Selling-An Art

"An incredibly busy social life, full of free meals and days on the golf course. That they get to travel to all sorts of interesting places and stay in great hotels, eat in fancy restaurants, and get to meet and entertain all kinds of interesting people. What a wonderful life they lead!"


Yes, here I am talking about our sales force who acts as the pillars of the company. Isn't the life they lead sounds interesting!!!!!!!

Young Talents - Embrace Happiness

The budding managers are the fresh victims of the hard faced, tight scheduled, target oriented work life. They are not acclimatized to handle work stress thereby tending to forget happiness or when they laughed last. They become the prey of alcoholism and other injurious habits. Why can't they be oriented towards the quality of life through enlightening them towards the perspectives of happiness? Once they imbibe the spirit of being happy, they would tend to put the worries out of their mind and start loving the targets and deadlines. They would embrace happiness and lead the life of complacency.

Mentoring!!!

"Trust is not a matter of technique, but of character; we are trusted because of our way of being, not because of our polished exteriors or our expertly crafted communications." --Marsha Sinetar

Companies are looking for better ways to develop the talents they owe while simultaneously creating value. Companies can optimize their social capital through a robust system of thought partnerships, which have as their goal shared learning and collaborative problem solving in the service of the enterprise.

One technique for supporting thoughts partnerships and developing leaders at every level is Mentoring. It's a technique in which a person wishing to learn (Protégé) accompanies observes and collaborates with the Mentor, while mentor is employing their expertise on a value producing assignment.

Presentation is an ART

Presentation is an integral part of the practicing as well budding managers. The practice managers have to present their project to the top management through PPT. The utility of the  ppt is not limited with in the organization only but the executives have to use it external stake holders like customers, clients or vendors also.

Branding Challenge in Today's Scenario

The battle for a share of the consumer's wallet and cut throat competition for every bit of market space has resulted in search for a powerful weapon that delivers sustainable competitive differentiation. In the beginning itself it is of great relevance to quote Philip Kotler, marketing guru about his perception on brands, "Branding is expensive and time consuming and it can make or break a product." But even then, today, branding is such a strong force that hardly anything goes unbranded. No one had thought that commodities like "Aata", & "Rice" would be branded. Today, one does not go to the shop and ask for just salt but will ask for Tata Salt or Captain Cook Salt or Annapurna Salt. These brands have become part of our daily life. Developing of an effective brand allows the organization to create a distinctive presence in the market and compete more effectively by leveraging its organizational strengths. In the current competitive market, brands are identified as an intangible asset that can be revenue generating in the long run.

Branding-An Overview

An Overview"
A brand is a collection of images and ideas representing an economic producer; more specifically, it refers to the descriptive verbal attributes and concrete symbols such as a name, logo, slogan, and design scheme that convey the essence of a company, product or service. Brand recognition and other reactions are created by the accumulation of experiences with the specific product or service, both directly relating to its use, and through the influence of advertising, design, and media commentary. A brand is a symbolic embodiment of all the information connected to a company, product or service. A brand serves to create associations and expectations among products made by a producer. A brand often includes an explicit logo, fonts, color schemes, symbols and sound which may be developed to represent implicit values, ideas, and even personality. The key objective is to create a relationship of trust.

Why Do We Need Different Selling Approaches for Larger and Smaller Sales?

According to the Principle of Pareto, "Twenty percent of your time generates 80 percent of your results." And this 80% of results are from major accounts. Selling a fan to an individual is quite different from that to an institution.  Smaller sales are the ones which involve less commitment in terms of time, money and effort by the customer. In larger sales such parameters are more and the people involved in decision making are also more.

When one understands the key differences that a sales person would face in the selling process between larger and smaller sales, he would not deny the need for different selling approaches to them.

