Sunday, October 3, 2010

Cross Selling- A Myth

I just love doing this.....Well, today i am gonna choose one of my most hated subjects, i.e., Cross Selling. Well, once a famous management guru, an Scandinavian quoted "If you cant sell, you cant survive". It was this particular quotation that is changing and ruining the life of many a job-goers. Let us first discuss the concept of cross selling and how it came.

Analysts say that it was in late 1930's, the time when the American Economy was purging out of the second greatest depression they ever had ( I say it second because i think the recent melt down as their worst ever). X was a wholesale store which was in the field of whole-selling everthing, almost everthing. Their store was so big (both in terms of area and the range of products) that the customer was not able to reach to his requirement. Due to this reason, the companies Sales dipped down and the top management was worried. They hired some management consultant 'Y' to overcome this situtation.

After analyzing and doing loads of research Y came with his finding that the customer was not able to reach to his product. Y came up with a conclusion that inorder to tackle this problem, each pay-roll of the company X be given a target of referring products. And thus the concept Cross Selling came into existence.

Cross Selling- Then and Now:

Citing the above reference, it is clear that 'Y's only intention of introducing targets was to ensure that customer was served well and moreover the concept was more Customer driven than Employee X driven.

As Kotler Shab says that there are needs and then there are wants. Likewise, an organizations need from an Service Industries point of view would be only good and timely service. Only during this course of service if the organization wants something, it should be referred.
But these days, services industries are entirely focussing on the wants of the customer rather than epitomising on their needs part.

Its like a telecom company offering a host of Value added Services to its client without ensuring that there are enough towers installed in the city.

As Linkin Park says, In the End.......It doesnt even matter.....

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