Rational
Reasons for having a well thought-out sales process include seller and buyer risk management, standardized customer interaction in sales, and scalable revenue generation. An advantage of approaching the subject of sales from a "process point of view" is that it offers the opportunity to use design and improvement tools from other disciplines and process-oriented industries. Joseph Juran observed, "There should be no reason our familiar principles of quality and process engineering would not work in the sales process".
In Management of a Sales Force (12th Ed. p. 66) by Rich, Spiro and Stanton a 'sales process' is presented as consisting of eight steps. These are: Prospecting/Initial contact; Preapproach- planning the sale; Approach; Need assessment; Presentation; Meeting objections; Gaining commitment; Follow-up.
From a seller's point of view, analysis of a sales process can reveal steps in a sale that are problematic, and may allow the predication of numbers of sales based on initial interest. The interface between the selling and buying process has also been diagrammed.
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