Richard Conde, Victor Prybutok, Kenneth Thompson and Cameron Sumlin
The purpose of this study is to extend sales control research to inside sales. Aside from a few notable exceptions (Conde et al., 2022) much of the sales control literature has…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to extend sales control research to inside sales. Aside from a few notable exceptions (Conde et al., 2022) much of the sales control literature has focused on a single control mechanism rather than a sales control portfolio perspective. The authors add multiple layers to Conde et al. (2022) by capturing secondary operational data and manager interviews to access sales control theory in practice.
Design/methodology/approach
With operational data from a Fortune 100 financial services company and sales manager interviews, the authors present evidence that managers apply a portfolio of controls to ensure sales agents’ overall performance.
Findings
Findings support that cultural controls have a greater influence on overall performance than a focus solely on process and outcome controls. Inside sales managers can generate better results when they focus on creating an employee-centric culture rather than controlling sales agents with formal sales controls.
Originality/value
This study extends sales control research by examining inside sales managers’ formal and informal sales controls. Historically, inside sales had sales leaders balance a myriad of sales controls grounded in strict oversight. With a few notable exceptions, the limited inside sales control research provides the opportunity to display an inside sales manager’s need to jointly focus on operational results and sales outcomes, illustrating the importance of cultural controls compared to other sales process and outcome controls. This research considerably extends sales controls research by focusing on inside sales.
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Richard Conde, Victor Prybutok and Kenneth Thompson
For the past several decades, the sales control literature has focused on the outside sales context. This study aims to extend sales control research by examining formal and…
Abstract
Purpose
For the past several decades, the sales control literature has focused on the outside sales context. This study aims to extend sales control research by examining formal and informal sales controls, embodied by cultural controls, used by sales managers in an inside sales context, where the sales agent’s performance focus extends beyond sales outcomes to include the influence of operational phone outcomes.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on 232 B2C and B2B inside sales agent survey responses, this study presents evidence that in an inside sales department, this study focuses on the congruent effect of formal sales and cultural sales controls on inside sales agent overall performance.
Findings
Based on 232 B2C and B2B inside sales agent survey responses, this study presents evidence that in an inside sales department, the operational focus of sales activities and resultant operational performance mediates the relationship between sales controls and inside sales agent sales performance, whereas cultural controls centered on maximizing inside sales autonomous motivation positively moderates the effect of operational outcomes on an inside sales agent’s sales performance.
Practical implications
By focusing on the tenants of an inside sales agent’s overall performance, this research provides practitioners a holistic view of the inherent conflict inside sales managers must balance between the impact of formal sales controls and the benefits of cultural controls.
Originality/value
By being the only study to examine sales controls in an inside sales context, with a broad definition of overall performance to include both sales and operational phone outcomes, this study extends sales control research to a new sales context. The need to jointly focus on operational results, as well as sales outcomes, illustrate the importance of cultural controls compared to other sales processes and outcome controls
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Aaron Schibik, David Strutton and Kenneth Thompson
The purpose of this study was to investigate assortative mating processes inside Internet-dating-service settings. Unattached consumers traditionally sought to satisfy their need…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study was to investigate assortative mating processes inside Internet-dating-service settings. Unattached consumers traditionally sought to satisfy their need for love through conventional search processes, including old-fashioned match-making. That was then, this is now; dozens of internet-mediated dating websites promising romantic-love-matches currently operate internationally. These dating services cultivate dating-exchanges by offering new-fashioned match-making processes. Despite these trends, theoretical and practical questions related to how and why dating services marketers might induce superior romantic exchanges between customers by managing assortative mating processes remain unanswered until now.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey-based approach was used to test hypotheses. Pretests were conducted to develop reliable measures of assortative mating propensity. Seven subconstructs of assortative mating were identified by analyzing data from a representative sample. The measurement model was validated before hypotheses testing. The focal assortative mating construct was measured formatively; assortative mating subdimensions functioned as indicators. The model was tested by structural equation modeling.
Findings
Assortative mating processes facilitated superior preference-selection outcomes for individuals seeking consumer-to-consumer romantic relationships inside internet-mediated service settings. Insights were generated about how and why assortative mating processes exercised positive effects on consumers’ attitudes toward online dating and about how dating services marketers might leverage assortative mating tendencies to benefit consumers.
Originality/value
A novel concept was introduced to the services marketing literature, as were several theoretical implications. The study simultaneously measured consumers’ propensities to engage in assortative mating and captured the effects of various physical/behavioral consumer characteristics. This study develops new and practical insights about how dating service marketers could manage the effects of assortative mating processes.
