People Power

Common Personal Selling Techniques

Common personal selling tools and techniques include the following:

  • Sales presentations: in-person or virtual presentations to inform prospective customers about a product, service, or organization
  • Conversations: relationship-building dialogue with prospective buyers for the purposes of influencing or making sales
  • Demonstrations: demonstrating how a product or service works and the benefits it offers, highlighting advantageous features and how the offering solves problems the customer encounters
  • Addressing objections: identifying and addressing the concerns of prospective customers, to remove any perceived obstacles to making a purchase
  • Field selling: sales calls by a sales representative to connect with target customers in person or via phone
  • Retail selling: in-store assistance from a sales clerk to help customers find, select, and purchase products that meet their needs
  • Door-to-door selling: offering products for sale by going door-to-door in a neighborhood
  • Consultative selling: consultation with a prospective customer, where a sales representative (or consultant) learns about the problems the customer wants to solve and recommends solutions to the customer's particular problem
  • Reference selling: using satisfied customers and their positive experiences to convince target customers to purchase a product or service

Personal selling minimizes wasted effort, promotes sales, and boosts word-of-mouth marketing. Also, personal selling measures marketing return on investment (ROI) better than most tools, and it can give insight into customers' habits and their responses to a particular marketing campaign or product offer.