How sales managers control unethical sales force behavior

Researchers have studied marketing ethics from several perspectives. Few studies, however, have analyzed supervisory reactions to unethical behavior by salespeople. The results of this study using a 2 × 3 factorial design showed that the performance level of the salesperson and the consequences of the salesperson's actions influenced some types of discipline used by a sample of 246 sales managers. The findings both support and contradict prior research on how sales managers respond to unethical sales force behavior.James B. DeConinck is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at The University of Dayton. His publications have appeared inThe Journal of Business Research, The Journal of Business Ethics, andThe Journal of Applied Business Research. Prior to being in academics, he held industry positions in transportation and sales.     

Improving salesforce productivity

Portfolio analysis is a tool that helps management deploy its salesforce more productively. It's cost-effective, user-friendly, and, say the authors, it works.     

Relationship between sales force reputation and customer behavior: Role of experiential value added by sales force

Based on the resource-based view theory and the experiential value model, this paper aims to investigate how experiential value added by the salesperson mediates the relationship between perceived salesperson reputation and customer behavior. A questionnaire is constructed, and data are collected from 229 customers served by financial salespeople working in five bank agencies in Canada. Structural equation modeling was employed to assess the proposed research model empirically. The empirical results revealed that the two dimensions of experiential value – economic benefit and service productivity – partially mediated the relationship between perceived salesperson reputation and both customer loyalty towards the salesperson and customer share of wallet. However, enjoyable interaction mediates only the relation among salesperson reputation and customer loyalty. The managerial implications are addressed.     

Scheduling sales force training: Theory and evidence

To have a productive sales force, firms must provide their salespeople with sales training. But from a profit-maximizing perspective, there are also reasons to limit training: training is expensive, it has diminishing returns, and trained salespeople need to be compensated at a higher level since their value in the outside labor market has increased. Due to these reasons, the following inter-related questions are not straightforward to answer: (1) How much training should be provided and how should training be scheduled over time? (2) How should compensation vary with training? (3) Should salespeople be asked to pay for some or all of their training? An analytical model is developed and analyzed using optimal control theory to provide answers to these questions. Thereafter, an empirical investigation is undertaken that broadly corroborates the analytical findings.     

Technology and the sales force: Amach,Inc

This paper explores the application of sales force technology by Amach, Inc. a Detroit based medical device firm. Sales force technology represents a variety of dynamic tools that can help the sales force. While these tools cannot replace the salesperson and generate deals from customers, they can enhance efficiency and effectiveness levels. Sales force technology can range from computer laptops, pagers, cellular phones, desktop personal computers and software for contact management, database management and multimedia presentations. The key for sales managers to remember is that these tools do not drive themselves and still need the skill of management to get the best results. Managerial suggestions and research ideas are presented.     

Drivers of sales force equity in the service industry

Based on the Stimulus–Organism–Response (S–O–R) model, this paper investigates the drivers of salesperson equity by exploring the mediating role of value added by salespeople in the relationships between salesperson attributes and both sales force loyalty and salesperson equity. A questionnaire was constructed and data were collected on customers served by financial salespeople working at five banks. A structural equation model was used to empirically assess the proposed research model. The empirical results reveal that the two dimensions of value added by the salesperson (enjoyable interaction, perceived risk) partially mediate the relationship between salesperson attributes (expertise, trustworthiness) and customer loyalty to the salesperson. In addition, the relationship between salesperson expertise and salesperson equity is partially mediated by both dimensions of value added by salespeople. However, the two dimensions of value added by salespeople fully mediates the positive relationship between trustworthiness and salesperson equity. Theoretical and managerial implications of the study are addressed.     

Effects of considering uncontrollable factors in sales force performance evaluation

Sales managers often make adjustments for factors such as territory difficulty or representative experience when doing performance evaluations. These adjustments may be subjective, they may be simple ratio calculations (e.g., sales divided by territory size), or they may involve complicated regression analyses. This research attempts an explanation of how and why these adjustments influence perceptions of the performance evaluation process, particularly its fairness and usefulness. Data from two surveys are presented. The first is an exploratory survey of sales managers; the second is a fuller survey of salespeople. Results show that making adjustments for territory difficulty increases perceptions of fairness and usefulness of the evaluation system among both sales managers and salespeople. Feedback quality is a key mediator of these effects for both groups. A different pattern exists with regard to accounting for representative experience. For sales managers, there are no effects on feedback quality or fairness or usefulness. Salespeople, however, rate systems that account for representative differences as providing better feedback quality, as more fair, and as more useful. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

The embedded sales force: Connecting buying and selling organizations

Business-to-business firms are increasingly focusing on building long-term partnering relationships with key customers. Salespeople are often responsible for managing these relationships. To be effective as relationship managers, salespeople need to be embedded in both their firm’s and customers’ organizations. They need to have extensive knowledge of their customers’ business and also know and be able to leverage their firm’s resources to develop offerings tailored to their customers’ needs. Their companies and sales managers need to use different approaches to manage and support salespeople in this new role. In this paper, we examine some issues affecting the interfaces between elements of the embedded sales force and suggest some directions for future research and methods for examining these issues.     

