Question

Case 13.1 Contemporary Technologies Contemporary Technologies (CT) has two primary offerings. The first is a series of products that are used to track inventories and involve handheld scanners, computer software, and the like. In addition, supplies such as bar code labels, tags, and other items that are stuck on or applied to products to track them are also sold by CT. The second offering is an inventory management service that helps organizations create supply chain management strategies. The firm has two sales staffs. One sells the product and the other sells the service. The services sale is a longer-term sale and those salespeople have more education, call at a higher level of the buyer's organization, and are paid salary. The other salespeople may not have a college degree and certainly no master's, they are paid straight commission, and they make their money on the sale of the supplies rather than the hardware. Sometimes, salespeople from both staffs make calls together and there can be some overlap in the buying centers. Usually, however, there isn't much overlap and even if there is, they refuse to work together. The services sales staff tends to patronize the hardware/supplies salespeople and the hardware/supplies salespeople mock the lack of “hard-sell” aggressiveness that characterizes the services reps' selling style. Recently, Molly Molloy, the vice president for sales, noticed two trends. One is that the hardware/supplies reps were losing supply sales within a year of making the hardware sale. This loss occurred in about 15 percent of all accounts, enough to cause some con- cern. The second issue is that buyers seem to be centralizing a lot of purchasing. When they centralize, it means that the buying centers tend to converge and the same people are making the decisions. But she participated in several sales calls with members of both teams and thought these were disasters. The hostility was apparent even to the customer. 1. Should Molly reorganize the sales force to address these two trends? If so, how? If not, why not? 2. Assuming that she is not going to reorganize, what can she do to create more of a team spirit? How can she get the two sides to work together?

Answer 1

1. Yes, it is important for Molly to reorganize the sales force in order to adapt to the two patterns.

When it comes to the first trend, it is important for Molly to reorganize its sales force as per the product category as hardware / supply us using the varied platforms and there is a huge requirement to have the expertise for the salespersons to remember the details. They can solve the issue of a 15% loss by implementing the full line selling method that is every hardware should have its own associated supply. When the hardware is bought by the customer, then the salesperson should also try to sell the CT’s supply.

In the case of the second trend, Molly should use her sales force to divide the CT’s accounts depending on the size. The larger customers will buy a greater number of units and have centralized buying, have many influencers, and always try to develop a cooperative association. Thus by having the dedicated salesperson to these clients, better services can be provided to the client. This salesperson can be treated as the strategic account manager who will operate to manage the local demands and will be accountable for account planning, product development, and pricing.

2. .

In this case, the feeling of team spirit can be used by Molly. The focus must be on inspiring and motivating the two sales staff by having the contest or setting the targets for the different teams and the team that wins will be given the prize depending on the results and efforts. Apart from this, Molly can also implement an equal reward for equal performance. This will have greater motivation among the teams and its members.

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