Business Evaluation
The subject that I interviewed was Mike from Allstate Insurance. Mike is an agent who owns his own office and has his own employees but at the same time is also an employee himself for the Allstate Corporation. The nature of Allstate is the sales of different lines of insurance policies. Mike's office is very service oriented although they are in the sales business. He classifies his office as a retail business with the explanation that he is selling something that is not provided directly by him, rather by the company, and because what he is selling is being bought.
Allstate is a company that has many people that work for it. Each of these employees is a separate agent that works as a mediator between the customer buying the product and the company selling the product. Thus, Mike's own business inside another business positions itself, as well as Mike, as an agency.
Since Mike is ultimately a salesperson, what he does most frequently during the day is to interact with people and sell them a policy or assist them with one he already provides them with. Even though this is what he does most often, he finds human relations to be the most difficult thing to do. Working with people isn't the easiest thing to do and he informed me that in the insurance business the calming people down and making sure you do your best to try to satisfy the customer can sometimes become quite exhausting. What made this the most difficult for him was frequently having to this for customers who were upset with something that happened and trying to remain calm and pleasant after dealing with someone who refuses to be satisfied.
He uses trend exploration to determine his forecast. Since he is the sales person of his business he does his own forecasting. Trend exploration involves extending a pattern observed in past data into the future. He simply looks at the past sales of a few months or a year to try to come up with a projection for the next few months or year. This is a simple way of forecasting because trend exploration assumes that sales will remain the same, however, this may not always be the case.
Allstate is probably known best as the "good hands people". This is their main advertising campaign. It commonly uses the sales pitch, "your in good hands with Allstate." Beyond having a photo and na...
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...is in itself is a good thing, it seemed as if the business was about to reach or already has reached its maturity. Even although the business seemed to be doing well, I feel that more effort needs to be placed into finding new customers and opening new policies. From talking with the owner about pricing, I learned that there are discounts that customers can receive by having more than one policy with the company. Two of these were: a multiple car discount for customers with more than one car on one policy and a percentage discount for policy owners who have both their auto and home policy with the company. Since the multiple car discount is automatic, I would suggest profiling as many customers as possible looking for customers who only had an auto policy with them. These customers should then be given a call to find out if they indeed had a home. If they do, then the agent or whoever was calling should offer them a quote on the home and car together so the client could compare what they could pay to what they are paying. Hopefully this would show that there would be savings with the company, the client would switch coverage to them, and new business would have been created.
Theresa Campana, CEO of the Buckeye Group, is a manufacturer’s agent for three companies that sells different types of software. As a sales agent for Accto Co., Saleco Inc., and Invo Inc., the Buckeye Group is responsible for calling business customers to sell accounting software, sales management software, as well as inventory management software out of Columbus, Ohio. With regards to logistics, according to the case, the Buckeye Group has sold $550,000 of total software, with Campana earning a 10 percent commission from Accto and Saleco, as well as a 7 percent commission from Invo per her dollar value of her final sales. Evidently, Campana’s initial ease of making sales come from her high knowledge of the products, background in business,
In the assigned case of Dick Spencer, we look into the personal and professional life of Dick Spencer, who performed sales and managerial roles. We will analyze the factors that contributed to his success in sales and tribulations as a manager. A variety of factors contributed to Dick Spencer’s success and tribulations. We will thoroughly analyze each factor, examine each issue, and provide a recommendation. Specifically, we will examine the issue with the Siding Department.
However, RLK’s competitors are downsizing and outsourcing R&D and exploiting on the cost advantages. If RLK decides to invest more money into R&D and should the new product stall on launch, they face the danger of becoming bankrupt.
Onset Ventures Business Evaluation ONSET was founded in 1984 on a well- thought analysis of the VC industry. It was intrigued with the process of starting and growing new businesses. ONSET distinguished itself from its competitors by its investment focus. ONSET focused on initial and follow-on investments in seed stage projects because returns are more profitable at this stage. The main risks ONSET faced were technical and marketing risks.
It is not possible to research the accuracy of their assumption of their target market due to the fact that they do not clarify the exact details of their target market. It is not clearly documented where the market size of “two million potential customers” is derived from, therefore, cannot be tested.
Personal selling will be measured in both qualitative and quantitative terms. Salespersons will have to fill reports regarding the interlocutors behaviour and product knowledge.
What major technology change has had the greatest impact on the quality of your life?
...is has been significantly better that the industry average and much low turnover than their local competitors.
Assessing the environment is the second part of step four in the strategic planning process. The organizational internal assessment is important in identifying the strengths and weaknesses of Brendel Elementary School. By providing an organizational assessment, the planning team can clarify the aspects that help in accomplish the mission and fulfill the mandates in the organization. This part of step four enriches the management information system (MIS) with more qualitative data in order to make MIS more effective. Moreover, the organizational assessment clarifies the organization’s competencies, distinctive competencies, and core competencies. (Bryson 2011, 166)
The change in health profiles of the population and the evolution of medical technology have made more explicit the gap between what medicine can do and what is economically feasible (Fuchs, 2000). Resources to satisfy needs are scarce and every society must decide how better to allocate the scarce resource among the different alternative uses. Economics tries to address the normative question of which allocation of resources is best for the society. The answer to such question depends crucially on the objective being pursued. When comparing different alternatives, under the classical assumptions of competitive markets (the Arrow-Debreu economy) and Pareto efficiency, a reallocation is said to be efficient if no one in the economy is made worse off and at least one individual is better off. However, such definition is very restrictive in at least two senses: first, it is not concerned with distributional issues and ignores any equity implications (a reallocation of resources that gives more money to the richest person, without taking anything from others, is efficient, despite the greater inequity such decision generates) and it doesn’t allows to judge reallocation of resources where there are some gainers and losers, because utility is neither interpersonally comparable nor cardinally measurable.
In summary, as a customer representative, I have been in unpleasant situations that have required me to calm irate customers. I’ve discovered first hand, that an apology is worth a thousand words; from experience, I understand the impact of being a great listener, especially when dealing with irate customers. However, we know that providing great customer service doesn’t end with apologizing, or being a tentative listener. It is our duty as CSR’s to go above and beyond providing customer satisfaction. We must show our customers that we value and appreciate their services, by providing them with the value of service they will appreciate. In the process we will gain loyal customers, prevent customer defections and generate free advertising by word-of mouth.
Business forecasting can be used in a wide variety of contexts, and by a wide variety of businesses. For example, effective forecasting can determine sales based on attendance at a trade show, or the customer demand for products and services (Business and Economic Forecasting, p.1). One of the most important assumptions of business forecasters is that the past acts as an important guide for the future. It is important to note that forecasters must consider a number of new information, including rapidly changing economic conditions and globalization, when creating business forecasts based on past sales.
Management is black and white and leadership is the gray area. It takes thought and
Wasserman, Michael. 15 Techniques When Dealing With Customers. My Success Company. 25 January 2005. .
Difficult customers are just part of doing business today. “Difficult customers could be those in which you have to deal with negative, rude, angry, complaining, or aggressive people. These are just a few of the types of potentially difficult interactions” (Street). From time to time, you will also find the need to help customers who can be designated as difficult, but in a different way: Lack of knowledge about your product, service and or policies, dissatisfaction with your service and or product, demanding, talkative, internal customers with special requests, language barriers and elderly or disabled customers that need assistance. Companies and businesses that know how to deal with difficult customers or customers with special needs the right way allow a company or business to reap the benefits of high customer satisfactions and increased customer retention.