INTRODUCTION
Personal selling involves a one to one interaction
between the buyer and seller where in the seller convinces the buyer about the
need for a particular product or service and persuades the buyer to buy the product or service. Personal
selling forms the components of the promotional mix of an
organization it is a form of inter
– personal communication to inform an
persuade prospective buyers to buy a
particular product service or ideal.
It culminates
with the close of sale and follow up activity. The sales force in the
organization is responsible for personal selling careful management of the sale
force is a prerequisite for
realizing efficient sales productivity . The paper examines
issues and steps involved in personal
selling the three basic tasks of personal
selling process are order getting,
order taking and supporting.
Designing an efficient sales force structure is imperative for effective
personal selling to take place.
1.
Order talking: The sales
person processes and routes orders from
regular customers
2.
Order Getting: The salesperson engages in
creative selling so as to increases sales and build relationship with
customers.
3.
Order
Supporting: Personnel are not directing
involved in selling the products but act as support staff for the front
line sales personnel.
TYPES OF PERSONAL SELLING
1. Retail selling:
In this the sales person communicates
directly with individual customers.
2. Business to business selling : The sales persons
sells products to industrial buyers
3. Trade selling: The salesperson sales product to marketing
intermediaries such as retailers and
wholesaler
Personal selling involves seven key process which are
identifying prospect, qualifying
prospect, percale planning , approaching the
prospect, making sales
presentation, handling objections
closing the sale and follow up
While other promotion tools like advertising, public
relations, and sales promotion are non-personal communication which have one
way communication with the target
audience, personal selling enables the company to communicate directly
with its
target customers. The key objective of personal selling is to retain
existing customers and convert prospect into clients.
The aspect of performance evaluation of personal
selling, the two aspects on which the performance of a salesperson is evaluated are :
The quantitative and qualitative aspects qualitative
evaluation is based on element like knowledge, ability, personality motivation and compliance while quantitative evaluation involves
defining the nature of performance evaluation and the expected levels of
performance .
Direct selling methods are though personal sales
effort advertising and for many
business, display including the
packaging and styling of the product
itself. To establish your business a
firm requires a great deal of aggressive
personal selling you may have established competition to overcome or if your ideal is new with
little or no competition, you have the extra problem of convincing people
of the value of the new ideal, personal
selling work is almost always necessary to accomplish this if you are not a
good sales person, seek an employee
or associate who is
Personal
selling of considered one of the most effective promotional techniques because
it facilitates inter action between consumer and seller . with personal selling, a sales person can listen to and determine a
consumers need by asking question and receiving feed back
from the consumer. Furthermore,
personal selling activities can generate long last ownerships purchases personal selling can
also occur by means of interactive computers,
telephone conferences and interactive
video conferencing.
Personal selling has a unique place in the marketing
communication mix because an organization can integrate personal selling with
other marketing communication elements to active the best communication effect