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Introduction Startle Distribution was originally part of the Telstar Record Label. In 1999, following a management buy out, Startle became independent of the Telstar Group. Startle is a music and video distributor of physical and digital products. Physical product is defined as CD, DVD and VHS, whilst digital distribution is Liquid Audio and MP 3 file streaming. Startle Distribution services the middle of the supply chain from record label companies and film studio to independent retailers. Startle has very diverse clients with differing needs e.
g. Independent Retail Chains requiring only good discounts and reliable service to small specialist record stores needing marketing and product management support. Startle employs 160 staff over 3 locations: Chelsea, Enfield and Telford. Some of the staff, notably sales, work from home and on the road. They will call in to one of the offices monthly. The Business Issue Information sharing is required amongst key departments: marketing, sales, finance and procurement (buying) to maximise sales and improve management of clients.
The current situation Clients are not receiving marketing offers and sales information relevant to their business from Startle. Startles competitors are presenting lower quality sales offers but winning the business from the Client. Sales representatives, remote from the office, are visiting the clients regularly. When they arrive at the clients office they have very little prior knowledge of communication between other Startle departments and the client.
In some cases they have even visited clients only to discover, from the client, that the client is on credit stop, making it impossible to achieve a sale and set the correct environment for potential negotiations. Sales representatives are constantly being made aware, again by the clients, of the campaigns and support that Startles competitors are able to offer such as point of sale and returns allowances. The sales representatives are frustrated by not being able to support the clients desires to grow their market share e. g.
into new formats such as DVD. The marketing department has excellent relationships with, and understanding of, the record labels and film studios. Marketing is trying to grow client business with offers based around the record labels and film studios needs that are not necessarily the same as the clients. Startle has produced some of the most innovative trade and consumer campaigns and these have been recognised with industry awards e. g. the Sisqoo, Thong Song E-Flier.
The marketing department would like to know what the clients needs are and what feedback the clients are giving to the sales teams. The buying department negotiates and sources product at very competitive prices. However, the buyers do not take advantage or communicate supplier value added services such as point of sale material, returns allowances and special limited edition versions as historically the business does not sell these very well and the clients take up rate is poor. Information Needs For Startle to maximise sales potential to clients, departments must share data and information. The shared data needs to be processed giving information output which enables each department to make informed decisions inline with each other.
The information sharing is both explicit and tacit as demonstrated below: Marketing needs: Marketing needs to be able to profile the clients and tailor sales activity to the clients needs. They need an up to date database on clients stores, product ranges, customer profile, POS. requirements, and preferred communication methods. Exact details of the fields will be set following consultation between the Marketing department and selected clients. The marketing team and the sales team should be able to update this database. Clients need to be able to view and update their own records, however sales and marketing staff need to be made aware of client changes, so if necessary client amended records can be challenged or discussed as to potential sales growth opportunities.
If clients are to view the database they must only have access to their own records. There must be the ability for the marketing department to obtain reports to group the different clients by linking similarities in any of the client data fields or to sales history from the sales database. This will enable Marketing to create client relevant campaigns and specifically to target campaigns with the relevant product. Flexibility in specifying the required output is required.
Each report is likely to be different from the last. One report could need to inform the marketing user of all clients that stock Disney films and require POS. another may require a report of all clients stocking CDs, require dance genre, have sales over 1 m per annum and how they prefer to receive marketing information. The system needs to be able to data mine sales records to prove a known correlation e. g.
Manic Street Preachers album sales and retail stores located in Wales, through to finding the unknown correlation that can give Startle a competitive edge. Sales Department Needs: The sales representatives need to be able review the following, ideally by selected client, by client product ranges and by all clients: Which campaigns marketing has sent to which clients. What current value-added services are available from the buying department and relevant to the customers profile. Sales must have access to information retaining to the clients current financial status, to include: trading terms / discounts , credit limits and payment details. All of the sales representatives spend the majority of their time out of the office. The information must be available to access with laptop computers from within any of the company buildings using the high-speed network connections and by remote by slower telephone lines.
Buying Department Needs: To aid in predicting demand for campaign products and value added services. The buying department needs decision support systems (DSS), using the information from both the customer profiles database and the sales database, to give a suggested order / buying quantity. Sales and Marketing Manager: The manager needs to be able to track Which campaigns are being presented to customers and what are the sales being recorded against them. Which clients the sales re...
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Research essay sample on Sales And Marketing Point Of Sale
