Marketing Management, Millenium Edition - epiheirimatikotita.gr

308 CHAPTER 16 MANAGING THE SALES FORCEWhether a sales contest is focused on selling a specific product or products duringa limited time period or is a more general recognition of top revenue earners forthe period, the reward should be commensurate with the achievement. Reps who arewell paid and whose earnings are based in large part on commissions are more likelyto be motivated by a trip, a trophy, or merchandise than by a check of equal value. Atthe same time, some firms are successfully using less conventional rewards to motivatesales personnel. Ann Machado, founder and owner of Creative Staffing (an employmentservices firm), rewards both sales and nonsales employees with expensive dinners,parties, flowers, spa sessions, cooking lessons, and extra vacation time. Her secretis letting people pick the reward they want and outline what they will do to earn it.Then all she has to do is approve it. “Letting people choose their own rewards andgoals empowers them,” says Machado. 24Evaluating Sales RepresentativesWe have been describing the feed-forward aspects of sales supervision—how managementcommunicates what sales reps should be doing and motivates them to do it. Butgood feed-forward requires good feedback, which means getting regular informationfrom reps to evaluate their performance.Sources of InformationManagement can obtain information about reps in several ways, including salesreports, personal observation, customer letters and complaints, customer surveys, andconversations with other sales representatives. Many companies require their representativesto develop an annual territory marketing plan in which they outline their programfor developing new accounts and increasing business from existing accounts.This type of report casts sales reps into the role of market managers and profit centers.Sales managers study these plans, make suggestions, and use them to develop salesquotas.Sales reps write up completed activities on call reports and, in addition, submitexpense reports, new-business reports, lost-business reports, and reports on local businessand economic conditions. These reports provide raw data from which sales managerscan extract key indicators of sales performance: (1) average number of sales callsper rep per day, (2) average sales call time per contact, (3) average revenue per salescall, (4) average cost per sales call, (5) entertainment cost per sales call, (6) percentageof orders per hundred sales calls, (7) number of new customers per period,(8) number of lost customers per period, and (9) sales force cost as a percentage oftotal sales.Formal EvaluationSales reports, along with other observations, supply the raw materials for evaluation.There are several approaches to conducting evaluations. One type of evaluation comparesthe rep’s current performance to that individual’s past performance and to overallcompany averages on key sales performance indicators. These comparisons help managementpinpoint specific areas for improvement. For example, if one rep’s averagegross profit per customer is lower than the company’s average, that rep could be concentratingon the wrong customers or not spending enough time with each customer.Evaluations can also assess the rep’s knowledge of the firm, products, customers,competitors, territory, and responsibilities; relevant personality characteristics; andany problems in motivation or compliance. 25 As indicated earlier, an increasing numberof companies are measuring customer satisfaction not only with their product andcustomer support service, but also with their salespeople. The sales manager can also