organizations; therefore the

recommendations are for three organizations as well.

7.2.1 Outsourcing

In order to resolve database issues quickly, it is best to recruit the help of a database-

marketing specialist. They will take in the database, inform what the main issues are and

then formulate a solution that fits particular needs. Data can then be returned to

organization in an updated and standardized format according to the requirements.

7.2.2 Remove gone away from your database

Numerous products are available that will identify the number of goneaways that exist in

database. Simply remove the goneways from the database, so that you don't continue to

waste money mailing them. However, be careful before removing any of your data as it is

possible that a record may be flagged just because the postcode has changed recently. It is

therefore advisable to test the results and then review what action needs to be taken.

7.2.3 Set data entry standards

Setting data entry standards is essential in ensuring to continue to keep database in the

best possible condition. There is no point in having it standardized and cleansed only to

be in the same situation a few months later because people are still entering information

in the same way they always have.

7.2.4 Set rules about record creation

Setting rules about new record creation will help to avoid duplicates on database. For

example, if the company name, post code and telephone number are all checked to see

whether a record is already on the database before a new record is created, then the

number of duplicates will be dramatically reduced. The above data entry standards will

also help to ensure that records can easily be found on the database and will therefore

help to reduce the creation of duplicates further.

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8. Selling Process

As shown in Table 1, the selling process consists of eight steps, none of which is less

important than any other if the process is to be effective. It should be emphasized to all

employees that all steps are vital to the achievement of effective selling.

8. Sales Follow-Up

7. Suggestion Selling

6. Closing the Sale

5. Handling Objections

4. Presentation of Merchandise

3. Initial Contact

2. Prospecting

1. Pre-Customer Contact

Table 1

8.1 Pre-Customer Contact

A smart builder would not attempt to build a house without a good foundation. Likewise,

a businessperson should not place people on the sales floor or telephone until these

people know the business, merchandise, services and customers. Before any contact is

made with the customer, every salesperson should know the aforementioned items.

Polices, Procedures, and Rules, have these in writing for all employees to see and to

know.

Operation of Equipment: Learn how to use equipment before a sale, not while

the customer is waiting for change.

Target Market Knowledge: The better salesperson knows something of the likes

and dislikes of the firm's primary customers. The business operator should tell all

sales personnel about the business's customers and their lifestyles. Tell the

salespeople about customer's interests and ability to buy.

Product Knowledge: A salesperson gains confidence by knowing about the

products and services that he or she is selling. If a person sells shoes, it helps to

know the merchandise as well as how to fit them. If a person sells building

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materials, the selling job is probably more effective if the salesperson can also

help answer questions about home repairs. It helps the person who sells clothes to

know something about fabrics and current fashions. If the person is in the lawn

service business, that person should know about lawn care. Most sales personnel

will not take the initiative to acquire product knowledge on their own. It is

management's responsibility to encourage employees to gain product and service

knowledge. Management should make such knowledge available to them.

8.2 Prospecting

Although not appropriate to every selling situation, prospecting should be used whenever

possible. Essentially, prospecting involves not waiting for the customer to show up at a

store or to phone about a service. It is concerned with taking the initiative by going to the

customer with a product or service idea. Prospecting may be of two types: new or regular

customer prospecting.

New Customer Prospecting: A salesperson sees that a person is getting married.

Action is taken on this knowledge by contacting the person and telling her about

appropriate items (or services) that might be of assistance to a new bride. By

using newspapers and personal contacts, a salesperson can take the initiative to

contact and create new customers.

Regular Customer Prospecting: A firm's best prospects are its current

customers. A salesperson should make a practice of calling regular customers on a

periodic basis to tell them about products or services. Prospecting with regular

customers works! All salespeople should be encouraged to prospect by phone and

in-person whenever they see regular customers. A word of caution must be

emphasized. Don't go to the well too often. Prospecting with the same regular

customer on a frequent basis can make prospecting lose the special feeling that it

can create in customers. Do not overuse it.

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8.3 Initial Contact

The most effective way to close a sale is to open it on a positive note. Unfortunately,

many sales do not open this way. The typical initial store contact begins in this manner:

Clerk: "May I help you?"

Customer: "No thank you. I'm just looking."

This ritual leaves much to be desired. Why? It is an automatic statement that shows no

creativity on the part of the salesperson. Also, because the customer has heard this

statement many times, his or her response is usually given without thinking what was

said. Every salesperson should be challenged to treat each customer as an individual by

responding differently to each customer.

Initial contact also means responding to customers when they enter the sales areas even

when they cannot be waited on immediately. Salespeople should be instructed to tell

waiting customers that, "I'll be with you in a moment." Such actions will reduce the

number of customers who leave without being served. When the employee is free to help

the waiting customer, the initial comment should be, "Thank you, for waiting." A

courteous, creative initial contact with the customer can go a long way to promote sales.

8.4 Presentation of Merchandise

In presenting merchandise (or services) to the customer, the salesperson should use

product knowledge to create the best advantage.

Talk Benefits: Although it is good to talk about the lawnmower's 3 ½ horsepower

mower, customers may be more interested in hearing about how fast the

lawnmower will cut the grass. Product knowledge is important but the salesperson

must remember what makes the customer buy. Sell benefits!