Corporate codes of ethics and sales force behavior: A case study

A growing public concern regarding ethical business conduct has stimulated marketing research in the ethics area. This study is the first empirical research to investigate the relationship between a code of ethics and sales force behavior. The findings present preliminary evidence that a well communicated code of ethics may be related to ethical sales force behavior. Furthermore, it appears that a sales force that is employed in such an environment can be profiled as being relatively high in job performance and receiving equally high satisfaction from their positions. Suggestions are made for future research and recommendations are offered for marketing practitioners.     

Business-to-business selling in the post-COVID-19 era: Developing an adaptive sales force

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed how salespeople interact with customers and with business-to-business (B2B) organizations. Organizations must confront the shifts in how their salespeople operate. Recent research recommends firms develop an adaptive sales force to address disruptions like a pandemic and be prepared to meet such challenges in the future. Based on interviews with marketing and sales executives, we explore how firms have responded to these interconnected changes during the COVID-19 pandemic and offer insight into best practices deployed across industries.     

强强联合打造重型汽车销售金融服务网络--中国农业银行与中国重汽签定汽车销售服务网络协议

7月10日,中国农业银行与中国重型汽车集团有限公司汽车销售金融服务网络业务合作签字仪式在山东大厦举行.山东省副省长王仁元、中国农业银行总行副行长张云、济南市委副书记、中国重型汽车集团有限公司董事长马纯济、济南市副市长杨佩钦、山东省农行行长姜尚君、副行长袁明男出席了签字仪式.     

Thrill of victory and agony of defeat: Emotional rewards and sales force compensation

When sales territories are imbalanced, how do salespersons’ emotions-pride and disappointment in goal attainment-affect the choice between sales contests and sales quotas? First, profits in a quota system increase when pride in the weaker territory or disappointment in the stronger territory increase. In a sales contest, by contrast, feelings of disappointment reduce profits regardless of territory characteristics. Second, a simultaneous strengthening of pride and disappointment enhances the advantage of quota over contest created by territory imbalance. However, the interpersonal nature of the contest, pitting a salesperson against a known rival, may generate stronger emotions than a quota-system, with its impersonal sales targets. So, third, a contest may overcome the profit advantages of the quota-system. Fourth, if pride and disappointment are strongly felt because of territory imbalance, handicapping either contest or quota is unprofitable, and moreover, if pride and disappointment are greater in interpersonal situations, handicapping may be more detrimental to a contest than to a sales quota-system.     

Improving marketing success: The role of tacit knowledge exchange between sales and marketing

Successful organizations adapt their marketing strategies to marketplace changes. Boundary spanners, such as salespeople, because they are able to embed themselves in social networks outside the organization, play a key role in developing marketplace knowledge. However, if this knowledge remains solely with the boundary spanners, it cannot be used effectively to improve firm performance. This study investigates tacit knowledge exchange between sales and marketing and its ability to enhance marketing success (i.e., marketing program innovativeness, relative efficiency, and relative effectiveness). In addition, by examining five antecedents hypothesized to influence tacit knowledge exchange, it provides guidance to sales and marketing managers, who desire to improve tacit knowledge exchange, and, in turn, marketing success.     

Improving relationships between sales and marketing: the relative effectiveness of cross-functional coordination mechanisms

ABSTRACT

The importance of effective sales and marketing working relationships is well known and this article examines the effectiveness of various coordination mechanisms used to improve this cross-functional relationship. Six coordination mechanisms are measured to identify their effect on sales and marketing conflict and collaboration, which in turn influence business performance. The results reveal that not all coordination mechanisms are equally effective. Structuring sales and marketing as a single unit and creating cross-functional project teams improve the interface, as do providing opportunities for job rotation and establishing cross-functional meetings. However, employing cross-functional training and co-locating sales and marketing do not influence this working relationship. Finally, reducing conflict and increasing collaboration between sales and marketing is shown to independently, and positively, influence business performance.     

Improving sales performance through ethics: The relationship between salesperson moral judgment and job performance

This study examines the relationship between salespeople's moral judgment and their job performance. Results indicate a positive relationship between moral judgment and job performance when certain characteristics are present. Implications for sales managers and sales researchers are provided. Additionally, directions for future research are given. Charles H. Schwepker, Jr. is Associate Professor of Marketing at Central Missouri State University. His research interests are in sales, sales management, marketing ethics and consumer behavior. His articles have appeared in the Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, Journal of Marketing Management, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice and Industrial Marketing Management, as well as various national and regional proceedings. Thomas N. Ingram is Professor of Marketing and Department Chair, Marketing Department, Colorado State University. His primary research interest is in personal selling and sales management. His articles have appeared in the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, and Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, among others. He is the coauthor of Sales Management: Analysis and Decision-Making, 2nd ed. (The Dryden Press, 1992) and coauthor of Marketing: Principles & Perspectives (IRWIN, 1995).     

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