Emerging Trends in Sales Thought and Practice

With each chapter written by a team of sales executives and academics specializing in sales research and theory, Bauer and the editors of this unique volume examine the five major selling trends today and provide detailed discussion and real-world examples of them. Selling is dynamic and companies must be quick to realize when a change in the way selling is done is imminent and adapt themselves to it. Now that sales research is firmly legitimized in the academic community, the views of academics on these problems and issues can be brought to the forefront of corporate attention. As a powerful insight into what's what in the world of selling, how that world is evolving, and what it all means for corporations engaged in a vigorous sales enterprise, this book will be thoughtful and provocative reading.

It is evident now that little of the academic research in selling was ever making its way usefully to corporate marketing and sales executives. Nor were academics always eager to hear what the corporate practitioners had to say, or to enfold corporate experience into their own thinking and teaching. There was a gap between what was happening in the field and what was being taught in the classroom, while sales managers, trainers, and consultants hunted for new conceptual frameworks to guide the development and implementation of hands-on sales strategy. A series of programs first held in 1990 led to a major breakthrough in the creation of a dialogue between professors and executives. The present volume reflects that dialogue, not only in the topics it covers but in the way the topics are presented: jointly, with academics collaborating with practitioners.

GERALD J. BAUER is a Sales Competency Leader and Field Marketing Manager for DuPont./e He also leads the DuPont Sales Network and the Channel Partner Network, two intracompany networks. In his 30 years with the company he has held a variety of positions, including sales, sales management, product management, industry management and others. A conference and seminar speaker in countries throughout North, South, and Central America as well as Europe and Asia, Bauer is a member of the Management Education Alliance, a collaborative effort between industry and the academic community.

MARK S. BAUNCHALK is a national sales and marketing manager for DuPont Refrigerant. He earned his M.B.A. from the University of Delaware and has held a broad range of positions with DuPont, most recently as U.S. Marketing Manager, Teflon Flouropolymers

tional Sales and Marketing Manager, Viton Floroelastmers, and North American Sales and Marketing Manger, Tedlar PVF Films. He also worked on DuPont's development of a corporate Sales Enhancement Process, used to design important customer interface capabilities.

THOMAS N. INGRAM is a Department Chair and Professor of Marketing at Colorado State University and has worked in sales, product management, and sales management for Exxon and Mobil. He has received numerous teaching and research awards, served as editor of a major journal in his field, and publishes extensively in those journals. He is coauthor of two books, one on sales management and another on selling skills.

RAYMOND W. LAFORGE is the Brown-Foreman Professor of Marketing at the University of Louisville. A founding editor of Marketing Education Review and coauthor of two previous books, he serves on the Direct Selling Association Education Foundation Board of Directors, and in other highly visible positions, including the American Marketing Association Academic Council, of which he is Vice President of Marketing.