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book SELL 4th Edition by Thomas Ingram,Raymond LaForge , Ramon Ramon ,Charles Schwepker, Michael Williams cover

SELL 4th Edition by Thomas Ingram,Raymond LaForge , Ramon Ramon ,Charles Schwepker, Michael Williams

Edition 4ISBN: 978-1285164724
book SELL 4th Edition by Thomas Ingram,Raymond LaForge , Ramon Ramon ,Charles Schwepker, Michael Williams cover

SELL 4th Edition by Thomas Ingram,Raymond LaForge , Ramon Ramon ,Charles Schwepker, Michael Williams

Edition 4ISBN: 978-1285164724
Exercise 2
ALLIANCE ADHESIVES PLASTICS, INC.
Background
As one of four regional sales managers for Alliance Adhesives and Plastics, Inc., you have just received summary details from a study of the company's national field salesforce. The study was done at the request of the vice president for sales and marketing and used a variety of assess­ment tools to identify the strengths and weaknesses of the company's 97 salespeople located across the United States. Based on these results, the vice president for sales and marketing has assigned your four-person regional managers team the task to develop a step- by-step program that will move the company forward toward a revitalized and more effective salesforce.
In response to the company's new marketing strategy designed to "get close to the customer," the salesforce was completely reorganized a little over four years ago, moving from a strictly geographic-based territory system to a specialized selling force organized around the different served markets. As a result of the reorganization and transformation of the company's salespeople into a salesforce specialized around served markets, definite improvements were realized in account penetration and customer retention. Nevertheless, spot checks randomly made across various customers indicate that there is still much room for improvement. Customer satisfaction levels are still low, and the company has some difficulty keeping good accounts.
Current Situation
Customers give Alliance salespeople strong marks for product knowledge-probably a reflection of the existing training program, which has intensive initial and recurrent training on the wide variety of products offered. Suprisingly, while customers rate the salespeople high for their product knowledge, they also indicate that Alliance salespeople appear somewhat arrogant and self-centered. Many of the responses show that, overall, the salesforce does not care about the customer and does not attempt to pressure and persuade buyers rather than offering creative or customized product solutions.
What changes in the recruiting and selection of salespeople would you suggest? Why?
Explanation
Verified
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SELL 4th Edition by Thomas Ingram,Raymond LaForge , Ramon Ramon ,Charles Schwepker, Michael Williams
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