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Kenneth Thompson, David Strutton, Tina Christine Mims and Trond Bergestuen
Organizational climate is an essential dynamic to leverage in salesforce performance. This study aims to develop a model that explores the determinants of independent…
Abstract
Purpose
Organizational climate is an essential dynamic to leverage in salesforce performance. This study aims to develop a model that explores the determinants of independent manufacturers’ representatives’ (i.e. IMRs’) intentions to comply with their principals’ requests for additional tasking. Using agency theory, the authors explore the application of behavior and outcome-based controls upon dyadic manufacturer-IMR relationships for these additional performance/task requests.
Design/methodology/approach
Data from over 1,000 US-based IMRs were used to test two constructs; inter-organizational climate and perceptions of mutual satisfaction within the agency-principal dyad. Compliance behaviors tested were IMRs’ intentions to engage in non-selling-related tasks and intentions to allocate additional selling time to principals’ products. The following four exogenous controls were tested: perceived goal congruence between IMRs and principals; IMRs’ perceptions of principals’ expertise; mutual communications between IMRs and principals in the supply chain dyad; resources and sales support programs provided by principals to IMRs; and IMRs’ perceptions of the adequacy and fairness of the principals’ compensation plans.
Findings
Two constructs – inter-organizational climate and perceptions of mutual satisfaction with the agency-principal dyad – mediated the effects of exogenous sales controls on two compliance behaviors. The model’s data were analyzed using Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). A marker variable was deployed to check for common method variance also supported using the Partial least squares (PLS) factor solution. Most variables demonstrated significant direct and mediated effects on each compliance behavior. Variables that emphasized behavioral-based controls dominated intentions for IMRs to engage in non-selling tasks. The principal commission structure, the only sales outcome-based control in the study, most influenced IMRs’ intentions to commit additional sales time to their principals’ products.
Research limitations/implications
This study only examined the intentions of IMRs to engage in additional selling activities and their intention to engage in non-selling tasks. Principals may desire longer-term commitments from IMRs. The model developed here can be modified to capture additional behavioral and attitudinal outcomes including, for example, the exit intentions of IMRs.
Practical implications
Principals are well-advised to foster a positive inter-organizational climate that fuels perceptions of mutually satisfying working relationships with their IMRs. These mutually satisfying working relationships can, by themselves, positively influence IMRs to acquiesce to reasonable requests made by principals. This advice appears to be particularly crucial when asking IMRs to engage in additional non-selling tasks. The total pattern of path estimates points to the conclusion that capable sales control plays an important role in fostering positive inter-organizational climates. The inter-organizational climate – mutual satisfaction link proved crucial as a mediator of the impact of sales controls on IMRs’ behavioral compliance intentions.
Originality/value
Knowing the impact of sales controls on IMR’s affords businesses the ability to use these controls for behavioral compliance intentions on non-selling tasks.
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Richard Conde, Victor Prybutok and Kenneth Thompson
Previous sales control research has limited the definition of outcome controls exclusively to sales outcomes in an outside sales context. In addition to sales outcome controls…
Abstract
Purpose
Previous sales control research has limited the definition of outcome controls exclusively to sales outcomes in an outside sales context. In addition to sales outcome controls, inside sales managers use phone operational outcomes to influence inside sales agent performance, supporting the need to expand the broader definition of outcome controls. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to explore the need to bifurcate outcome controls into two distinct variables: sales and phone operational controls. Researchers know little about the application of sales outcome controls beyond sales-only outcomes, which, in turn, limits the definition of outcome controls.
Design/methodology/approach
Through the utilization of survey, secondary operational data and sales manager’s feedback, this paper demonstrates that the definition of outcome controls needs to be divided into two distinct areas, sales and phone operational controls for inside sales agents, which, in turn, acts collectively to impact an inside sales agent’s job performance and satisfaction.
Findings
This research demonstrates that inside sales managers depend on both sales and phone operational outcome controls to drive sales agent performance, varying in degrees by industry. Even as inside sales managers focus on creating an employee-centric autonomous motivational work culture, the overarching controlling factors associated with phone operational outcomes dampen an inside sales agent’s performance and job satisfaction.
Research limitations/implications
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, as the first sales control research to examine an inside sales context, this study provides support to further study sales controls in an inside sales context. This research can be enhanced by examining business-to-consumer inside sales environments, behavior controls, greater sample size and additional work outcomes such as turnover and tenure.
Practical implications
The findings have important implications because they can help practitioners understand the effect that both sales and phone operational outcomes have on sales agent performance. It also illuminates the need for inside sales managers to be less controlling in their focus on phone operational outcomes, as such a practice has a negative influence on key sales agent job outcomes.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to triangulate multiple data sources to illustrate the need to evaluate both sales and phone operational outcomes as broader components of sales outcome controls. The study of sales controls in a different sales context suggests that sales management controls may differ by sales context, opening the door to extend the vast sales control literature beyond its current context of outside sales.
