MN5072 - International Selling & Negotiation: Dyson V15 Sales Report

This report explores the application of the Johnston Sales Cycle to the international sale of the Dyson V15 Detect vacuum cleaner. It begins with an introduction to the product and the rationale behind its selection, highlighting its technological advancements and market appeal. The report then details each of the seven stages of the Johnston Sales Cycle—prospecting, preparing to contact, contacting and qualifying, presenting the product, handling objections, closing the sale, and follow-ups—applied to the Dyson V15. The analysis includes identifying target customer personas, tailoring sales pitches to address customer pain points, and strategies for overcoming objections related to the product's price. The conclusion reflects on the benefits of the exercise, emphasizing the development of key sales skills and identifying areas for further improvement, such as developing detailed customer personas and utilizing frameworks like BANT and LAER for more effective prospecting and objection handling. The report emphasizes the importance of customer feedback and continuous improvement in sales strategies.

International selling
and negotiation

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................1
Introduction to product................................................................................................................1
Johnston Sales Cycle...................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Selling is one of the most important business functions in modest times as both domestic and
international trade depends upon the perspective selling of good and services between multiple
parties. Unlike the concept of marketing, sales are simply considered with exchanging the
ownership of a commodity through various means of negotiation manipulation and exposition
and is hardly considerate of the customer experience involved. This also makes the art of selling
quite complex as salesperson must follow strategic steps to close sales deal to attract modern day
educated customers (Kongo, 2021). This report will highlight the Johnston sales cycle which is
one of the best methods to ensure product sales happen at a consistent pace and apply it to the
sale of Dyson’s V15 detect vacuum cleaner which is one of the most advanced electronic home
cleaner appliance available in the UK market right now making it a hot commodity. The report
will showcase use of various models of business administration and selling to highlight the best
way to sell and negotiate for a particular product or service.
MAIN BODY
Introduction to product
The product which has been chosen to be sold using a definite sales cycle is the Dyson
V15 Detect which is one of the most technologically advanced home cleaning appliances
available in the UK market and is a premium electronic offering by Dyson (Pal, 2019). This
product is truly one of its kind as it an intelligent cordless vacuum which is built to give the
fastest cleaning service possible to the people. One of the striking features which makes this
product unique is that is features a laser built to detect and remove dust completely at a
microscopic level.
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Figure 1 The Dyson V15 Detect
The new technological innovations by Dyson have also made it so that the V15 Detect is
capable of measuring the amount of microscopic dust particles in the surroundings and also has a
built in LCD display which showcases the amount of dust removed from the environment.
Figure 2 Features of the V15 Detect
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This product has been selected in this report and will be sold using the Futtrell sales cycle
as it is comprised of modern technology, solves major issues related to common household
chores done by people, majorly women and the product is priced at a point where an effective
sales pitch can be drafted around the properties of the product. The product was Also selected
due to its near universal appeal which stems from its practical application as the emphasis on
living in cleaner and dirt free environments has increased in the post pandemic world. The sales
cycle which will be used in this project will be based around the Johnston sales cycle which
divides the sales process into 7 broad steps to ensure that proper negotiation and properly
exchange takes place (Boyer and Jap, 2022).
Johnston Sales Cycle
This sales cycle is quite comprehensive as it divides the sales process into 10 cyclic steps
which be followed in the designated order in order to ensure that the product is sold in an
optimum manner at a consistent pace. This sales cycle has been applied and reflected upon below
on the chosen product which is Dyson’s V15 Detect smart cordless vacuum cleaner which excels
to identify and clean dirt materials at a microscopic level. The 7 stages of the Futtrell Sales Cycle
are listed herein.
Prospecting
This is the first step of the sales cycle and involves the proper identification of the
customers to whom the product will be pitched towards in order to commence the sales process
for Dyson’s V15 detect. The first step of the customer prospecting process begins with the
development and identification of the customer persona on the basis of the identified pain points
of customers and the way in which the product can help solve the same. According to me, the
major customer group which Dyson should target with the V15 detect are the people aged
between 18-30 and especially women who during this age period need to do away with their
home chores as quickly and efficiently as possible. The major pain points of this target group is
that they do not have access to quick and wireless cleaning solutions with high quality which the
V15 can address in a great manner (Geiger and Hüffmeier, 2020).
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Preparing to contact
In this second cyclical step of the sales cycle, the businesses and salesmen ought to gather
as much information about the party that they will sell their products to according to the chosen
business model. B2B model refers to a business model in which trading occurs between two or
more business vendors and in this case the information about the vendor company, their financial
and operational efficiency are all taken into account. On the other hand, for the sale of V15
detect, Dyson utilizes the B2C model in which sales operations takes place directly between the
company and the customer. In this business model theory, the major information about the
customers such as their key demographics, needs and concerns all need to be taken into account
prior to initiating the sales process.
Contacting and qualifying
Dyson is a famous multinational company and follows both inbound and outbound sales
models. Inbound sales model refers to the usage of techniques such as digital advertising and
search engine optimization to drive sales by attracting customers to the company website.
Outbound model on the other is built around the use of salesperson to form and contact
