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This paper aims to explore the usage of selling influence tactics across prospective customers with differing information-related needs.

The research study uses an exploratory critical incident technique (CIT) methodology to identify and examine salesperson influence tactics.

This study identifies and explores the use of salesperson influence tactics across three information-based conditions often encountered by salespeople (i.e. information seeking customers, informed customers with information inaccuracies and informed customers making sub-optimal decisions). Regardless of condition, salespeople readily used non-coercive information exchange tactics. Whereas, recommendations and ingratiation tactics were applied by more effective salespeople when interacting with informed customers with information deficiencies. Furthermore, salespeople report executing less effectively with prospects with inaccurate preexisting information and with prospects making flawed or sub-optimal decisions.

Findings illustrate the need for a renewed focus on salesperson influence tactics, the conditions under which they are effective, and how salespeople adapt their influence tactics to various situations. The exploratory nature of this study limits the generalizability of findings.

A framework of adaptive selling strategies is proposed to help tackle new challenges faced by B2B salespeople in today’s information intensive market. When interacting with more informed customers, pre-existing information is often inaccurate and incomplete. Thus, salespeople must assess and address these flaws and gaps and can adapt their influence strategies to do so effectively.

Industrial buyers today have virtually unlimited avenues to conduct extensive research and gain supplier information without the aid of interactions with salespeople. Thus, salespeople often enter sales interactions when their prospects have significantly more information than ever before. By examining salesperson influence techniques in selling situations that vary based on prospective customer preexisting knowledge, this research provides guidance on how selling may need to change in a more information intensive era.

Adaptive selling can help build positive relationships between salespeople and consumers. The literature shows that consumers respond positively to salespeople under approach but not avoidance motivations. This paper aims to demonstrate a circumstance under which consumers with avoidance motivations can also respond positively, something not previously shown in the literature.

This research paper uses three experimental between-subject designs to test hypotheses.

The current research identifies appropriate sales influence tactics (e.g. a customer-autonomy-oriented or a loss-avoidance-oriented influence tactic) where consumers with avoidance motivations can also respond to sales agents positively by the evidence of higher purchase intentions. In addition, this research shows that consumers with approach motivations may not always respond positively to salespeople. Further, goal facilitation appraisals of the salespeople serve as a mechanism between consumers’ shopping motivations and their behavioral responses (e.g. purchase intentions).

First, while the previous literature demonstrates that approach motivations generally lead to more positive effects (Elliot and Trash, 2002), this research indicates that avoidance motivations can also have positive effects, which is a finding that has not been demonstrated in the literature thus far. Second, this research identifies goal facilitation appraisals as one underlying process that explains the interactive effect between matching influence tactics and consumers’ approach/avoidance motivations when shopping. Third, the authors integrate regulatory focus theory by using gain- or loss-avoidance-oriented sales influence tactics to match approach and avoidance motivations.

Even though there has been anecdotal evidence regarding the use of ingratiation techniques in retail salesperson-shopper interactions, surprisingly, there has been limited research on the nature of these ingratiatory techniques and their impact on consumers’ perceptions and attitudes. The research reported here was conducted to determine the extent to which different ingratiation techniques that have been identified as techniques used in non-retailing domains are also used by retail salespersons in salesperson-shopper interactions. In addition, it sought to assess whether there are additional ingratiation techniques used by retail salespersons in salesperson-shopper interactions that have not been identified in existing ingratiation literature. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Two studies, drawing on research on ingratiation in other domains, were conducted in pursuit of realising the purpose. Study 1 was a survey involving a sample of 282 participants, which yielded 267 useable critical incident reports and 283 discrete examples of ingratiatory behaviours. Participants responded to various questions including a critical incident question. Cross-tabulations were, for the main part, used in assessing responses. A second survey involving 158 participants was undertaken as a verification study. This Study 2 yielded 144 useable responses.

