Introduction to the special issue on the intersection of professional selling and service

Abstract

As organizational operations continue to evolve in response to increasing customer demands, frontline research has begun to consider how traditionally separate organizational functions may be complementary to firm performance. Specifically, as sales and service activities become increasingly intertwined within the frontline role, this special issue explores how the sales and service functions interact within an organization. The articles contained in this special issue consider the interaction of sales and service with respect to customer, employee, and firm outcomes. After introducing evolving thought in the area, we provide an overview of five articles that make up this special issue. We conclude by offering additional areas of research.

Keywords:

• frontline
• sales
• service
• service-sales ambidexterity
• sales-service interface

Background

Understanding how to best manage the boundary between the organization and the environment in which it operates has been a critical issue since the beginnings of organizational research (e.g., Lawrence and Lorsch 1967; Thompson 1967). Early organizational theorists worked to identify ways to “buffer” the core technology of the firm (e.g., manufacturing) from environmental changes. While much of this research focused on how to best characterize the environment (e.g., Dill 1958; Duncan 1972), Lawrence and Lorsch (1967) instead focused on how the organization might respond to environmental concerns. Most germane to the present article, they identified the sales subsystem as being one of the three major subsystems the organization can use to best handle environmental changes. Regardless, all of these approaches conceptualized the relationship between the environment and organization as deterministic in the sense that the organization had to take what the environment allowed.

Eventually, researchers began to focus on what can be labeled “environmental management” strategies designed to allow the organization to mitigate the deterministic effect of the environment on the firm (e.g., Galbraith 1977; Miles and Snow 1978; Pfeffer and Salancik 1978). Within marketing, this perspective was first voiced by Zeithaml and Zeithaml (1984), who suggested that marketing could act “to change the context in which the organization operates … in terms of constraints on the marketing function” (47). The focus on managing the environment was accelerated as the economy transitioned from a product-driven one to a service-oriented one. Accordingly, it has become less important to “buffer” the core technology as the boundary between the environment and organization is increasingly blurred. Within marketing, this has had important implications for the management of both the sales and service functions, as these are on the “front line” of the organization’s interactions with the environment.

Although having been traditionally treated as separate functions within the firm, increasingly the sales and service functions have become more intertwined as firms work to provide a more seamless customer experience and to enhance firm performance. To this point, most practitioners and academics would agree there exists a strong synergistic effect of professional sales and customer service on bottom-line performance (Sheth and Sharma 2008). This intersection has become more prevalent amidst rising service expectations of customers and increased pressure from managers for new sources of revenue generation on the front line (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012). Under such conditions, it would seem that operational separation of sales and service is less effective as the role of the frontline employee evolves to meet rising demands. It is these issues that motivate this special issue of JPSSM designed to provide insights into the interaction of these two historically distinct functions (Evans, Arnold, and Grant 1999).

Even though managers have begun to understand the need to integrate sales and service activities, organizations still often manage sales and service as unique functions. Namely, the sales force is focused on revenue generation and customer acquisition while the focus of customer service personnel traditionally aligns with customer satisfaction and retention goals. However, despite these seemingly different goals (Evans, Arnold, and Grant 1999), the employees involved with both of these customer-facing functions require a number of shared abilities (Weitz 1981; Saxe and Weitz 1982; Gwinner et al. 2005; Jasmand, Blazevic, and de Ruyter 2012) such as “diagnostic behavior, empathy, and interpersonal adaptation” (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012, 53). Accordingly, one question that has emerged from the recent development of what has come to be known as “organizational frontline research” (OFR) is exactly where the sales process ends and customer service begins in today’s selling environment. Should the two functions coexist on the front line? What are the implications when they do?

The increasing role of service in sales

The publication of Vargo and Lusch’s (2004) article on service-dominant logic (S-D Logic) has had a significant effect on the conceptualization of firm activities. In essence, S-D Logic proposes that the product-dominant perspective that has driven managerial practice and academic research for a century should be supplanted by one that recognizes all firms are engaged in service activities. Accordingly, the role of the salesperson has evolved (Tanner et al. 2008), requiring salespeople to perform more service-fulfillment activities. This product-to-service movement has directed the evolution of the sales function toward a “customer-focused sales force” (Sheth and Sharma 2008) with sales performance increasingly requiring high levels of traditionally service-related activities. Service activities are necessary when maintaining accounts, when selling intangibles in addition to products, or when working closely with customers to provide solutions. This new sales landscape has critical implications for frontline salespeople and sales managers. Undeniably, shifting salespeople toward a focus on service presents a number of challenges (Jasmand, Blazevic, and de Ruyter 2012; Schrock et al. 2016).

The nature of service makes communicating and demonstrating value to customers more taxing on salespeople than traditional sales approaches (e.g., detailing features or benefits of products). Service value is contextual, intangible, and often experiential in nature. As a result, communicating value to customers requires additional skills and abilities of the individual salesperson. In this environment, customer interactions are more complex and strategic in nature and demand higher levels of expertise and resource management, as well as a broader range of capabilities, from salespeople. Such complexities create challenges for product-centric salespeople (Ulaga and Reinartz 2011; Ulaga and Loveland 2014).

With this customer focus, the traditional “hunter” role within selling firms is declining (Sheth and Sharma 2008; Ulaga and Loveland 2014). Traditionally, “hunter” salespeople focused on prospecting new customers rather than focusing on expanding existing customer relationships (Ulaga and Loveland 2014). However, as buying firms are increasingly demanding a high level of after-sales service (Sheth and Sharma 2008), the historical focus on hunting versus farming has flipped. This shift has led to recognition of the importance of salesperson service behaviors in order to function effectively in the maturing era of customer-focused sales strategies (Ahearne, Jelinek, and Jones 2007).

The challenges discussed so far focus on the increasing array of demands and expectations affecting salespeople and sales managers in the day-to-day management of frontline employees. However, the effect of increasing service expectations is critical at the organizational level as well. For example, to most effectively support those employees on the front line, organizations that currently have more of a selling orientation may need to reorganize toward a more customer-focused organization of their sales function (Shah et al. 2006; Rust, Moorman, and Bhalla 2010; Lee, Kozlenkova, and Palmatier 2015; Lee, Sridhar, Henderson, and Palmatier 2015). Part of this reorganization will likely include a shift toward a more intense customer focus that provides the resources, support, and structure necessary for successful (and sustainable) service deployment. This shift requires organizing the sales function around customers and working with customers to define needs, orchestrate solutions, and provide deployment and postdeployment support. As noted by Sheth and Sharma (2008), over the next several years the role of the salesperson will require marshaling, organizing, and deploying both internal and external resources to satisfy the current and anticipated future needs and desires of customers. The demands of the salesperson role will continue to increase as this customer-centric focus adopted by sales firms continues to intensify over the next several years.

Approaching an intersection: the convergence of sales and service research

Drawing in part on the issues raised in the previous section, researchers have slowly begun to look at sales and service as complementary, rather than as uniquely different functions. This is due, in part, to the necessity of both revenue generation and service excellence for long-term organizational survival. For example, research on salesperson customer orientation (Lassk et al. 2012; Terho et al. 2015), services selling (Crosby, Evans, and Cowles 1990; Kindström, Kowalkowski, and Alejandro 2015), and the role of CRM in sales organizations (Tanner et al. 2005) all straddle the line between sales and service research. Postsale service (Challagalla, Venkatesh, and Kohli 2009), which emphasizes the importance of customer service and relationship maintenance, has more recently been emphasized as an essential factor for joint sales-service provision, particularly as many customers view postsales service as part of the “customer solution” rather than as a separate function (Tuli, Kohli, and Bharadwaj 2007). To this point, Ahearne, Jelinek, and Jones (2007) suggested that today’s salespeople are required to be not only productive in meeting sales quotas but also effective in exhibiting excellent customer service in the future.

Recently, the trajectory of customer expectations and sales roles has shifted to accommodate a growing need for traditionally service-based knowledge, skills, and abilities in frontline salespeople, as these frontline personnel are often the primary customer contact point with the company (Crosby, Evans, and Cowles 1990). Indeed, the notion of a coexistence of service and sales activities in the frontline role has received a great deal of attention by top researchers in the area (e.g., special issue in the Journal of Service Research; see Singh et al. 2016; Rapp et al. 2016). However, many questions still remain concerning the extent to which these functions can exist in harmonious and mutually beneficial ways.

The most recent discussions regarding frontline employee management have placed an emphasis on the sales-service interface, or “the level of integration between the sales and service function” (Rapp et al. 2016, 59), arguing the need to break down functional silos within the organization. As a result, frontline employees are more frequently challenged to perform dual roles (e.g., simultaneously attaining sales and service goals) in order to increase their productivity and revenue generation (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012). On a daily basis, these boundary-spanning employees are tasked with engaging in activities that have implications for both internal and external stakeholders (Agnihotri, Rapp, and Gabler 2013), tied to sales and service goals, respectively.

Many researchers agree that there is a high level of compatibility between sales and service activities (Evans, Arnold, and Grant 1999; Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012; Agnihotri, Rapp, and Gabler 2013). However, when frontline role expectations increase (e.g., sales personnel are asked to engage in service activities or vice versa), it is likely that tension, conflict, or forced tradeoffs (Raisch and Birkinshaw 2008) could lead to reduced individual, and ultimately firm, performance (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012). So while calls for a further integration of service and sales activities increase, the implications of this simultaneous pursuit are far from clear. However, some guidance may be found in recent research regarding the ability of employees or organizations to successfully achieve dual goals, or ambidexterity. Research into employee ambidexterity received considerable attention in the previous decade (e.g., He and Wong 2004; Raisch and Birkinshaw 2008; Junni et al. 2013; O’Reilly and Tushman 2013; Hill and Birkinshaw 2014). This includes special issues on ambidexterity in the Academy of Management Journal (see Gupta, Smith, and Shalley 2006 for overview) and Organization Science (e.g., Raisch et al. 2009). Yet, not until the work of Jasmand, Blazevic, and de Ruyter (2012) did marketing research begin to consider the interfunctional ambidexterity that could exist between sales and service functions.

Ambidexterity in this context refers to the ability of frontline employees to engage simultaneously in behaviors that might otherwise be viewed as being in conflict with one another (Jasmand, Blazevic, and de Ruyter 2012). Furthermore, service-sales ambidexterity is thought to be a multiplicative concept, whereby selling and service are viewed as “non-substitutable, interdependent activities” (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012, 493). Thus, from an ambidexterity perspective, the dual pursuit of sales and service goals involves aligning conflicting roles and often requires trade-offs to be made (March 1991; Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012). Sales professionals are challenged with finding a balance between providing excellent customer service and increasing their likelihood of making additional sales in the short run. However, in making these tradeoffs, employees require resources and support from the firm to accomplish the job, thus the need for the aforementioned potential reorganization of the firm. With limited resources, attaining consistently high levels of both service and sales excellence can become challenging for the firm and employees (Schneider and Bowen 1995; Evans, