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 “ A sales person is an individual acting for a

company by performing one or more of the
following activities: prospecting,
communicating, servicing, and information
gathering.” (Philip Kotler)

 Personal selling is the direct personal

presentation by company sales force for sales
and building customer relationship.

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 Personal selling is paid personal communication
that attempts to inform customers about
products and persuade them to purchase those
products.
 The goal of Personal Selling typically involves
finding prospects, informing prospects,
persuading prospects to buy, and keeping
customers satisfied through follow-up service
after the sale. To effectively deliver on these
goals, salespeople have to be not only competent
in selling skills but also thoroughly trained in
technical product characteristics.

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 Salesmanship is one of the skills used in
personal selling. It is the art of successfully
persuading prospects or customers to buy
products or services from which they can
derive suitable benefits, thereby increasing
their total satisfaction. Salesmanship is a
seller-initiated effort that provides
prospective buyers with information and
other benefits, motivating or persuading
them to decide in favour of the seller’s
product or service.

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 Know the Product
 Know the Company
 Know the Competition
 Know the Customers
 Know the Process Of Selling
 Know Own Self

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 According to the AIDAS theory, during the personal
selling interview, the prospective buyer’s mind
passes through the five successive mental stages
shown below. The buyer goes through these stages
consciously, so the sales person should lead the
buyer through them in the right sequence if a sale
is to result
◦ A-Attention
◦ I-Interest
◦ D-Desire
◦ A-Action
◦ S-Satisfaction

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 Prospecting and Qualifying: Prospecting is the process of identifying
prospects or potential buyers and eliminating non-prospects. Success in
selling depends on approaching the right potential buyers. The sales person
may have to approach many prospects to get just a few sales. The sales
person should also know how to qualify the leads, i.e., identifying the good
ones and screening out the unwanted ones. Qualifying the prospects can be
done by studying their financial background, volume of business, special
needs, location and scope for growth.
 Pre-approach: The sales person has to do his homework before
meeting the prospect. He should learn as much as possible about the
organization and its buyers, as a pre-approach. The salesperson should
set call objective. Another task is to decide on the best contact approach,
which might be a personal visit, a phone call, or a letter. Finally, the sales
person should plan an overall sales strategy for the account.

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 Approach: The sales person should know how to meet and greet the
buyer appropriately and get the relationship off to a good start. His
appearance, opening lines of conversation and the follow up remarks
are important in this step

 Presentation and Demonstration: The sales person presents the

product to the buyer through the ‘product story’, explaining its
attributes, customer benefits and how the product could solve the
customer’s problems.

 Overcoming Objections: Customers typically pose objections during the

presentation or when asked for the order. Psychological resistance includes
resistance to interference, preference for established supply sources or
brands, reluctance to giving up something, predetermined ideas, dislike of
making decisions etc

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Logical resistance might consist of objections to the price, delivery
schedule, or certain product or company characteristics.
The sales person should handle objections with a positive approach,
seek out hidden objections, ask for clarifications, convert the
objections into opportunities to explain more about the product and
its benefits, and turn objections into reason for buying.

 Closing: Once the objections are handled properly, the sales

person tries to persuade the prospect to take the buying
decision, i.e., closing the sale. Sales persons should know how to
recognize closing signals from the buyer, which includes body
language, comments and questions. The sales person can ask for
the order, summarise points of agreement, offer to help to write the
purchase order, ask whether the buyer wants this model or that one,
etc

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 Follow –Up and Maintenance: This is necessary if the
salesperson wants to ensure customer satisfaction and
repeat business. The sales person should follow up the
sales and ensure that there is proper installation,
instruction on usage and servicing arrangements. Such
follow up actions would reveal any problems, assure the
customer of the sales person’s interest, and reduce any
dissonance that might have arisen in the buyer’s mind, after
the purchase.
The salesperson should develop a maintenance and growth
plan for the account.

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