Based on a critical incident technique (CIT), other enhancement: compliment and praise was the ingratiation technique most frequently cited by participants in the first sample, with product-customer enhancement being second and favour-rendering third. The Study 2 confirmed other enhancement: compliment and praise and product-customer enhancement as the top two techniques. Four new categories of ingratiatory behaviours emerged in retail salesperson-shopper interactions, and many of the ingratiatory behaviours previously identified in non-retailing contexts also exist in this retailing context.

Both samples are US samples, and the method used was the CIT. Though the US samples are appropriate for this study, the study could be extended to other groups and across cultures, to see whether cultural differences in the use of, and consumer responses to, ingratiation techniques exist. The study also did not look at the retail salespeople’s perspectives regarding the use of these techniques. Hence further research should address dyadic interpretations of a single ingratiatory encounter; and efforts should also be made to assess how consumers respond to ingratiation in retailing.

The studies result in a classification of the influence techniques used most often in retail settings in the USA. Retailers should be aware that customers may, therefore, expect certain kinds of influence tactics and may not respond in the same way when there is a departure from a “customary” influence tactic.

Not much research has explored the different kinds of ingratiation techniques used in retail contexts; nor has the stream of research sought to categorise them.

This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

Developments in digital technology means many customers enjoy wider access to information than previously. Poor reliability of certain sources risks potential clients having information gaps or in possession of knowledge that is inaccurate or misleading. Salespeople in B2B contexts must therefore determine the knowledge status of potential customers and accordingly adapt and use appropriate sales information tactics to make desired outcomes more attainable.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

This paper seeks to describe supplier coordination of sales and marketing activities to manage customer relationships.

Six propositions are suggested that examine the drivers dictating how customers initiate influence tactics for their benefit in dealing with their suppliers.

Illustrations are provided to show how and when the marketing and sales functions come close to synergistic efforts and what hinders them from doing so.

Although influence tactics have a rich history in social psychology and organizational behavior research, more influence tactics must be tested using various samples and multiple methods in the customer‐supplier realm of selling and marketing activities.

Understanding trust, commitment, and cooperation from the supplier's perspective, enhances one's ability to understand why the sales and marketing functions must work together to program a defense mechanism against customers that are initiating influence tactics against them.

The study presents useful information for the coordination of sales and marketing activities.

This study aims to examine the applicability of Hartmann et al.’s (2018) service ecosystem framework to the day-to-day management of the modern sales force. The authors provide a review of the framework, acknowledging its strengths, while also indicating areas for advancement. The authors conclude with recommendations to the framework and indicate opportunities where future research could advance sales theory.

A review of the theoretical underpinnings of the service ecosystem framework is weighed against the established roles and responsibilities of the modern sales force in the literature.

The ability of the framework to capture the multi-level, multi-actor and dynamic aspects of sales represents an improvement in the conceptualization of selling is critical. Suggestions around the refinement for meso-level sales interactions and a more pliant application of service dominant-logic are offered.

The suggested extensions of the framework continue the advancement of novel theorization for the field of sales. Priorities for future research include consideration of ethical implications of the framework and formulations of new management strategies reflective of the broad and dynamic properties of the ecosystem conceptualization.

This paper provides managerial guidelines and implications tied specifically to the thick and thin crossing points and how they may impact employee decision-making.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to pointedly examine the service ecosystem framework with respect to established principles of managing a modern sales force.

This paper seeks to empirically test the use of persuasion knowledge among the millennial generation.

College aged students were randomly assigned into two groups and given scenarios where one was designed for persuasion knowledge to be more likely utilized by consumers, and a second where is was less likely to use it. The respondents were exposed to a scripted sales scenario and their perceptions of the salesperson were measured. It was hypothesized that millennial consumers using persuasion knowledge were more likely to develop negative affective and cognitive attitudes toward the salesperson, and were less likely to develop purchase intentions than those not using persuasion knowledge. Factor analysis was used to confirm that three dimensions existed, and a follow‐up MANOVA/t‐test was used to measure the differences between the two treatment groups.

All three hypotheses were supported. Millennial consumers that feel compelled to cope with the salesperson's tactics were significantly more likely to develop negative perceptions of the salesperson, and were less likely to buy than other consumers.

