Question

in today's environment of Internet purchasing and self-service technologies, do you think the role of personal selling will change? If so, how might it change? Will it go away? Remember (hint) that you are in an online class which is certainly a different experience than being in a traditional classroom.

Answer 1

According to me, the role of personal selling will definitely change in today's environment of Internet purchasing. Internet has caused a revolution in the buyer-seller relationship where the complete control of selling activities are in buyer's hand with the help of self servicing technologies. If your webstore doesn't have what customer wants then they will find another webstore which will satisfy their needs without taking too much efforts. With this approach of internet selling, buyers have got high convenience of buying any product and also returning it if they don't like which has enabled them to do complete shopping by just sitting home and a few clicks on the mobile or laptops.This is the main reason which has forced traditional approach of personal selling to change its role.

In traditional personal selling approach, main focus was on prospecting, qualifying, presenting, spreading knowledge about the product, giving handling/real time experience to customers etc. but now customers can easily get all these knowledge from web searches and online content so they no longer have time for sales person. Hence we can say that, prospective customers have replaced the traditional sales activities and internet has become the main source for buyers to learn and get knowledge about different things.

Though we said that internet selling has changed the traditional approach of personal selling, it doesn't mean the personal selling will be completely obsolete and internet selling will take complete charge of selling activities. In todays world sales person has also begun to integrate themselves to web marketers as Internet is the primary driver of the selling activity. Though their competency lies to personal selling, they are also trying to get leads from the online market along with traditional personal selling. The role of personal selling which prospects, presents, share information etc. has changed the medium from personalized sales to online portals. Company’s Website has become a key sales tool and it needs to be operated like a great prospector.