Business Studies

Promotion and Advertising Topic 7 Q1

Describe personal selling and how it differs from other marketing tools.

ANSWER

Personal Selling and Other Approaches

Personal selling is a technique where salespersons engage in face-to-face interaction with the consumers. These professionals use interpersonal skills to create an effective persuasion that leads to a potential purchase decision. Personal selling accelerates the chances of making positive decisions linked to products and services. Also, it increases product demand. As Adewale, Adeniran and Oluyinka (2019) reveal, personal selling has a major influence on customer demand for products. The one-on-one interaction helps consumers to obtain vital insights linked to a product or service. This accelerates its demand based on the positive purchase decisions created through personal selling.

Personal selling differs from other forms of marketing in line with the relationships created, helping reach out to audiences that other mechanisms fail to reach. Through personal selling, a marketer or seller interacts face-to-face with a potential consumer. This interactive process helps build trust between the two. Therefore, consumers are likely to make positive purchase decisions because of the established trust compared to other marketing approaches. Notably, unlike other selling strategies that might fail to reach out to potential clients, personal selling ensures that marketers reach out to all audiences. For instance, social media marketing tools can only enable marketers to reach out to anyone with a digital gadget and a social media page. Personal selling, on the other hand, advanced a wider reach.

Overall, personal selling exists as one of the central marketing tactics that businesses should invest in to enable them to accelerate potential purchases. This is because it aids in building trust where the consumers portray a positive willingness to purchase a product or service. Also, it creates a broader reach, unlike other strategies that support limited consumer reach.

Reference

Adewale, A. G., Adeniran, A. J., & Oluyinka, S. A. (2019). The Effect of Personal Selling and Marketing on Firm Sales Growth (A Study of PZ and Dangote Nigeria PLC). IJRDO-Journal of Business Management, 5(1), 19-35.