Customer Involvement: Product knowledge can be used to get customer

involvement. Show the customer several features of the digital watch and then

have the customer put it on and work it. If the interest is there, it will be hard for

the customer to take off the watch so that the salesperson can put it back into the

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case. The best way to present many products is to get involvement. Want to sell

dance lessons? Get the customer on the dance floor and let the fun of dancing do

some of the selling. The same is true with clothes, perfume, sports equipment, and

almost anything else.

Limit the Choices: If during the sales presentation more than three items are in

front of the customer, the changes of a sale are reduced while the possibility of

shoplifting is increased. If, for example, the salesperson continues to carry dresses

into the fitting room for the customer to try without removing any from

consideration, the customer will likely not buy any because of the inability to

decide from among so many choices. Also, with so many items under study, the

clerk may lose track of how many items are in the fitting room. It is possible that

some may be put on under the customer's clothes while the clerk is not present,

thereby resulting in an expensive experience for the store. Unless there is a

definite reason for an exception, the rule of three (never show more than three

choices at one time) should be followed whenever merchandise is presented.

Limited choices have been found to promote sales.

Use Showmanship: In presenting merchandise to the customer, encourage all

personnel to be creative. Be enthusiastic about the merchandise. Hold the

necklace up for the customer to see it. Make the portable baby crib "look" easy to

work. Lay the different pieces of the cookware set before the customer in an

attractive easy-to-see everything manner. Ask your salespeople to think like a

customer. If I were a customer, what would I like to see?

Message Adaptation: A knowledgeable salesperson should know about the

products being sold. Message adaptation involves deciding what information is

needed to sell a particular customer and how that information should be presented

to that customer. Canned sales presentations do not allow for adaptation. The

effective sales person will make an effort to adjust the presentation to the

customer. If the customer knows about gardens and lawns, the person selling a

lawn service should adapt the sales presentation to the level of the customer's

expertise. Don't bore the customer with known facts. It could lose a sale.

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8.5 Handling Objections

Remember, if objections are present, progress is probably being made on the sale. Most

salespeople are afraid of objections. Stress to all employees that objections are a natural

part of the selling process. They do not mean that the sale is lost. In most cases, all that is

required to overcome an objection is more selling on the part of the salesperson.

Common types of customer objections that are faced by a salesperson include:

Product: "That dress looks out-of-date."

Store: "You never have the right merchandise."

Service: "If I believe what I hear, I can't get good service from you."

Price: “It is just too expensive."

These and other objections can be met by the salesperson in several ways. Using the

above product objection as an example, these methods include:

Yes-But: "Yes, it does look out-of-date, but it is the latest." This approach brings

on a positive note by agreeing with the customer and then moves on to answer the

objection.

Counter-Question: "Why do you feel it's out-of-date?" The counter-question

puts the ball back in the customer's court. By asking "Why?" the real reason for

the objection may become known.

Re-state Objection: "You feel that the dress looks out-of-date." By restating the

objection, the customer may respond by saying, "No, I mean it just doesn't look

right on me," or something of a similar nature. This approach tends to reduce the

magnitude of the objection in the eyes of the customer.

Direct Response: "The dress you have on was first shown at the market this

season. It is the latest thing." Although offensive to some, this approach may be

necessary if the customer is not going to buy unless the untruth can be corrected.

Tact is important when using this approach.

These four approaches for handling objections are not meant to be all-inclusive. These

and other approaches do point out, however, objections should and can be answered by

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the salesperson. Unless objections are overcome to the satisfaction of the customer, it is

questionable the sale will be made.

8.6 Closing the Sale

In various ways, the salesperson can assist the customer by helping him or her to make

the buying decision. Closing techniques that can aid in this effort include:

Offers a Service "Let us deliver it to you this afternoon." A "Yes" implies

purchase. Give a Choice "Do you want the five-piece or eight-piece cooking set?”

Either choice implies purchase. Note that "No" was not one of the choices.

Offers an Incentive "If you buy now, you get 10 percent off the already low

price." If you wait, you don't get the 10 percent discount.

Better Not Wait "If you want this refrigerator, better get it now. It's the last one

in stock." Note it pays to be honest. If the customer buys and then comes by the

store the next day and sees that the store did have another one, this closing

technique may have made the sale, but it could lose the customer.

8.7 Suggestion Selling

The customer has made a purchase. Now what? Encourage your sales personnel to make

a definite suggestion for a possible additional sale. For many businesses, sales can be

increased by 25 percent through positive suggestion selling. Please note that statements

such as: "Will there be something else?" or" Can I get you something else?" are not

suggestion selling. They do not make a positive suggestion. When the customer buys a

lamp, what about a light bulb to go in it? If a picture is purchased, inquire about the

necessary hardware to hang it properly. If a suit is bought, about a new blouse or shirt

that goes well with the color.

Where appropriate, the creative salesperson will actually get the suggested item and show

it to the customer. Or if a person brings in a watch to be repaired, why not also clean it

while it is taken apart? This type of initiative usually results in more sales. It should be

emphasized that most customers like to receive a valid suggestion. In some cases,

suggestions may even permit the customer to avoid another shopping trip to pick up that

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needed item that they had not thought about. Good suggestion selling makes sales and

builds confidence in the firm's business.

8.8 Sales Follow-Up

Although not apparent to many salespeople, follow-up is a part of every sale. The closing

statement, "Thank you for shopping at (name of store)," is a form of sales follow- up if it

is done with enthusiasm. Unfortunately, just making the statement in an automatic

manner is about as effective as that other worn out phrase, "May I help you?" If done

correctly, however, it allows the customer to leave on a positive note, thereby increasing

the changes of repeat business by the customer.

