SALES MANAGEMENT

Session 4: Sales strategies

Sales Management
 THE PLANNING PROCESS

Where are we now? Where do we intend to be?

• Internal audit • Missions & objectives
•External audit
•SWOT analysis

What is the precise How do we intend to get there?

route to be taken? • Strategies
• Tactics

How can we ensure arrival?

• Problems to overcome
• Management controls

Sales Management
 MARKETING PLANS
• Objective: where does the firm wish to go or
what does the firm wish to do or be?
• Strategies: how does it intend to get there?
• Tactics: which precise route does the company
intend to take and what specifically does it
intend to do?

3
Sales Management
 OBJECTIVES

... SMART
 Specific
Objectives  Measurable
should be ...  Achievable
 Results-oriented
 Time-bounded
 OBJECTIVES

- Ensure objectives focus on result

- Establish measures against objectives
- Where possible have a single theme for each
objective
- Ensure resources are realistic
- Ensure marketing objectives are integral to
corporate objectives
 ANALYZING CURRENT BUSINESS PORTFOLIO
The Boston Group Approach
• Growth share matrix is a portfolio planning method
that evaluates a company’s strategic business units in
terms of their market growth rate and relative share.

Sales Management
Selling strategies/ Build Maintain Harvest Divest
Market share
objectives

Objectives Create sales Maintain sales Decrease sales costs Minimum sales costs
Reduce selling costs
Target profitable
accounts

Sales organization Build sales Maintain Target to the most Minimize selling
Strategies volume; Secure sales volume important customers costs and clear out
distribution Consolidate market who provide highest inventory
position through profit
concentration
on targeted segments
Secure additional
outlets
Primary sales Prospective and Call on targeted Eliminate Cut off service
tasks new accounts current accounts unimportant delivery
Provide high service Incr. service levels to customers, decrease
levels particularly current accounts service delivery and
pre-sales service Call on new accounts inventory
Product/market
feedback

Sales Management
PRODUCT/MARKET EXPANSION GRID STRATEGIES

Sales Management
 SEGMENTATION, TARGETING & POSITIONING

• Market segmentation is the

division of a market into
distinct groups of buyers
who have distinct needs,
characteristics, or behavior
and who might require
separate products or
marketing mixes.
Sales Management
 SEGMENTATION, TARGETING & POSITIONING (CONT.)

• A market segment is a group of consumers

who respond in a similar way to a given set
of marketing efforts.
• Target marketing is the process of
evaluating each market segment’s
attractiveness and selecting one or more
segments to enter.

Sales Management
 SEGMENTATION, TARGETING & POSITIONING (CONT.)

• Market positioning is the arranging for a product

to occupy a clear, distinctive, and desirable place
relative to competing products in the minds of the
target consumer.

Sales Management
 SELLING STRATEGY

Sales Management
 13
Sales Management
 THE PLACE OF SELLING IN
MARKETING PLAN
1. Analysis of current market situation:
- Sales contributes to analysis of customer needs
and trends in purchasing behavior.
- Sales manager can also make a valuable
contribution of knowledge about competitors
and their standing in marketplace
- Sales executives can provide information about
the changing needs and wants of customers

14
Sales Management
 THE PLACE OF SELLING IN
MARKETING PLAN (CONT.)
2. Determining sales potential/sales forecasting:
-Short, medium and long term forecasts by sales
manager form the basis for allocating company
resources in order to achieve anticipated sales
3. Generating and selecting strategies:
- The field salesforce are at the forefront of tactical
marketing and can more realistically assess how
existing target markets will respond to company
marketing initiatives

15
Sales Management
 THE PLACE OF SELLING IN
MARKETING PLAN (CONT.)
4. Budgeting, implementation and control
-On the basis of the sales forecast, the sales manager must
determine what level of expenditure will be required to achieve
the forecasted level of sales.
-Annual sales budget usually includes salaries, direct selling
expenses, administrative costs, commissions and bonuses.
-In preparing future plans, information on past performance
against budget and, in particular, any differences between actual
and budgeted results is very important. Such “budget variances”,
either favorable or unfavorable, should be analysed and
interpreted by sales manager

16
Sales Management
 INSIDE-OUT VS. OUTSIDE-IN
PLANNING MODEL

17
Sales Management