Sales and Marketing - Term Paper Example

The sales and the sales department is a key component of any form of organization and this extends largely to the sales professionals in terms of what is demanded from me verses my own expectations. As a sales professional, the value of sales I make and the personal sales goals I have for myself will largely depend on the way the implementation the goals I set for myself as well as the general achievements to be attained (Hession, 2001). The sales professional’s expectations are based on defined Key Performance Indicators and they exist in a range of expectations. First, I would wish to maintain a very high level of customer satisfactions with each of their customers, this ensures that the company does not lose them in the future as they may be vital to the business (Belch and Michael, 2011). The to an extent I expect to maintain a very high level of professional attitude to enable them take orders from the seniors enhancing their achievement in terms of sales. Sales professionals are very ambitious individuals and with this regard, they strive to pursue all their opportunities in line with their sales objectives for them to maximize their sales revenues (Seitel, 1998). Other expectations include; the identification and qualification of probable leads within and without regions in aiding the development of estimates and deals to improve on the sales revenues of the given corporate (Belch and Michael, 2011). They expect to have the capability if demonstrating highly professional and negotiation skills in all the activities that they engage in. this has the impact of enabling the demonstrate the expertise in all the product lines as well as influencing the markets reenergizing the old markets while focusing on newer markets (Seitel, 1998). A sales professional position is a key position in any corporation as sales is the driving force of any form of organization (Seitel, 1998). The position is much involving as each of the tasks and the expectations revolves around requiring a lot of dedication and effort each of which is critical in the overall development of all the performance systems of the organization. His career is one that is needed a fundament for the effectiveness of the organization to realize the set goals and objectives of the company. When the actions by a sales professional are well implemented the sales of the organization are likely are likely to increase by more than targeted margins (Cutlip, Allen and Glen, 1985). Therefore, in order to ensure there is good working environment of doing business and for all businesses to operate freely without having fear of any form of unfairness, ethics is fundamental. Ethics can be attained mainly through regulations and guidelines, which are solely contained in an ethics policy. To ensure that there is ethics in adverts made, the policy defines the advert types in a manner that will define what is acceptable and not (Tellis, 1998). The policy sets out all the available positions that the adverts are placed by ensuring that the top, right and bottom of the content require the advertising space. The policy stipulates clear guidelines through which advertising is done and largely it does not allow for advertising any defined content (Belch and Michael, 2011). The exceptions of the moral code of behavior are defined to encourage the links to in-house sales revenue. The policy gives out a clear peculiarity between what promotions is and how it is done as well as the actions of the company. This ensures that there is no mix-up in all the roles displayed by the organization. The code of conduct is that guides advertising and promotes all the objectives of the company to help the organization in understanding the context in which the organization operates which is well defined (Seitel, 1998). The policy ensures that advertisement are far much family friendly and are not offensive that are in line of enabling the understanding of all the roles. The advertisement policy guideline document gives clear guidelines how the executive contributes to the way ethical advertisement is conducted where honesty and integrity is stressed. Through an open door policy advocated for suggestions and concerns are welcomed from employees and all the major stakeholders of the company (Cutlip, Allen and Glen, 1985). In addition, the policy attracts all the commitments of such stakeholders while creating the company awareness to promote the ethical conducts while maintaining the ethical practices within the company (Tellis, 1998). The policy also indicates the ways in which unethical practices when advertising can be regulated, this will help in avoiding the intentions and the manifestation, which would blemish the associations between organizations. Policy guideline for ethical advertisement is the key and must be entrenched in all the aspects of a company’s operations (Hession, 2001). Public relations are derived from the fact that organizations irrespective of the size largely derive its survival and success out of its reputation. In one of the definitions we can define public relations as a strategic communication process and procedure that can be employed in building relationships that are two way beneficial between the organization in question and the public’s who form the stakeholders behind its operations (Horchover, 2002). This procedure accepts most of the formalities behind effective communication, principles of effective communication are entrenched in this act. The act spills into the strategic objectives of the company a factor that makes it create beneficial acts to all the parties involved. Publicity on the other hand is any form of deliberate attempt thrown towards the management of the perceptions by the public with regards to a given subject which when left just like that would have an undesired impact on the company (Hession, 2001). Such subjects would range from the people around the business, the goods and services provided the organizations within the field as well as the works of art involved and the entertainment aspects. This act is conducted by attracting the attention of the media to enable the targeted group be aware of the communication being portrayed hence it can never be done without the attention of the same (Belch and Michael, 2011). Just like PR, publicity also borrows a lot from strategic management by carrying out the publicity through the reference of the publicist. As opposed to PR, which can be done internally, publicity is required to and must involve the attention of the media. It is one of the components of encouragement and it plays comparable roles to marketing and sales sponsorship. Corporate advertising is a form of advertising that is largely inclined towards making the image of the company better that it is inclined to promoting of sales (Martini, 2012). The building of a company’s corporate image is the key to corporate advertising, which is directed towards the public or in the industry. Therefore, it is important to note that PR, Publicity and corporate advertising are the key to the performance of an organization. PR builds the reputation of the organization with its stakeholders either internal or external, publicity is used as an advertisement tools to promote the business of the firm while corporate performs some of the roles by PR (Cutlip, Allen and Glen, 1985). Publicity is one of the tools used in public relations and it is a non-personal statement through the media in form of media stories. Its main aim is to cause a situation where the public becomes aware of a company and its products without incurring any cost (Martini, 2012). Publicity in the first place is free hence the company does not incur any costs and it is as well more credible as compared to advertising. Records have it that corporations which uses pure of either the two, those using publicity gets to win more clients than those employing advertisement despite the fact that advertisements are also quite expensive (Horchover, 2002). The main setback of using his method is the fact that it is at the discretion of the media to find whether the news channeled to them is worth advertising or not. The forms of promotions expected to survive in the future must be technology oriented. Publicity is done by the company drafting and sending a press release, which is in most of cases through a video tape to a media house (Tellis, 1998). After this it is upon the media to find whether the news channeled to them is worthy of advertising or not. If the act remains in this manner, that is it refuses to adopt the digital aspects of promoting a product then it may not survive in the future (Martini, 2012). The method is also not certain; hence, not a sure way of advertising in the future where strict timeliness is a requirement in sales promotion. Corporations contemplating to use this mode must go out of their way to employ vibrant, innovative and creative staff; this will ensure that spot on adverts that attract media using the most recent forms of technology are created (Hession, 2001). Publicity is a cheap form of promoting a company’s products and hence it would attract most corporations. There is also research going on in the promotion arena to modify the method in line with the adoption of modern technological applications an act, which is a big bust. This is concerning the fact that the media expansion is also a current undertaking and the advocating of media space and freedom is a modern phenomenon. Therefore, the continued use of publicity in the future cannot be avoided (Horchover, 2002). References Belch, G.E, and Michael, A.B. (2011). Advertising and Promotion An integrated marketing communications perspective. 9. Reprint. New York: McGraw-Hill Education. Cutlip, S.M., Allen H.C, and Glen M.B. (1985). Effective public relations. 6th ed. Englewood Cliffs, N.J: Prentice-Hall. Hession, R. (2001). Drive a great sales team for sales managers who want results. Oxford: How to Books. Horchover, D. (2002). Sales promotion. Oxford, U.K.: Capstone Pub. Martini, N. (2012). Scientific Selling Creating High Performance Sales Teams through Applied Psychology and Testing.. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 2012. Print. Seitel, F.P. (1998). The practice of public relations. 7th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Tellis, G.J. (1998). Advertising and sales promotion strategy. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley. Read More