Key differences between Larger and Smaller Sales

	SMALLER SALES	LARGER SALES
1	Decision making is fast and may happen before the sales person for which he acts as an assurance.	Decision making is time consuming and decision making may happen even in the absence of sales person. The importance of the centers of influence is more critical in this case. It is therefore essential that a sales person has a spokes person who can do the selling on his behalf even in his absence.
2	Needs more exploration of Problems. E.g. Lack of calculator in the class may give rise to several problems to the student.	Needs more exploration of the serious implications of the generic problems. E.g. Lack of a vehicle to a student can create problems such as poor time keeping for which the other implications are poor image among friends, not able to concentrate effectively due to additional physical effort, poor impression with the faculty which ultimately has an impact on the marks awarded, not able to use time effectively like his counterpart etc.
3.	Needs through product knowledge to impress customers	Sometimes mere product knowledge may backfire on the effectiveness of the call. It might prevent the sales person from getting into the shoes of the customer.
4	Product Demonstrations are more powerful and influential at the time of delivery. Research says if 8 key benefits are presented all of them would be remembered till the next day before which the decision is normally made.	Demonstration effect fades away slowly after delivery. About 5.7 points remembered after a week and 2 points remembered after10 days. As large sales proceeds for a longer time pure reliance on product demonstration might not help.
5	Customers are less conscious of the value of the solution.	Customers are highly sensitive towards the perceived value of the solution. So they should understand the various ways in which the solution would be of use to them.
6	Features based selling : More features all at a lesser cost is the selling point.	Benefits based selling: Matching the solution with the specific need of the customer and thereby enabling him to understand the benefits of the solution offered is the selling point.
7.	Closing techniques such as   alternative close, standing room close etc. might be required to finish the deal.	Closing techniques might invoke doubt in the minds of the customers about the credibility of the solution offered.

It is therefore apparent from the above points that a company has to necessarily distinguish between its larger and smaller sales and clearly adopt suitable strategies to enable success to the sales call and the Sales People.

Tips for a Successful Customer Care or Tele Calling Executive

We are now in the era of cut-throat competition and in this competitive scenario it is more difficult to make new customers and retain the existing consumers. So we have to often contact or inform our customers about our products and service. Tele-calling is an effective and economic method for contacting and informing our new and existing customers about our products and service. But it has to be done carefully. A tele-caller can make a effective and efficient call by following the underlying tips.

E-Commerce Payment Systems

INTRODUCTION
Over the last few centuries, human beings have experienced two major revolutions – the industrial and electronic revolution.  The former transformed our society from being agriculture based to industrial based, whereas the latter transformed our society from being mechanical based to electronic based.  As we enter 21^st century, we are seeing the beginning of a new revolution namely, the network revolution.  It interconnects different parts of the world, enabling the seamless flow of information.  The internet is the engine of this revolution and electronic commerce (or e-commerce) is its fuel.

VRS in The Banking Industry

Introduction

The development strategies of India in the post Independence period 1950-1990, were implemented with a view to having high levels of growth, high public savings and self-reliance. The central and the leading role for industrialization were assigned to the State. The primary emphasis was on increasing the domestic savings rate by suppressing consumption, high taxation, and appropriating income through ownership of commercial enterprises. The role of the financial system was also limited to providing incentives for savings and capital accumulation as interest rates were controlled. The actual results fell far below the expectations. India showed one of the lowest rates of growth in the developing world with rising public deficits and periodic balance of payment crises. In the period between 1950 and 1990, India's growth averaged less than 5% per annum, and per capita income growth was less than 2% per annum. This period showed a growth rate of 5.2% per annum in the developing world, including the Sub-Saharan Africa and the least developed countries (Jalan, in Kapila, 2002).

What is Image Management???

• Ongoing process of evaluating and controlling the impact of your appearance on others and on yourself

• Managing your image to create a powerful first impression is key to success in personal, professional and social life

• A multibillion dollar industry abroad poised to grow at similar levels in India

• Youngest country in the world with average age in 30s resulting in tremendous competition in all walks of life

• Statistics indicate the average age to be 29 by 2020 resulting in fiercer competition day by day

• People who will not manage their image will get left behind

• In last few months scores of articles in newspapers and magazines highlighting the need for image management and first impressions

• Government initiatives to enhance image by attempting to revamp education system to instill soft skills

• Huge funds allocation for teaching soft skills to rural mass

C' sense of Management

"Management is more of commonsense than anything else"


It will be a surprise to read an article on "Humour in management" because many of you come across articles on Professional management, Contingency Management, Intuitive management, Proactive Management, Knowledge management, Change management and so on but not on C'sense of management.
With arguments you may win the arguments definitely not hearts. But with C'sense it is possible to win the both. Here are some C'sense related examples we  come across in our day to day life and we can learn from them the following lessons.

