IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-02013750.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The impact of sales contests on customer listening: an empirical study in a telesales context

Author

Listed:
  • Maryse Koehl
  • Juliet F. Poujol

    (MRM - Montpellier Research in Management - UPVM - Université Paul-Valéry - Montpellier 3 - UPVD - Université de Perpignan Via Domitia - Groupe Sup de Co Montpellier (GSCM) - Montpellier Business School - UM - Université de Montpellier)

  • John F. Tanner Jr

Abstract

Companies often use sales contests to achieve short-term objectives to motivate salespeople and to boost sales. However, sales contests also may encourage salespeople to adopt less relational behaviors and limit their ability to manage customer relationships, as manifested in their customer listening practices. Therefore, this study, based on a natural field experiment, examines the effects of a sales contest on customer listening. In so doing, four dimensions of customer listening (passive, active, adaptive, and assertive listening), associated with a process of listening (Hearing, Processing, and Responding), were identified. The study helps clarify the effect of a sales contest on these four dimensions of customer listening by telesales agents. The results reveal that this sales contest exerts negative effects only on the active and passive customer listening, not on the adaptive and assertive customer listening. The study sheds light on how sales contests influence important behaviors such as customer listening, as well as on the nature of customer listening itself.

Suggested Citation

  • Maryse Koehl & Juliet F. Poujol & John F. Tanner Jr, 2016. "The impact of sales contests on customer listening: an empirical study in a telesales context," Post-Print hal-02013750, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02013750
    DOI: 10.1080/08853134.2016.1186556
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-02013750
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hal.science/hal-02013750/document
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/08853134.2016.1186556?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Murphy, William H., 2004. "In pursuit of short-term goals: anticipating the unintended consequences of using special incentives to motivate the sales force," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 57(11), pages 1265-1275, November.
    2. Drago, Robert & Turnbull, Geoffrey K., 1991. "Competition and cooperation in the workplace," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 15(3), pages 347-364, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sunil Singh & Detelina Marinova & Jagdip Singh & Kenneth R. Evans, 2018. "Customer query handling in sales interactions," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 46(5), pages 837-856, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fanny-Juliet Poujol, 2009. "Management of sales advisers and service climate: an experiment," Post-Print hal-03122111, HAL.
    2. Lutz Kaufmann & Jens Esslinger & Craig R. Carter, 2018. "Toward Relationship Resilience: Managing Buyer‐Induced Breaches of Psychological Contracts During Joint Buyer–Supplier Projects," Journal of Supply Chain Management, Institute for Supply Management, vol. 54(4), pages 62-85, October.
    3. Johannes Münster, 2007. "Selection Tournaments, Sabotage, and Participation," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 16(4), pages 943-970, December.
    4. Münster, Johannes, 2006. "Selection Tournaments, Sabotage, and Participation," Discussion Paper Series of SFB/TR 15 Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems 118, Free University of Berlin, Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Bonn, University of Mannheim, University of Munich.
    5. Beck A. Taylor & Justin G. Trogdon, 2002. "Losing to Win: Tournament Incentives in the National Basketball Association," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(1), pages 23-41, January.
    6. Nasratullah Obaid & Ahmad Tariq & Obaidullah Shinwari & Ihsanullah Shorish & Syed Sajad Ali Sha, 2023. "Importance of seller’s ethical behaviour and its Impact on sales performance at the sole proprietorship level businesses in Jalalabad market of Afghanistan," Eximia Journal, Plus Communication Consulting SRL, vol. 6(1), pages 10-27, January.
    7. Arai, Mahmood & Billot, Antoine & Lanfranchi, Joseph, 2001. "Learning by helping: a bounded rationality model of mentoring," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 45(2), pages 113-132, June.
    8. Ola Kvaløy & Trond E. Olsen, 2008. "Cooperation in Knowledge-Intensive Firms," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(4), pages 410-440.
    9. Subhasish Chowdhury & Oliver Gürtler, 2015. "Sabotage in contests: a survey," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 164(1), pages 135-155, July.
    10. Nikiforakis, Nikos & Oechssler, Jörg & Shah, Anwar, 2019. "Managerial bonuses and subordinate mistreatment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 509-525.
    11. Michelle Brown & John Heywood, 2009. "Helpless in Finance: The Cost of Helping Effort Among Bank Employees," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 30(2), pages 176-195, June.
    12. Sayanjit Guha, 2016. "Effects of Motivating to Sustain Commitment of the Sales Professionals," Journal of Marketing and Consumer Behaviour in Emerging Markets, University of Warsaw, Faculty of Management, vol. 2(4), pages 58-74.
    13. Flores-Fillol, Ricardo & Iranzo, Susana & Mane, Ferran, 2017. "Teamwork and delegation of decisions within the firm," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 1-29.
    14. Xiaoyan Wang & Guocai Wang & Yanhui Zhao & Wyatt A. Schrock, 2024. "The Intellectual Structure of Sales Ethics Research: A Multi-method Bibliometric Analysis," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 193(1), pages 133-157, August.
    15. Arai, Mahmood, 1997. "Economics of personnel : Edward P. Lazear, (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 1995) pp. 170, ISBN 0-262-12188-3, [UK pound] 19.95 (cloth)," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 4(4), pages 419-423, December.
    16. Willy Bolander & William J. Zahn & Terry W. Loe & Melissa Clark, 2017. "Managing New Salespeople’s Ethical Behaviors during Repetitive Failures: When Trying to Help Actually Hurts," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 144(3), pages 519-532, September.
    17. Dragon, Robert & Garvey, Gerald T. & Turnbull, Geoffrey K., 1996. "A collective tournament," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 223-227, February.
    18. Poujol, F. Juliet & Fournier, Christophe & Tanner Jr., John F., 2011. "Compliance versus preference: Understanding salesperson response to contests," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 64(7), pages 664-671, July.
    19. Matthias Kräkel, 1998. "Internes Benchmarking und relative Leistungsturniere," Schmalenbach Journal of Business Research, Springer, vol. 50(11), pages 1010-1028, November.
    20. Nicholas McClaren, 2013. "The Personal Selling and Sales Management Ethics Research: Managerial Implications and Research Directions from a Comprehensive Review of the Empirical Literature," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 112(1), pages 101-125, January.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02013750. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.