Follow-up may also concern itself with checking on anything that was promised the

customer after the sale. If delivery is supposed to take place on Friday, the salesperson

will check to make sure that the promise will be met and, if not, will notify the customer

of the problem. Good sales follow-up will prevent the type of situation that occurs so

often when the customer calls on Friday asking, "Where is the delivery truck?" A

business with a reputation for sales follow-up is going to obtain additional business

because of its concern after the sale.

Sincere sales follow-up is good business. Imagine the impact that can be had on a

customer when the carpet cleaning service telephones the customer 48 hours after

cleaning her carpets to be sure that everything is satisfactory. Sales follow-up, builds

good will and repeat business.

9. Selling processes followed by the organizations

Out of the processes that is been discussed in detail above, the processes that the

companies follows are as follows. As its discussed in detail, only the highlights of the

processes will be mentioned below.

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9.1 Agora

Selling process of Agora are pre customer contact, prospecting, presentation of

merchandize and closing the sale. They gather all the relevant the information before

reaching out the customers and identify the most potential customers. After that they

present and when the customer agrees they close the sale. This is the most frequently

used selling methods in Agora. When the customers come to their shops, they just show

them where the products are held and if the customers want they will close the sale. The

follow up sale services is not provided in any of Agora’s outlet.

9.2 Sunup

Most frequent selling process of Sunup includes pre customer contact, prospecting, initial

contact, presentation of merchandize, handling objections and closing the sale. Like wise

Sunup also use the same procedures in selling. However, in addition to Agora, Sunup

reaches the customers initially and asks whether they need any help and they also deal

with objections. When you purchase anything from the Sunup, you have all the right to

check it properly, once you purchase there is no follow up sales service.

9.3 Dhiraagu

Dhiraagu provides wide range of electronic products along with the services. Therefore,

the selling approach is bit different from other two organizations. Dhiraagu makes sure

that they pre customer contact, prospect and make initial contact. And then they present

the merchandize while handling objections. When the customer is satisfied they close the

sale while providing sales follow up for electronic products. Dhiraagu provide sales

follow up and after sales service only for the electronic items purchased.

Out of all, Dhiraagu has the most effective selling process, even though they do not

follow all the selling processes. Dhiraagu follows the maximum number of stages

including sales follow up, amongst all the organizations, which will enhance their

customer database.

Sincere sales follow-up is good business. Imagine the impact that can be had on a

customer when the internet service is disconnected due to Dhiraagu mishandling and

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when customers calls, they re connect it and check whether everything is satisfactory.

Sales follow-up, builds good will and repeat business.

10. Sales Strategies

A sales territory is thought of as a geographic area that contains customer accounts. In other

words, a sales territory is composed of a group of customers or a geographic area assigned

to a salesperson, a group of salesperson, a branch, a dealer, a distributor, or a marketing

organization at given period of time. The territory may or may not have geographic

boundaries. The term customer, here, refers to both the existing as well as the future ones.

Assigning sales territories helps a manager to achieve a match between sales efforts and

sales opportunities. When sales territories are out of balance, some areas with high

potential customers may be underserved while other areas are saturated. Too much effort

may be expended against low potential customers. Sales and service people spend too

much ³windshield time´ driving from sales call to sales call and don’t spend enough time

seeing and listening to customers.

Increased sales and customer coverage: when territories are properly aligned,

issues of under- and over-capacity are reduced or eliminated. Each territory is

created allowing the sales person to reach and spend time with the greatest

number of high potential customers, thus increasing sales.

Reduced travel time and associated expenses: due to the geographic nature of

sales territories, better alignment means less travel time to reach customers. Less

time spent in the car means more time spent with customers, thus more time for

selling. Other associated expenses such as fuel and automobile costs are reduced

as well.

Competitive advantage: this benefit of sales territory alignment is often

overlooked. However, if an organization has better coverage in its territories, it

can reach new opportunities faster than your competitors, again leading to

increased sales.

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Equity and morale: nothing can be more discouraging to a sales person than to

see an associate milking a highly profitable territory while they’re stuck servicing

an area with low potential. Properly aligned territories provide a more equitable

distribution of accounts, level the playing field in terms of achieving rewards, and

boost morale among sales people. In addition, sales people stay longer, thus

lowering the costs associated with hiring.

Strengthening of Customer Relationship Management: properly designed

sales territories allow salespeople to spend more time with present and potential

customers and less time on the road. The more the salespeople can learn about

their customers the more comfortable their relationship becomes with the

customer. Well designed sales territories should result in regularly scheduled sales

call on customers. Let us say, for example, if there is a customer who purchases

regularly but is too busy to see a salesperson, then he might prefer placing an

order over the phone. Or the customer may receive updated pricing information

and place an order on a facsimile machine, that is, fax. Another way could be

through the use of voicemail.

Each of the above discussed situations is ripe with the potential for decreased

productivity, missed customer opportunity, and confusion and competition among sales

people. Sales territory alignment can help rectify all these situations.

There are myriads of software packages available in the market which can help an

organization in aligning the territories. Some are simple and may lack the functionality

required to align multitiered territories and account for complex relationships. Others can

be sophisticated, expensive and non-intuitive. It might be required to engage a firm with

expertise in sales territory alignment that can advise on the territory alignment process

and provide software and analysis services.