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Aaron Schibik, David Strutton and Kenneth Neil Thompson
This purpose of this study is to develop actionable marketing insights regarding why consumers might elect to purchase vintage products. A concept called consumer pastness is…
Abstract
Purpose
This purpose of this study is to develop actionable marketing insights regarding why consumers might elect to purchase vintage products. A concept called consumer pastness is introduced, developed and defined to achieve this end. Consumer pastness demonstrably affected consumers’ perceptions of vintage products’ scarcity and consumers’ propensity to purchase vintage items. When applied inside marketing contexts, consumer pastness may also explain how and why consumers distinguish vintage products that are “of the past” from new and second-hand products. The data suggest that when consumers perceive products are characterized by higher consumer pastness the products will be perceived as scarcer, more desirable and more valuable than new or second-hand versions of the same item.
Design/methodology/approach
A scale was developed to capture three dimensions that comprise consumer pastness and then a pilot study and two experiments were conducted to test the research propositions.
Findings
Study propositions were confirmed. Consumers perceive vintage products as scarcer and more desirable than other types of products.
Originality/value
A novel and useful concept is introduced to the marketing literature inside this study. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to investigate and develop theoretical insights regarding how and why consumers perceive vintage products differently from new and second-hand products. The investigations reported below are also the first to develop practical insights regarding how management might respond to these insights about the role consumer pastness plays.
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Kenneth Thompson and David Strutton
This study seeks to explore the value of using brand alliances, or co‐branding strategies, to influence consumer perceptions of new brand extensions under circumstances where the…
Abstract
Purpose
This study seeks to explore the value of using brand alliances, or co‐branding strategies, to influence consumer perceptions of new brand extensions under circumstances where the firm (parent brand) introduces new products that will be targeted to product categories within which the parent brand has a low initial degree of perceptual fit.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected through a four‐stage questionnaire administered to 308 subjects. Hypotheses were explored through a four‐level single factor between subjects experimental design.
Findings
Analyses suggest that by partnering with brands possessing higher perceived degrees of fit in the extension category (i.e. co‐brand), parent firms' brands can achieve more favorable positions for their extensions than could be realized if firms acted independently. Explained variance in perceptions of the extension increased substantially when perceptions of co‐ and parent‐brand fit were considered. Fit between the co‐brand and the new extension product apparently should be the driving factor in selecting best partnering brands for alliances. Fit between parent and partner brands may take a back seat when forming alliances.
Originality/value
Current co‐branding research typically addresses the ability of brand alliances to improve perceptions of new products bearing the names of both co‐joined brands. “Perceptual fit” and brand attitudes are major constructs thought to influence the ability of brand alliances to achieve this goal. Specifically, in co‐branding applications, perceptual fit is usually conceptualized as the fit between co‐joined brands themselves, rather than fit between each co‐joined brand and the proposed new product for which both has been combined to launch. The paper's original argument is that when one brand (parent or host brand) seeks to co‐brand for purposes of improving its ability to penetrate an untested new product category, fit should be treated from a more traditional brand extension perspective. This argument is supported.
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Kenneth N. Thompson, Barbara J. Coe and John R. Lewis
Posits that, by specifically examining price‐value relationship,buyers can avoid many of the problems inherent in comparingproducts/suppliers in terms of net delivered price…
Abstract
Posits that, by specifically examining price‐value relationship, buyers can avoid many of the problems inherent in comparing products/suppliers in terms of net delivered price. Provides background on economic value pricing, along with a detailed discussion of the steps and considerations for buyer‐side application to supplier price analysis and its managerial implications.
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Kenneth N. Thompson and Barbara J. Coe
Sustainable competitive advantage is recognized as a critical factor for survival in the turbulent environments of the 1990s. The limited use of pricing as a strategic tool to…
Abstract
Sustainable competitive advantage is recognized as a critical factor for survival in the turbulent environments of the 1990s. The limited use of pricing as a strategic tool to gain and hold competitive advantage has created an opportunity for companies willing to redesign their competitive portfolios and go with unorthodox strategy mixes. Proposes an approach to value pricing that can be used to seize and drive competitive advantage, and which yields a price that minimizes the risk that buyers will not perceive value at least equivalent to that provided by a reference product. At the same time, the risk to sellers of not achieving minimum margins is controlled. Suggests that this approach enhances the ability of management to develop dynamic and proactive strategies for pricing.
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How do successful management educators prepare for, organise, conduct and evaluate their teaching? A dialogue between four management faculty members is presented.
Abstract
How do successful management educators prepare for, organise, conduct and evaluate their teaching? A dialogue between four management faculty members is presented.