Top Corporate Leaders

Top 25 corporate leaders of the world according to the CNN in 2005

1. Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft
2. Sam Walton, former CEO of Wal-Mart
3. Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric
4. Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway
5. Lee Iacocca, former CEO of Chrysler
6. Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple
7. Herb Kelleher, chairman of Southwest Airlines
8. Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computer
9. Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve
10. Carl Icahn, 1980s corporate raider
11. Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel
12. Michael Milken, former junk-bond wizard
13. John Reed, former CEO of Citigroup
14. Ted Turner, founder of CNN
15. Jim Clark, former CEO of Netscape
16. Meg Whitman, CEO of eBay
17. Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com
18. Michael Eisner, CEO of Disney
19. Peter Lynch, manager of Fidelity's Magellan Fund
20. Phil Knight, CEO of Nike
21. Katharine Graham, late CEO of Washington Post Co.
22. W. Edwards Deming, influential business consultant
23. Ken Lay, former CEO of Enron
24. Shawn Fanning, founder of Napster
25. Lou Gerstner, former CEO of IBM

LEADERSHIP

Concept of leadership

Leadership is a term used for a man who has the qualities to persuade people to do what they don't want to do, or do what they're too lazy to do, and like it.. Leadership is the quality of a superior to influence the behavior of a subordinate or group working under him and persuade them to follow a particular course of action for achieving the organizational goals. Leadership is the art of influencing and directing people in such a way that will win their obedience, confidence, respect and loyal cooperation in achieving common objectives. The first job of a leader is to define a vision for the organization.

A Grueling Interview Session

Nowadays a common problem is observed with the students pursuing professional qualification, they think that having course knowledge is enough for them to get a job and they don’t focus upon the PDP and general awareness. They sometimes don’t even care to search about the company details for which they are appearing for and lack to prepare themselves for an interview.

Some Common Interview Questions...

Some common questions to practice:

1. Tell me a little bit about yourself.

2. Why are you interested in this position?

3. Why did you choose this type of career?

Interview Tips

Tips for interview: 
* Dress clean and formal
* Have black shoes with shine
* Be courteous, smiling and confident looking
* Avoid controversial questions
* Don't get agitated by provocative questions, laughter or remarks by members
* Study business of the employer and about likely role you may be given.
* Don't pity yourself and don't under-demand too.
* Practice a few common starting and interview questions given below.
* Don't try bluffing and guessing but admit you don't know or are not sure.
* Prepare current affairs.
* Don't act casual and I-don't-care type.
* Watch out, you might be silently watched and heard by someone or a camera as you wait; gossip or come out of interview room.

How To Prepare For An Interview???

An interview can be defined as a face to face oral communication between the interviewer and the interviewee in order to assess the views, attitudes and ideas of the interviewee. However the interview process also enables the interviewee and observers to assess the skill and ability of the interviewer. Thus, an interview is a test of both the communicants and parties engaged in the interaction. Intelligence, knowledge, personal qualities and character are revealed and both parties are required to be well prepared. The process allows everyone involved to make some important decisions. The candidate decides whether he should accept the position and the interviewer decides whether the candidate should be appointed; this decision may affect the organizational interests.

Golden Handshake: A Boon or a Bane

"GOLDEN HANDSHAKE" - the term is not new we have listen it many times but do we actually know what it is?

MBA: Are You Crazy For It.....

"Why do you want to pursue a MBA?" I questioned a MBA aspirant. "I want a job" pat came the reply. A simple straightforward and honest statement made. It was a statement that made me uneasy and raised many questions in my mind.

What do management institutions strive to achieve? What do management students think such institutions should offer? Are management institutions indirectly assuming the role of placement agencies?