All the three organizations mentioned that they set targets for the sales forces are based

on the following.

Analyze current targets, sales force composition, compensation plans, target

markets, customer locations and market penetration.

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Assess existing targets to find underserved or saturated areas based on the number

of customers and prospects in each territory, and analyze how easily they can be

reached by their sales force.

Determine the number of territories needed based on criteria for realignment.

Criteria can include equitable distribution of leads or workload, account

assignment, number of sales people, travel time, location of distributors, and other

variables relevant to your business.

Rank and align territories, optimizing them at multiple levels. For example,

territories that rolls up into districts, districts into regions, and so on.

They assign the sales targets after analyzing the SWOT of their work force along with the

environmental analysis. And the past records of the sales target, whether they have any

deviations to correct. If so they take corrective measure accordingly and then set the

targets based on the available resources.

10.1 Sales Recruitment method

Every company aims at recruiting the right person for the right job. The greatest

challenge faced by organizations today is to be able to recruit the best talent and to be

able to utilize that talent to achieve organizational objectives. Recruitment and hiring the

right people is as important in a sales organization as it is in any other organization.

Before coming to the details of recruitment, let us bear one thing in mind hiring, contrary

to the popular perception is an ongoing process and not confined to the formative stages

of the organization. As such sales managers need to constantly be recruiting and meeting

potential new hires, even when hiring for a sales position doesn’t appear to be on the

horizon. People leave positions and companies for a variety of reasons, so you have to be

fully prepared for when this happens. A bad new hire or a string of new hires that don’t

work out can quickly turn your once great sales team into a dysfunctional sales force

incapable of meeting your sales plan or quota.

At the same time there are several organizations or managers working in sales

organizations, which like to hire mostly experienced sales persons. There is rationale for

such an approach towards hiring. The managers want to save on training and

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development costs, especially during the period when economy cannot be said to be

booming. Besides, there are also arguments that people who have experience in the field

add more value to the organization in terms of the relationship which they bring in. also

the relevant exposure helps them cope better with the work related stress.

The sales force selection process consists of several stages. These are:

Sourcing the candidates: sales managers try to develop a pool of applicants by

attracting candidates from various sources for filling the sales positions in their

organizations. The various sources from which sales managers can source their

potential candidates include college and university campuses, use of placement

agencies, newspapers and trade journals, referrals from other salespeople etc.

Potential candidates can even be sourced from within the organization. This trend

is known as re-recruiting.

Screening the candidates: the curriculum vitae of the candidates serve as the

first screening tool in most of the organizations. Also, some organizations ask the

candidates to fill some standardized application forms to get over the problem of

varying formats in which the candidates apply.

Selection test: tests serve as the selection tool to assess a potential employee’s

skills and abilities. Although tests help in weeding out most of the inaccurate

candidates they have their own pitfalls. For example such test which are often

called knowledge tests are memory based while in work situations one does not

depend much on memory rather on other skills.

Personality tests

Honesty tests

Psychometric tests: these are used to ³look into the mind´ of the candidates.

These are designed to test the candidate for skills, interest, aptitude, and other

aspects of personality like strengths and weaknesses.

Background checks: here the purpose to screen out undeserving and undesirable

candidates.

Personal Interview: in many organizations, a potential employee is called for a

personal interview only after he or she clears the background check.

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Letter of Recommendation: there are chances of a candidate providing wrong

information about himself in his resume. As such, letter of recommendation also

forms the part of selection process.

Physical Examination

Making the Employment Offer: the last stage in the selection process involves

making the employment offer to the candidate

Despite such elaborate mechanisms being in place for the recruitment purposes,

organizations have to keep on recruiting all through the year. Yet, organizations are not

sure of the performance from the salespersons that they hire. What can be the reason

behind this? Well. First and simplest answer to the question is that many a salesperson

hired are not “job-fit”. The candidates who are not compatible with the job will surely not

be able to do justice with it. But the question here is how to gauge the compatibility?

10.2 Sales Training to the selected candidates

The success of an organization is a function of the effectiveness of its sales force to

convince customers to make purchase. As sales force performance has significant impact

on the bottom line of the organization, it is imperative for the sales manager to think

about the various ways in which the performance of the sales force can be boosted. This

assumes all the more significance keeping in view the fact that most of the salepersons do

not have the inherent talent to sell. As such the role of training to overcome this

limitation becomes important.

The training provided should be based on the need assessment of the saleperson. Hoever,

very few organizations take this trouble. Most of the organizations design a formanl and

common training for all its new recruits.

The types of training that the companies provide can be listed as:

Initial Sales training

Follow-up or Refresher training

Training by the manufacturer to the Distributor’s sales force

Training by the manufacturer to the Customers

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10.3 Motivation

It is no secret that only highly motivated people have been able to achieve what they had

set their sights on. This is so because the people who are highly motivated do not give up

trying. Setbacks, for them, are an opportunity to analyze and identify the mistakes. This

learning helps them to avoid future mistakes. Their motivation keeps them going.

Now, let us understand the role of motivation in a sales organization.

Sales organizations comprise of human beings working at different levels. As such

organizations are affected by the effectiveness of its employees. The effectiveness of

employees is again a factor of many things significant among them is the motivation

levels of the employees. Thus, we can say that the success of a sales organization

depends on the ability and the style of functioning of the sales manager to motivate the

sales staff to achieve organizational goals. The importance of motivation is felt within

and across the organization because the salespeople have to put in a lot of effort to realize

sales in the market. They get demotivated due to frequent rejections by the customers,

lower esteem ascribed to the sales job, and customer complaints about non-compliance of

the products and services. The nature of job itself serves to weaken motivation levels.

Salespeople have to do the job of prospecting, presentations, and demonstration

repeatedly which makes the job monotonous. Also, their personal and domestic life

suffers because of the job.

Sales manager needs to constantly motivate his employees and at the same time continue

to be motivated himself. The greatest challenge in motivating employees is the issue that

not all the employees are motivated by the same factors. It is here that different theories

of motivation: Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Hertzberg’s two factor theory, Alderfer’s

ERG theory, Vroom’s expectancy theory etc., come into picture. Deciding on the ways to

motivate an employee differs from manager to manager, yet certain guidelines are laid

down by respective organizations in this regard.

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10.4 Remuneration and Reward system

Sales organizations design compensation plans with multiple objectives. One of the key

objectives is to attract quality salespeople. If the company’s compensation and reward

system is perceived to be equitable then it will not have much problem in attracting good

salespeople. Besides, it also helps in keeping the employees motivated. This in turn helps

in getting better performance out of the force and retaining them.

As such, the reward system should address the short-term as well as long-term issues of

the salespeople. While survival is the short-term issue of the salesperson, recognition and

growth in the company are his long-term needs. The compensation should be guarantee

fair wage. The pattern of remuneration should be such that it should reflect a stream of

stable income flows for the salespeople.

10.4.1 Steps in Designing compensation plan

Determine Sales force and compensation objectives

Determine major compensation issues

Implement long-term and short-term compensation plan

Relate rewards to performance

Measurement of performance

Review and revise (if needed) the compensation plan

Also, the performance appraisal of the salespersons should be fair. Besides, emphasis

must be laid on proper performance management system. Most of the organization

mistake performance management for appraisal, which it is not.

11. Practical application

11. 1 Dhiraagu

11.1.1 Recruitment and selection

Recruitment in Dhiraagu is not just an event but is a part of a complete leadership

development process. Most of their recruitment is done from campus. Dhiraagu began

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recruitment people from premier institutes since 1991 and have developed some of the

best leaders of the Maldivian Industry.

However, it does not hire people at senior levels unless it is absolutely required. The

policy at Dhiraagu is that even if an insider is 60% ready for a given internal vacancy, he

will be preferred over an outsider.

The recruitment process is extremely important to Dhiraagu and involves a significant

application of the senior and top management time. The assessment of the campus panel

is supported by an assessment of the candidate’s performance in group discussions,

psychometric tests and an in-depth reference check.

The selection procedure includes following four steps:

Written examination of a duration of 1 hour. It has 3 sections

a) English Language test: This section has a total of 20 questions. Out of

these ten questions are in the form of fill in the blanks of prepositions,

synonyms and antonyms. Then these are two passages related to

computers. This section tests the communication skills.

b) Aptitude test: Topics on which questions are generally asked are as

follows:

Blood relations

Directions

Time and Distance

The section seeks to test the candidate on logical reasoning and as such his

general mental ability.

c) Verbal and Non-Verbal reasoning: Topics on which questions are

generally asked are:

Mathematical Operations

Data sufficiency

Logic

Puzzle test

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Here, quantitative ability of person is put on test.

d) Essay Writing: Candidates are required to write an essay in 100-150

words within 10 minutes. The purpose is to test the communication skills

and understand the thought process of the candidates.

Group discussion: The purpose of the group discussion is to identify confident,

informed, and enthusiastic candidates.

HR round: Here, the oral communication as well as the personality of the

candidate is assessed. Some of the common questions are:

Tell me about yourself?

Why should we hire you?

Technical round: Here, the candidates’ knowledge regards to computers and

information technology is tested.

11.1.2 Training and Development

Dhiraagu has also developed a competency model whereby need assessment for the

new recruits as well as existing workforce is done in order to provide them with

requisite training. Also, the competency model is used to assign the new recruits to

proper teams. The organization uses a competency framework as the anchor for

driving individual and organizational performance. There are 14 behavioural

competencies and nine quality competencies that shape recruitment, staffing, training,

and HR processes. During performance appraisal, employees are assessed on these

competencies. The organization also has an assessment center to help measure the

competency levels and effectiveness of training.

A future manager program, aimed at building behavioural competencies of

employees, took off during 2006-2007. More than 20 employees were certified as

future managers in the year. That number rose to 40 in the second year. Service

Academies helped new employees assimilate into their jobs quicker (from 180 days to

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155 days). These academies catered to the special training requirements of their job

functions, especially the practical application skills.

Development of employees is one of the most critical processes in Dhiraagu. The best

thing, according to the employees, at Dhiraagu is that a person gets to learn many

things. A person may be working in sales team initially but he can very well go on to

work in other functional areas too. This can be attributed to the employee

development programs at the organization. There are broadly two categories of

development programs:

I. Life cycle management program

II. Individual development program against individual development need

The following areas are covered under the life cycle management program:

Entry-level program: this consists of both elaborate technical exposure as well

as exposure to issues related to how to be a good productive employee in the

company. This is in addition to a common introduction program that employees

go through on joining.

New leaders program: For employees who become leaders for the first time.

