Sales and Customer Service: Business Analysis, Strategies, and Ethics

This assignment solution delves into the critical aspects of sales and customer service across various business sectors, including retail, restaurants, and hotels. It explores the significance of customer service, analyzing the role of rating systems in understanding a company's strengths and weaknesses. The solution differentiates between attitudes and behaviors, emphasizing the importance of focusing on behaviors to improve customer service, while also defining company culture and its impact on customer relationships and loyalty. It addresses how companies should handle customer turn-offs, categorizing and explaining the different types, and providing a manager's perspective on value, efficiency, effectiveness, and quality in customer service. The assignment further explains the distinctions between suspects, prospects, and customers, highlighting the challenges and tactics of prospecting. It also examines the concept of trust in business and the role of sales ethics in building and maintaining it. The solution references scholarly articles to support its findings and provides a comprehensive overview of key concepts in sales and customer service management.

Running head: SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
Q. What is the most important aspect as it relates to comparing two different
businesses? (Retail, restaurant, and Hotel) Does a rating system help understand the
strengths and weaknesses of a company’s customer service?
The most important aspect depends on the type of businesses the companies are
operating. For example, in the hospitality sector like hotel and restaurants, the most important
aspect can be termed as the customer service. It includes the quality of the food delivered to
the customers, maintaining the décor of the place, and maintaining warm and cordial
relationship with the guests. In case of the retail sector, providing the product required by the
customers. The needs and wants of the customers need to be matched by the products
provided in the retail units.
A rating system helps to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the customer
services provided in the hospitality sector, as many people visit the hospitality units
depending on the customer rating points who has previously visited the place (Brewster).
Q. Explain the distinction between attitudes and behaviours. Why is it important to
focus on behaviours rather than attitudes when seeking to improve customer service?
What is a company's "culture?" Why is it important to build relationships and loyalty
with existing customers as opposed to a focus on gaining more and more new
customers?
Attitude of a person helps indicates the predisposition of the minds of that person to
specific people, values, systems, ideas and institutions. On the other hand, behaviour
indicates the actual expression of action, feelings, action or inaction through body language
or orally. The actions of a person affect the thoughts and the behaviour of that person affects
the actions.

2SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
It is important to focus on the behaviour of a person rather than attitudes when it is
required to improve the customer service because behaviour would help to take actions
according to that particular scenario. The proper action which would be taken wold reflect the
behaviour of that person and would help be able to satisfy the needs and wants of the
customer (Liu, Zuzanna and Wim)
The company culture can be termed as the personality that the company possesses. It
helps to define the environment on which the employees work. It includes a number of
elements like mission and vision of the company, ethics, aims, expectations and work
environment.
It is very much important to build and maintain relationships and loyalty with the old
customers as it helps to form a base for a particular organization. If the base becomes solid, it
would be less difficult to attract the new people, as word-of-mouth publicity helps a lot to
these kind of companies.
Q. How should companies deal with customer turn-offs? What are the categories of
turn-offs? Please list and explain. As a manager, how would you define value, efficiency,
effectiveness and quality as it relates to customer service? Describe ways to earn
customer loyalty.
The companies need to follow certain terms and policies in order to deal with
customer turn-offs. They need to take prompt actions in order to satisfy the customers on the
basis of the reason of their turn-offs. The turn-offs can be categorized as Value, System and
People turn-offs. Value turn-offs are those where the customers are not getting the exact
value of what they have paid for. System turn-offs involves the delivery of the product or
services to the customers according to their requirements. People turn-offs refers to the
miscommunication relating oral or written exchange of words.

3SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
From the viewpoint of a manager, the value would be to provide the exact product or
service required by the customers in the best possible way. The effectiveness and efficiency
would be related with the promptness and correctness of the ways involved in providing the
services to the customers. Maintaining the quality of the product as well as the service would
help to attract new people along with the retention of old people, and would increase the
customer loyalty (Martínez and Ignacio Rodríguez del Bosque).
Q. Explain the difference between a suspect, prospect and customer. Discuss why
prospecting is an important and challenging task for salespeople. What are some
prospecting tactics?
A prospect is an individual or company that a possible customer in order to buy the
product or service and has passed a qualification process. They possess a chance to become a
customer, who actually is availing the product or service in terms of paying a certain amount.
A suspect, on the other hand, possess no intention to avail any kind of services or products,
only engage themselves in a mere sales conversation.
Prospecting is a challenging task as it helps to understand what would be the number
of customers to avail that particular product or service, who would help to increase the
number of sales revenue for that particular organization.
Some prospecting tactics are Leads, Referrals and Incentives.
Q. Explain what trust is. How do businesses earn trust? How do sales ethics play into
the concept of trust?
Trust is the belief or confidence of a person towards another person or a group of
person or on something.

4SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
Businesses can earn trust by matching the product or the service manufactured or
designed according to the requirements of the people in the market places. It wold help to
retain those people whose trust would be won by that organization.
Sales ethics plays an integral part into the concept of trust by following the proper
way in order to achieve the sales target for an organization. Ethical sales procedures wold
help to gain the trust of the people or customers (Müller et al.).

5SALES AND CUSTOMER SERVICE MAN
References
Brewster, Zachary W. "The effects of restaurant servers’ perceptions of customers’ tipping
behaviors on service discrimination." International Journal of Hospitality
Management 32 (2013): 228-236.
Liu, Rongduo, Zuzanna Pieniak, and Wim Verbeke. "Consumers' attitudes and behaviour
towards safe food in China: A review." Food Control 33.1 (2013): 93-104.
Martínez, Patricia, and Ignacio Rodríguez del Bosque. "CSR and customer loyalty: The roles
of trust, customer identification with the company and satisfaction." International
Journal of Hospitality Management 35 (2013): 89-99.
Müller, Ralf, et al. "Ethics, trust, and governance in temporary organizations." Project
Management Journal 45.4 (2014): 39-54.