This study was limited in scope, as it was designed to be a basic sales interaction with a retail salesperson. Future research is needed to identify millennial's use of persuasion knowledge in a variety of sales environments, and for different types of products.

This was the first study to provide empirical evidence supporting the use of persuasion knowledge by younger consumers.

This paper aims to examine the impact of customer perceptions about a salesperson’s combined use of adaptive selling (AS) and selling orientation (SO) on customer trust in the salesperson. Based on insights from attribution theory, the contingency model of salespeople’ effectiveness, relationship marketing and market orientation literatures, the authors analyze the interplay between customer perceptions of salespeople’s AS and SO, and how this affects customer trust. Furthermore, adopting a contingency perspective, the authors investigate how two important situational variables (i.e. length of buyer–seller relationships and importance of purchase for the buyer) affect this relationship.

This study is based on regression analysis with two- and three-way interactions, using survey data from 134 business-to-business (B2B) buyers.

The results indicate that the interplay between AS and SO is negatively related to trust, and that the above situation is attenuated in sales contexts characterized by high purchase importance or enduring buyer–seller relationships.

The empirical findings are based on firms from a single industry. Second, a cross-sectional research design is adopted. Third, the absence of measures of objective performance (e.g. sales) might be regarded as a limitation.

The study suggests that salespeople willing to win customer trust should modify their approach across the relationship life cycle. Similarly, when purchase importance for the customer is low, salespeople interested in building relationships based on trust should combine AS and customer orientation. In contrast, when purchase importance is high, salespeople can only generate more trust by increasing customer orientation/reducing SO. These findings might inspire sales trainers and sales managers in developing training experiences based on adaptation and customer orientation.

The research contributes in several ways to the literature. First, the simultaneous effect of AS and SO on performance (i.e. customer trust) was investigated. Second, the analysis of the interaction between AS and SO was complemented by testing two important boundary conditions residing in the selling situation: purchase importance and relationship length. Third, this study is the first to examine the interplay among AS, SO and selling context outside using customer data from actual B2B sales interactions. Also, it enhances knowledge of the effects of AS on sales outcomes by adding a long-term, relational outcome (i.e. trust) to previous work that tended to focus on short-term outcomes (i.e. sales revenues). Furthermore, by investigating perceived benefits from the point of view of customers rather than sellers, our findings add to previous studies of AS which relied too heavily, or exclusively, on the voice of the seller. Finally, this study shed further light on the role played by SO in affecting customer-based performance.

This article reviews the quantitative marketing literature on artificial intelligence (AI) through an economics lens. We apply the framework in Prediction Machines: The Simple Economics of Artificial Intelligence to systematically categorize 96 research papers on AI in marketing academia into five levels of impact, which are prediction, decision, tool, strategy, and society. For each paper, we further identify each individual component of a task, the research question, the AI model used, and the broad decision type. Overall, we find there are fewer marketing papers focusing on strategy and society, and accordingly, we discuss future research opportunities in those areas.

Power is one of the single most critical concepts for understanding industrial relations management. Yet, despite having been subject to much scholarly attention, existing research often implicitly assumes an organizational level of behavior or examines influence tactics within the confines of an individual-level dyad. This has led to a limited understanding of influence exercises involving a third person. Motivated to advance the understanding of this phenomenon, this study aims to explore how boundary spanners from a buying organization influence supplier representatives by involving a third person.

This study uses a longitudinal single case study design grounded in social control theory. Data consist of interviews, observations and documents collected over a period of 27 months in a global sourcing context.

The findings demonstrate how the influence agent from the buying organization can invoke a third person’s mediated and nonmediated social power base through either direct or indirect social control mechanisms. With these findings, this paper makes a novel theoretical contribution by developing a deeper understanding of underexposed social influence tactics unfolding in individual-level triads.

This study offers boundary spanning managers with practical insights into subtle and indirect forms of social influence with which they can influence external exchange partners.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to draw on social control theory to examine interpersonal influence tactics in buyer-supplier relationships. By integrating this theoretical perspective with extant research on social power, this study emphasizes the importance of considering how the influence agent mobilizes a third person’s social influence base.