Dhiraagu leaders program: For employees who start leading other managers.

Business leaders program: For those who become business managers for the

first time.

Strategies leaders program: For top management who are responsible for

strategies inputs.

Besides the above, a detailed action plan is made on completion of performance appraisal

for the individual employee. The action plan can include the following:

Specific need related development program

Efforts on the job by the employee

Supervisor coaching guidance etc.

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11.1.3 Performance Management System

Dhiraagu has a comprehensive performance management system, which has been

institutionalized over two decades. The human resources department does the review and

planning is the high point of the performance management and employee development

process at the organization. The human resource review and planning serves the

following purpose:

Identifying top 10% and bottom 10% of the employees

Identifying talent that we should not lose under any circumstances

Succession planning

People in the same job for five years and more

11.1.4 Remuneration and reward for sales employees

Dhiraagu pays a great attention on maintaining the motivation levels of its sales force.

This is a very important aspect of sales force management. The compensation to the

employees include a fixed salary, field expense reimbursement in the form of daily

allowance, and travelling allowance and incentives based on sales. It also provides fringe

benefits like Contributory Provident Fund and soft loans.

In order to provide a target to the sales force Dhiraagu takes into account mainly the

previous year’s sales performance. Besides, industry growth is also factored while

designing the target.

11.2 Sunup

The company currently recruits people mainly from two sources, placement agencies and

campus recruitments. Campus recruits are mainly taken in as interns. These recruits are

given a small training of two to three days where the focus is on product knowledge and

sales process. These recruits are not provided with any compensation as of now.

However, they are given freedom to choose their area of projects and the company

provides them with resources to complete the project. Also the interns get to meet their

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Regional Sales Manager every week and recognition of their work comes straight from

him. This serves as a big motivation for the interns.

The regular sales force, however, is recruited through placement agents. The new recruits

are given a small training just like the interns. These recruits are put on a probation

period of one year. During this one year the new recruits have to show consistency in the

achievement of sales target. During their probation period, the salespersons are given a

fixed salary and reimbursed for travelling and telephone expenses. There is no incentive

on the offer. The company gives best in the industry salaries. The purpose of fixed salary

is to make the salespersons feel secure economically. This, according to the company

helps keep them motivated.

After completion of one year the salespersons are put on the rolls of the company. At this

stage, incentives also come into the compensation picture. The company, in fact, starts

increasing the share of variable pay to the salespeople at this stage. This serves as a

motivation to them.

The company now has, however, felt that this approach will not suffice them in achieving

desired results over a longer period of time. So, the company is contemplating hiring HR

consultants and domain experts to chalk out new policies for managing the sales force.

11.3 Agora

11.3.1 Recruitment and Selection

Agora recruits from various sources. These sources for the recruitment of sales staff are:

HR consultants

Employee referrals

Campus recruitments

Walk-in interviews

The company employs various methods to select for the process of recruitment.

Interviews are held for selection at any level in the organization. For entry level jobs, a

simple interview is the most preferred mode of selection. When selecting from campus,

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the organization also uses group discussion for first level of screening, followed by

interviews.

11.3.2 Training and Development

New employees undergo an induction and training program for two weeks. They are

taught about the company’s business, various departments etc. they are informed of their

roles, duties and responsibilities. They are also briefed on the HR policies and rules of the

company.

The new employees are put on probation for a period of six months. After this period the

HR manager along with the department manager will review the performance of the

employee. If the employee’s performance is good and encouraging, the employee’s

services are confirmed.

11.3.3 Performance Management

The HR department conducts performance appraisal of all the employees annually in the

month of December. The decision as to increments in the pay to the employees is decided

upon on the basis of their performance. Moreover, if an employee achieves or exceeds the

target given to them along with their team members then they are provided with attractive

cash prizes and other incentives.

11.3.4 Motivation

At Agora, the employees are motivated through various means. The sales managers

believe that the good working environment and organization’s culture themselves are the

biggest motivator. There is healthy competition among the sales staff. Besides, good

salary and incentives, appreciation from the floor managers and even higher level

managers too serve to motivate the sales force. Moreover, the organization has worked to

make its employees feel secure in their jobs, and this is reflected in the trends pertaining

to job cuts during recessionary phase. The higher level employees took to voluntary pay

cuts rather than firing its sales staff in the face of economic slowdown. The HR team

worked overtime to communicate with the employees. Even counseling sessions were

undertaken to some extent.

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11.3.5 Remuneration and rewards

The employees are rewarded suitably with attractive pay packages. The salary of an

employee includes basic pay, special allowance, and medical insurance etc. Annual bonus

is given at the time of Ramazan

Agora employees and their dependents get treatment at a discounted rate in some

hospitals. The company has entered into alliance with hospitals and medical clinics to this

effect.

Besides, all the employees are given an ‘Employee Discount card’ through which they

can buy any product at Agora at a special discount of 20% - 30%.

As far as the provided information are concerned, the most appropriate structure and the

procedures are followed by Dhiraagu. When setting the targets and all the fundamentals

of HR are being performed effectively then other organizations. However, there is always

room for improvement. Therefore the recommendations that we made are for all the three

organizations.

