Eric Panitz

Face-to-face selling: Making it more effective

Abstract Research reported here suggests that adaptable field sales personnel can identify cues that signify differences in purchase behavior across different customer groups. A national sample of sales engineers from the construction industry were able to identify 14 specific characteristics that differentiate expected purchase behavior across three discrete buyer groups. Further, using a previously developed scale for measuring adaptability, differences between more adaptable and less adaptable salespeople turned out to be significantly large, making a strong argument for continued training in adaptability.

Distributor image and marketing strategy

Abstract This study presents buyer-based company profiles, perceptual maps, and factor analysis to analyze a companys market positioning. Three factors were identified: personal selling, personal contact, and corporate attributes. The interpretation is used to develop marketing strategies for an industrial distributor.

Marketing Services Globally: A Fourfold Typology

With the various service industries accounting for more and more of the worlds GDP, it is fast becoming a necessity for U.S. service firms to globalize their market offerings. This article offers a typology that categorizes services as being core or augmented and then determines both the process and content of service delivery and an appropriate delivery mode for each. This article integrates the concepts of service marketing and service standardization by offering a new typology for global service marketers.

Standardization Versus Customizing Services Across Global Markets

The literature exammmg services standardization or customization is reviewed from a global perspective. Eleven propositions focusing on standardization or customization of the marketing mix on a global basis are developed. It is argued that the standardization of the marketing mix elements are appropriate for the core service and for the service process. Customization of services occurs with the augmented aspects of the service and with the service content. The type of global marketing strategy used will affect the extent of standardization or customization depending on whether control of the marketing mix elements occurs within the firm or is imposed by the environment.

Market Attitudes and Opinions of Chief Executive Officers as Predictors of Small Professional Service Firm Performance

Abstract The authors seek to define the relationship between attitudes and opinions about marketing and company performance among very small professional services businesses. Responses to 47 attitudinal statements are regressed on 3 measures of company performance. Eighteen of the 47 are found to be associated with company performance. But only a very few attitudes about marketing turn out to be significant across all measures of company performance. Improvements in staff expertise, employing the services of public relations specialists, advertising in appropriate professional journals, and emphasizing price/value in the service were the only activities thought to be universally effective, regardless of how company performance is measured. Managerial implications are discussed and suggestions for additional research are presented.