individual leads based on the market information (Atefi, and et.al., 2020). This third step is more
important for the outbound sales model. This third step of the sales process describes the first
sales call in the process of selling the prospective product of the company which in this instance
is Dyson. I think that one of the major reasons as to why sales is a difficult process to get right
the first time and many salespersons are unable to introduce their selling pitch is that they sound
desperate and are committed to selling their product on the first call itself. Salespersons should
ensure that their first call with the customer contains strictly open ended questions to build a
relationship with the customers and to get to know them better before pitching the V15 detect.
Presenting your product
This is one of the most important steps of the Johnston sales cycle as it involves the
initial pitching of the product to the customer. However, I personally think that simply notifying
the customers of the features of the product such as the laser cleaning technology of the V5
detect is not enough. Salespersons must ensure that they identify the pain points of the customers
and then relate the features to pitch the product as a solution. If I was selling the Dyson V15
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Detect then I would first make the customer imagine a way to clean their entire house down to a
microscopic level within minutes, relate with their pain of spending hours charging and
unplugging their traditional vacuum cleaners and then pitch the V15 Detect as a cordless smart
microscopic dirt cleaner which hits two birds with one stone.
Handling the objections
This next stage of the cycle involves the salespersons entertaining the doubts of their
sales prospects and aiming to secure the sales deal by alleviating the majority of their concerns
on the spot. When it comes to the V15 Detect, the price at which Dyson offers this product in the
UK market is at 529 pounds which can be quite an expensive purchase which means that doubts
regarding the price might be raised at any moment after the price has been disclosed. The
salesperson must focus on the build quality of the vacuum cleaner, the superior technology and
the microscopic cleaning to make it seem for the customer that spending 500 pounds will be
worth it (Vasciuc, Săndulescu and Crăciun, 2020).
Closing the sale
This is one of the most important stages of the Johnston sales cycle as after the end of the
sales cycle, prospects becoming paying customers and product users of the company. There are a
variety of methods which the salespersons use to effectively close a sale which are listed herein
in context of the V15 Detect.
 The puppy dog close – This type of close up follows the process of offering the clients a
free trail period of sign up to experience the service for free or for a discount in order to
discover the value and utility derived from the product. The salesperson selling the V15
detect can offer a discount on the product to create urgency during the call as I find such
tactics necessary to ensure sales closure. This is also called the technique of now or never
closure.
 The assumptive close – This type of closing technique revolves around sending the
prospect all the information about the product purchase along with billing. This technique
is quite complex and risky and only works if the salesperson know that the prospect is
ready to purchase the V15 Detect.
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Follow-ups
This last step of the sales cycle involves making sure that the customers are having a
positive experience with the product and checking for feedback to import both product quality
and customer relations. The salesperson of Dyson should make sure that they take regular
feedback from the customers regarding the microscopic cleaning, the LCD dirt collection and
removal display along with the cordless functionality of the vacuum cleaner. This part is also
important to build further leads and sales as satisfied customers who recommend the product to
their known ones are one of the best forms of organic marketing (Falebita and Adesina, 2022).
CONCLUSION
The above report went into detail regarding the various elements of the Johnston Sales Cycle
which divides the sales process of goods into 7 cyclical stages which gives the salesperson in
question the best chance to close the sales in an effective manner. The above exercise consisted
of application of the sales cycle on the Dyson V15 Detect which is a highly advanced cordless
vacuum cleaner. The above exercise has many key benefits such as helping instil key skills
related to talking with clients and convincing them that they are in requirement of a product and
also learning about effective sales communication skills. However, there is major scope for
improvements down the line in order to solve the challenges that might occur during the
presentation which are listed herein.
 In order to be thorough with the problem solving features of the product and the target
market for proper prospect identification, I could have developed a detailed customer
persona which helps establish product value during prospect conversations.
 During the initial sales call with the customers before the product is pitched, the use of
BANT framework can be quite beneficial which is a prospect qualifying process which
focuses on Budget, Authority, Need and Time of the sales in context of the customers
(Cyplik and Farfał, 2018).
 When it comes to handling sales objections, I can benefit highly from learning about
techniques such as LAER framework within which the salesperson Listens,
Acknowledges, Explores and Responds to the raised objections in a proper manner.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals:
Atefi, and et.al., 2020. Open negotiation: The back-end benefits of salespeople’s transparency in
the front end. Journal of Marketing Research, 57(6), pp.1076-1094.
Boyer, S.L. and Jap, S.D., 2022. The big spaces in sales negotiation research. Journal of Personal
Selling & Sales Management, pp.1-12.
Cyplik, P. and Farfał, P., 2018. The impact of omnichannel on b2b sales process case study.
Falebita, O.A. and Adesina, T.M., 2022. The clustering stimulus on pricing techniques and sales
performance in business organisations. EuroMed Journal of Management, 4(3), pp.257-
268.
Geiger, I. and Hüffmeier, J., 2020. “The more, the merrier” or “less is more”? How the number
of issues addressed in B2B sales negotiations affects dyadic and seller economic
outcomes. Industrial Marketing Management, 87, pp.90-105.
Kongo, D.M., 2021. The Impact Of Digitalization On The Efficiency Of The Sales Cycle.
Business Strategies.
Pal, S., 2019. Understanding the impact of marketing transformation on sales and marketing
alignment. Journal of Brand Strategy, 8(1), pp.48-57.
Vasciuc, C.G., Săndulescu, D. and Crăciun, O., 2020. Methods, techniques and sales strategies.
LUMEN Proceedings, 14, pp.661-669.
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