An experimental approach to segmenting buyers of marketing research

Successful industrial market segmentation may often depend on the marketer's ability to identify key characteristics influencing purchase preferences. Environmental, organizational, and personal factors are all potential determinants of buyer response patterns. Recent attention to microsegmentation processes has focused interest on personal level factors and how these are modified by organizational and situational variables. Utilizing a simulated buying experiment, this study explores a simplified approach to microsegmentation that emphasizes information readily available to industrial vendor representatives.     

Salary increases for the marketing executive

This article discusses how marketing executives view their pay raise. A study of 491 marketing executives examined their views on what is a meaningful salary increase and the reasons why their companies give pay raises.     

The key issues and procedures of industrial marketing research

Industrial marketing research has failed to receive its due attention in marketing books and journals, even though the volume of transactions in industrial goods and services is more than twice that of consumer goods and services. This article provides a systematic and wide ranging review of the issues, procedures, and opportunities found in industrial marketing research.     

Vendor segmentation: An additional level of market segmentation

This article describes a new conceptual approach, called “vendor segmentation,” which will be useful to industrial marketers in making their vendor evaluation and selection procedures more customer oriented, and hence more profitable, than conventional procedures. A practical approach for doing vendor segmentation analysis is outlined as a stepwise procedure, and the potential benefits and limitations of using this approach are discussed.     

The relative importance of industrial promotion tools

This article describes a survey of the perceptions of organizational buyers regarding the extent to which their purchasing decisions are influenced by various promotional tools. The results of this survey provide some practical implications for industrial marketers regarding the relative effectiveness of various promotional tools and the relative emphasis that they should place on each of them.     

Researching marketing problems and opportunities with focus groups

Focus group research is a popular and effective qualitative research method for generating ideas and assessing marketing programs and concepts. This article provides marketers with insights about implementing focus groups in the industrial environment. It presents a specific procedure for conducting focus groups, potential industrial applications for the research technique, guidelines for making decisions about selecting moderators, establishing objectives, recruiting study participants, and controlling costs.     

Guidelines for marketing a new industrial product

This article presents an illustration of what evaluations and obstacles a new product can face in an industrial market. Guidelines are also suggested which will hopefully better prepare industrial marketers for more success in marketing new products.     

Increase response to industrial surveys

The results of this article support the contention that a prenotification telephone call increases the probability of response to a mail survey request. The article also discusses the practical problems associated with the use of a telephone prenotification in an industrial setting and provides a step-by-step procedure to help overcome these problems.     

Increasing the role of direct mail marketing in industrial marketing strategy

Direct marketing has long been a dominant factor in the distribution strategy of industrial goods and services. Yet frameworks for strategy formulation in this area are nearly nonexistent in the literature. Much that has been written focuses on successful techniques, such as how to use a specific type of sales letter to improve results. This article outlines a set of key perspectives that industrial marketers may use to evaluate the potential effectiveness of direct marketing strategies.     

Social auditing for marketing managers

A general framework is suggested for use by the marketing manager in maximizing efforts to safeguard consumer rights by thoughtfully preparing for his part in the corporate social audit. He can adapt a suggested audit preparation sequence to the needs and resources of his individual company.     

Sales force evaluation with expectancy theory

The salespeople and their sales managers of two national firms were surveyed to examine the relationships between the salespeople's effort, performance, satisfaction, and propensity to leave their job. The 399 salespeople participating in the study were evaluated by their sales managers. Research results provide insights into the problems associated with correctly measuring performance and testing expectancy theory when salespeople are not evaluated on objective performance measures.     

Reducing overreaction in contract markets

Predicting market share can be difficult for industrial firms whose sales occur in the form of a few large contracts received at irregular intervals during the course of a year. This article discusses the problems that this type of sales pattern may cause and provides a solution for determining probabilistic share forecasts.     

Realigning industrial marketing channels

Dramatic changes are occurring in industrial patterns of distribution. This article provides a structure for analyzing realignments in industrial marketing channels. Specifically, the analysis centers on the channel efficiency and effectiveness dimensions that were generated by a shift from industrial distributors to a public warehouse.     

Buying an industrial service warehouse space

This paper reports the results of a study of the industrial buyer of warehouse space. The role of the purchasing agent and the other members in the buy group are identified and evaluated.     

Rating industrial advertisements

Industrial advertisers can create more effective advertisements if they have some notion about the immediate effect their advertising has on the target audience. Here, a multiple item scale is developed for categorizing an audience's reactions to print ads. The proposed scale is discussed as a copytesting instrument and could be used to evaluate alternative executions in order to indicate which ads may be most effective.     

Marketing research by a small industrial firm: A case study

There is a growing need today for industrial marketers to conduct marketing research and use the results in making profitable business decisions. This paper describes a marketing research study conducted by a small industrial firm and discusses the nature and extent of its impact on the firm's operations. Several implications and practical guidelines are derived for industrial marketers in general, based on the firm's marketing research experience.     

Disclosing sales force pay increase

The motivation of sales people is partly achieved by matching pay or compensation to performance. This study addresses itself to the effects of publicizing or keeping the pay raises confidential.     

Setting multinational industrial marketing strategies

Nations of the world are striking out, from various starting points, along a variety of new development paths, reflecting a widespread repudiation of the conventional economic model of development based on a common, predetermined roadway to progress. Marketers who are bound by tradition may perceive the alternative development approaches as threats to standardized marketing strategies. Innovative marketers will view them as important keys to expanded market opportunities throughout the world.     

Women as industrial sales representatives

The incidence of women in industrial sales is rising, and females can now be found frequently in traditional all-male type industries such as steel, lumber, and heavy machinery. A strong consensus exists among sales managers that women are effective in industrial selling, and the representatives' records sustain this opinion. Women are proving themselves as worthy, capable, and competent, although they do face special problems in this type of work, some of which are role reversal, production pressures, sexual overtures, and loneliness during travel.     

A sales mix model for effective industrial selling

The purpose of this article is to focus on one aspect of the marketing mix for industrial firms. Specifically, the control of promotion centers on the promotional mix, which includes personal selling, advertising, and sales promotion. The personal sales mix model (Figure 1) highlights those factors that are controllable by the industrial sales representative. Also, the uncontrollables involved in industrial selling are discussed. An understanding of the personal sales mix model should aid industrial marketers in satisfying buyer's needs through effective selling.