11.4 Recommendation for improvement

Sales is an important function in any organization as the very survival of an organization

depends on the revenues that it earns, which comes from sales. As such, bottom-line is

affected to a great extent by rise and fall in the performance of each sales person. So,

managers often set high targets for the sales staff. The sales person who works in the field

goes through tremendous amount of hard-work, diligence and stress. Yet, a slight fall in

the performance and he can find his job under threat. Very often, they are not treated well

by the customers as well as their superiors. Most of the sales persons encountered during

the course of the study believed that they face undue sales pressure which is thrust upon

them by strategists without knowing the ground realities. Also, they also begin to feel a

conflict which is resultant from the difference between the espoused values and practiced

values of the organization. Often, achieving the sales target puts them under ethical

dilemma. The sales staff often begins to see his performance taking a downward spiral.

Also, it begins to affect the company’s relation with its customers.

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So, any organization should take certain measures which will help it better manage its

sales force. Some of the suggestions in this regard are:

Sales targets should be realistic and onstage contact employees should be made

participant in the process. The best results can be observed if it is not thrust upon

the sales staff. For example, an Area Sales Manager working at a reputed stock

broking firm complained that he was required to achieve a target six hundred

accounts in one year even during recession. A failure to reach to the eighty

percent of the target would result in no bonus and certainly no incentive. In this

regard Management by objective (MBO) can be a useful practice. But again the

risk is that the superior may not be skilled enough to handle this kind of approach

and would create more problems.

Performance appraisal should not be confused with performance management.

Many organizations declare lofty ideals with regards to the performance

management yet on the terra firma the practice is not to look beyond appraising

the performance.

Adequate training should be provided to the superiors so that they could handle

their human resource, which in this case would be their sales staff, in a better

manner. They should not look upon them just as a means to achieve the target

assigned to them.

Job rotation should be followed in organizations. For example, a sales person who

has done three-four years of sales could be shifted to HR functions like training

and development, or even strategy formulation. Such measures would be of

mutual benefits to both the respective companies and their sales staff.

While recruiting, many companies keep attaching more importance to experience

and qualifications rather than giving due importance to competence. This happens

due to haste and also because company take HR functions to be a cost to company

only. Despite being a known fact that there should be candidate-job fit, that is,

µright person for right job, companies at times fail to practice the maxim.

Experienced or µqualified candidates may not always be the right candidate for

the job. At the same time equally important is to note that errors like ageism

should not creep into recruitment policy.

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Effort should be made to create a learning organization as it can help fight

problems related to manpower shortage.

Organizations should look to develop their own competency model to develop an

efficient and learning organization

12. Selling in different environment

12.1 Industrial and technical selling

Industrial and technical selling is selling business to business transactions for raw

materials, fabricated materials, capital equipment and supplies. Dhiraagu, Agora and

Sunup supermarket do not sell in business to business transaction. They only deal with

consumer markets. Therefore this industrial selling is not performed in these

organizations.

12.2 International selling

Exporting is the easiest, cheapest and most commonly used route into a new foreign

market, where they can concentrate a single location. Any of selected organizations do

not sell in the international market.

12.3 Trade Fairs and Exhibitions

These are unusual buying situations artificially created to bring together buyers and

sellers with a shared area of interest. Such approaches are very good for making new

contacts and renewing old ones. Companies will seldom sell much at such events. The

purpose is to increase awareness and to encourage trial. They offer the opportunity for

companies to meet with both the trade and the consumer. All the organizations take part

in the trade fairs and exhibitions. It helps them to increase their customer data base and

more sales.

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12.4 Selling to a public authority

None of the selected organizations directly deals with the selling to the public authority;

because of the decision making process is very slow in the public sector.

12.5 Selling a service

Service is a product with no shelf life are intangible and this characteristics makes

working with service more difficult than working with products. All the organizations

sell productions along with the some services; no company is solely based on services.

Therefore this is not a barrier to any of selected organizations.

12.6 Consumer selling and selling for resale

This is where the organizations major themselves. The retailer is acting as an adviser in

the DMU of the final customer. The products can be visible and demonstrated.

Consumer selling and selling for resale, and selling over the phone, are commonly used

methods of selling in all the three organizations.

In addition to having personnel who understand and apply the creative selling process, an

organization should try to have salespeople who possess certain attributes that can make

them more effective in their jobs. These attributes, which can be grouped into mental and

physical categories, merit further discussion.

Therefore to perform selling process the skills and the attributes of the sales force are as

follows. Three organizations require sales representatives of similar skills and attributes,

so that the organizations can experience the highest sales.

13. Attributes of Salespersonal

13.1 Judgment

Common sense, maturity, intelligence, these and other terms are used interchangeably

with judgment. A salesperson knows that it does not pay to argue with a customer. The

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salesperson also knows that the firm should never be "cut" in front of customers. These

situations reflect the use of good judgment on the part of the employee. Please note that

the term maturity is sometimes used in place of judgment but that it is not necessarily a

function of age.

13.2 Tact

If an employee has a keen sense of what to say and do, many problems can be overcome

before they are created. Many employees give little thought to the impact of their actions.

A child playing with toys in the toy store is told in a blunt manner to "quit playing with

the toys and go find your mother." While all this is going on, the mother is standing

behind the salesperson. Was a confrontation with the child necessary? No. Could it have

been handled differently? Yes. How do the child and mother feel about the store? The

feeling is not good. This salesperson lacked the ability to know what to do and say in

order to maintain good customer relations. Therefore the organizations need sales

representatives to be tactful.

13.3 Attitude

A good salesperson will have a positive attitude toward customers, merchandise, services

and the business. A good attitude means that an employee is willing to accept

suggestions, to learn and to apply the steps in the creative selling process, and to not be

afraid of work. A salesperson with a bad attitude can create unnecessary problems. A bad

attitude is contagious. All the organizations believe in positive attitudes can result in

sales.

13.4 Selected Physical Attributes

To be a success, the salesperson must physically belong in the firm's particular

environment. Personal appearance and personal hygiene are important in the selling

environment. Equally important in terms of personal appearance is a clothing salesman

who wears last year's clothing. He will have difficulty in selling the latest fashions to his

customers. Personal appearance does count in the selling equation.

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13.5 Personal hygiene

Body odor, bad breath, dirty hair, soiled clothes, scuffed shoes, and un-kept hands are all

reasons why a sale may be lost. Obviously, be tactful when handling problems of

personal hygiene. Customers will usually react unfavorably to this and similar

inappropriate selling situations. This will not be favorable to the organization.

14. Selling Skills

14.1 Interpersonal skills

These include the ability to lead, motivate and delegate. They are important at every level

of organisational responsibility and should always be evident. Being the most technical

person in field is not always enough to succeed unless s/he can combine this with the

ability to convince others that what you are doing is important. 

14.2 Team working

There are two issues a team must consider as a group. Firstly and most commonly

addressed is the task at hand and problems that might be involved in completing it. The

second and most overlooked consideration is the process of the teamwork itself and what

procedures will ensure the group works cohesively. By acknowledging both of these

issues will have be able to clarify group objectives and enhance team working

capabilities. 

14.3 Negotiation skills

Negotiating in a way that means ability to achieve desired outcomes and still maintain

successful ongoing relationships with others is also beneficial. Influencing positively will

help to achieve more of what people want and build relationships based on openness,

trust, understanding and mutual respect. 

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Being able to see a situation from another person’s perspective is the key to successful

negotiation because appreciating how they are thinking will enable to present thoughts in

the most favourable way.

14.4 Communication skills

The ability to communicate ideas to others effectively is an absolutely essential

requirement sales representative. Speaking clearly and coherently will allow effective

verbal communication with others. Bear in mind that the way of speaking is more

influential to the person that you are communicating with than what you actually say, so

think about body language and tone of voice when are talking. 

The ability to present comprehensive written ideas will enable you to put forward

professional documentation of your thoughts and is a highly regarded skill.

Communication is a two-way process so listening is therefore an essential aspect.

Listening is more than just hearing what is being said. Effective listening encourages

others to listen to you and respond to what you say.

14.5 Time management

Demonstrating time management skills means controlling and using the time as

effectively as possible. Learning how to prioritize can be difficult in a new role, but

categorizing the responsibilities can help.

Some people are able to produce their highest quality work under immense pressure,

while for others meeting tight deadlines can affect their ability to carry out a task

efficiently. The best way to prepare for this is to ensure that plan ahead by identifying the

objectives, the tasks that will need to be completed to meet the objectives and the time

that is expected to complete. 

It’s vital for all the sales representatives to posses all the above mentioned attributes and

skills in order to perform their tasks effectively. All the selected organizations have

mentioned the same attribute and skills indicate that the companies are looking for people

who are motivators, team players, leaders and they also should be able to present

themselves in an appropriate manner.

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15. Conclusion

The salespeople in the past were not held in high esteem by the society. The Roman

equivalent of the word salesperson is cheater. Today, however, an organization relies

heavily on its salesperson, that is, its sales force. This is so because of the increasing

importance of selling. Today’s selling approach also includes maintaining good customer

relationship, managing the profitability of a firm, managing customer complaints and

building brand value in the eyes of the customer. As such, the concept of sales force

management becomes central to the growth of a sales organization. Therefore, the

companies that we have selected to compare with are Dhiraagu, Agora and Sunup

supermarket. Dhiraagu and Agora are Maldivian based companies and Sunup is a Sri

Lankan based one.

These days a lot of managers and strategists place great emphasis on the bottom-line as it

not only reflects a company’s well-being but also affects its stock values. In this pursuit

of profit top-line assumes special significance. Different organizations have adopted

different methods to go about it, as can be observed in the study undertaken. But, despite

different approaches to sales one thing that remains constant is the significance of sales

force. As such, managing the sales force assumes strategic importance in the growth of

the organization. The policies pertaining to sales force have a deep impact on not only

achievement of targets, but also on the image of the organization, employee satisfaction

and attrition rate. Different elements in the promotional mix have been identified and

compared choosing the best practices between the selected organizations along with the

role and responsibilities of the sale force. In addition to that, the stages involve in the

selling process has been discussed thoroughly comparing all the selected organizations.

The management policy at a sales organization is a function of various factors

environment, strategy adopted by the organization, organization’s learning curve, and

sales manager’s own understanding of the environment and his tactical responses.

Organizations policy, especially those which are related to performance management and

training and development are heavily influenced by organizations learning curve.

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The organizations should also look towards their HR function as a strategic function, not

only in the sense that it helps them hire right candidate for right job, but also because it can

improve overall efficiency. The sales strategies, sales targets recruitment method,

remuneration and techniques to coordinate and control sales out put have been analyzed

giving recommendations wherever necessary. The selling requirements in different

environmental context have been studied and the skills and the attribute that the sale

personnel should posses have been thoroughly discussed.

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