Paradigm: A Management Research Journal

For any organization, the sales persons are the soldiers on the front lines of business. Certainly, if anyone can claim the title of “company warrior”, it would be the members of the sales force. After all, developing new client relationships - and managing existing ones - is an uphill battle.

It is interesting, though, that many of the battles that sales persons choose to fight are with the people on their own side - that is, those individuals within their own organizations who are also selling but to different channels or customer groups.

My experience has been that, in most companies where alternate distribution channels operate in parallel, the sales team managing one type of channel often has a poor, even contentious, relationship with the other teams. Most of this friction is avoidable and has its roots in the different perceptions that sales teams carry about their counterparts.

In this article, the effort has been to explore the sources of these conflicts based on my experience and discussion with sales persons in some companies. The article also tries to suggest some measures to avoid the conflict within the sales department.

Brand positioning and market segmentation appear to be the hallmarks of today's marketing research. A company cannot serve all customers in a broad mass market. The customers are too numerous and diverse in their buying requirements. Thus, company needs to identify the market segments it can serve effectively. By segmenting the market, .firms can better understand their customers and target their marketing efforts efficiently and effectively. Thus positioning and segmentation go side by side. This study attempts to carry out benefit segmentation of the passenger car market and suggests repositioning strategies for the existing brands of passenger cars in the identified segments. The study is based on a sample of 303 car owners/ potential buyers from the major cities of the state of Punjab and union territory Chandigarh. Eleven brands of cars alongwith an Ideal (Imaginary) brand are considered. Advanced multivariate techniques, viz., Cluster analysis and Multidimensional Scaling (MDS) were used for data analysis. Results of the analytical study brings out two segments of respondents on the basis of benefit segmentation and also identified position of Ideal brand vis-à-vis other brands. Study further reveals that Ideal brand is away from all other brands (considered in the study) as far as segment I is concerned. However, Zen and Santro can very well be stretched towards the most preferred Ideal brand using various repositioning strategies. In case of segment II, Zen is observed to be closer to the ideal brand.

Co-branding is ‘the placing of two (or more) brand names on a single product’. While co-branding is getting increasingly popular in the Indian market place, researchers have not devoted adequate attention to it. Data was collected from 103 respondents on their perception about four prominent cobrands and their seven constituent brands. No fictitious brands were used.

Contrary to hypothesis, it was found that perception about foreign constituent brands is not superior to perception about Indian constituent brands. Again, contrary to hypotheses results show that co-brands formed by brands of related products are not perceived more favourably than co-brands formed by brands of unrelated products. In keeping with the hypothesis it was found that perception of co-brands is similar to that of constituent brands.

Marketing Managers will find these results of use when they are choosing a brand with which to partner of forming a co-brand. Brand managers of the brands featured in this research will get information about the perception of their brand in the Indian market.

The banking & financial sector in India is undergoing rapid transformation Banks & financial institutions have amassed huge NPA's (Non-Performing Assets). This paper presents a comparative analysis of NPA management practices in several Asian countries and seeks to find out whether Indian institutions should emulate these. It also looks at several innovations in NPA and credit risk management techniques at banks & financial institutions in the last decade. This paper also analyzes the efficacy of credit derivatives as a tool for credit risk management and insolvency management in banking and financial institutions. It critically analyzes the evolution, growth and usage of these instruments since their introduction in the banking sector in India.

Rural non-farm enterprises and products remained a relatively neglected area of inquiry until recently. But, given the present and potential importance of this sector for rural livelihoods, and the emerging opportunities in terms of new markets for rural non-farm products, it is important to understand the dynamics and issues of this sector. This paper examines the concept and domain of rural non-farm sector in general, and the nature and dynamics of production of and market for handicraft products in particular, with focus on Gujarat. It identifies problems and explores strategies for better organisation of production and marketing of these products. It is argued that the lack of marketing orientation is the major problem in this sector, besides poor backward and forward linkages and lack of capital. Based on empirical evidence, certain solutions to better attend to the problems of the handicrafts sector are suggested.

Waves of liberalization are sweeping all over the world breaking political barriers, integrating world capital and financial markets, opening up international trade and freeing import of technology or raw materials from licenses. New challenges and opportunities have been thrown up. The new economic scenario has also brought in risks of increased competition.

As the customer is supreme, only those enterprises are going to be successful, which are able to provide goods and services to the customer in a timely cost-effective manner and also provide quality, which not only satisfies him but delights him. This means that the enterprise has to manage its operations in such a way that the production costs and delivery costs are kept to the minimum and margins are optimized. Simultaneously, it has to build a culture of quality and productivity because without that it is just not possible to survive. Finally, to stay always one step ahead of the competition, there has to be an element of creativity.

Advance Product Quality Planning and Production Part Approval Process help the organization to be creative and innovative in approach in addressing all customers' related issues. Both these tools are very important while implementing quality management system requirements pertaining to ISO/TS 16949:2002. These tools are generic in nature and can help any type of industry. Effective implementation of PPAP will help the supply chain to improve the quality of the product, reduce the cost by optimal use of resources and maintain on time delivery at competitive cost.