Sales and personal selling
Task 1: Individual written assessment 1,500 words (75% of total marks)
Your client company has asked you to write a report that reviews their stales strategy to
submit to the Board of Directors. Your report must include your assessment of the elements
of their sales strategy as directed below, and your fully justified proposed recommendations
for potential relevant improvements.
Task 2: Individual presentation (25% of total marks) end of week 9
The same company has also asked you to give an oral presentation as a sales pitch for a
proposed course on how to develop the sales skills within their organisation. Your pitch must
be no longer that 10 minutes long in duration. (It may be less.)
Task 1.1: The Sales Process (20 marks)
Provide a detailed overview of the sales process for your chosen organization: i.e. what are
their different distribution channels: who do they sell to within each channel, who sells, how
they sell, what intensity of distribution they follow and why. It is suggested that you use a
flow chart to present it within your report. It is essential that you distinguish between what
the sales route looks like for the different B2B and B2C channels within your company, i.e.
you must choose a company that sells to both businesses and consumers as you need to be
able to assessthe different characteristics of the sales process for your company when selling
to businesses.
Review the company’s sales organisation structure, for example, is their sales team organised
along geographic lines or by product specialization; is it customer-based; a mixture; or other?
Suggest and explain with a clear rationale which structure is most appropriate for them, again
distinguishing between B2B and B2C as necessary.
You also need to examine the role ethics plays within the sales process of your company. As
part of your answer you will need to discuss and appraise the impact of any relevant legal or
ethical issues for your company.
Task 1.2: The Importance of Sales to the Organisation’s Success (20 marks)
Based on your research and analysis, identify the importance of sales to the organisational
success of your chosen company.
Extend your answer by identifying and appraising the interaction of the sales team or
department with other key business functions / departments, e.g. marketing, logistics.
Give your assessment of any challenges you discover with how the sales function interacts
internally with other departments, or externally with their customers, and explore how these
challenges are overcome today. Then provide two to three specific and realistic
recommendations as to how they could be better overcome.
Task 1.3: Appropriateness of different tools and techniques in B2B and B2C environments
(30 marks)
Evaluate the appropriateness of different selling tools and techniques in both the B2B and
B2C environments in which your chosen company operates. For this, you will need to discuss
the use or otherwise of:
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• a Key Account Management (KAM) structure
• Personal Selling
• Direct Marketing and the extent to which it works effectively with Sales personnel,
• The role of Customer Relationship Management and marketing automation
• The use of the internet
• Other factors relevant to your company
If your company does not use one of the elements mentioned above you must still assess
why not and whether that is or isn’t appropriate for them.
Give your assessment of the success of these tools and techniques for the chosen
organisation, and suggest two specific and realistic recommendations for what the company
might do to improve the tools and techniques they use