Selling as a Component of a Marketing Plan

When you cut right to the chase, the point of marketing is to generate sales leading to income and eventually profits. Knowing this you would think all companies would focus on the interactions between company staff and customers because, as they say, customers are the lifeblood of the business. Without customers and sales, there is simply no business.

All too often organisations see selling as the responsibility of the sales department or the telemarketing centre, and everyone else working for the business is in a strictly supportive role. This is an unfortunate viewpoint that can limit the ability of the organisation to grow and thrive. Selling is an integral component of a marketing plan which covers everything from direct customer contact to customer service.

What is important to realise is the fact customer service is a function of every single department within the organisation. For example, in the finance or credit departments, employees frequently talk to customers on the phone or communicate through email concerning payments on accounts. How efficiently and productively the communication is handled can have a direct bearing on whether that customer ever does business with the company again.

From that perspective, the accounts receivable clerk is a sales person when she discusses a past due amount on a bill. Senior management are sales persons every time they attend a professional meeting. The examples could go on and on. Each contact a member of the organisation has outside the business is a form of a “sales call”.

When you cut right to the chase, the point of marketing is to generate sales leading to income and eventually profits. Knowing this you would think all companies would focus on the interactions between company staff and customers because, as they say, customers are the lifeblood of the business. Without customers and sales, there is simply no business.

All too often organisations see selling as the responsibility of the sales department or the telemarketing centre, and everyone else working for the business is in a strictly supportive role. This is an unfortunate viewpoint that can limit the ability of the organisation to grow and thrive. Selling is an integral component of a marketing plan which covers everything from direct customer contact to customer service.

What is important to realise is the fact customer service is a function of every single department within the organisation. For example, in the finance or credit departments, employees frequently talk to customers on the phone or communicate through email concerning payments on accounts. How efficiently and productively the communication is handled can have a direct bearing on whether that customer ever does business with the company again.

From that perspective, the accounts receivable clerk is a sales person when she discusses a past due amount on a bill. Senior management are sales persons every time they attend a professional meeting. The examples could go on and on. Each contact a member of the organisation has outside the business is a form of a “sales call”.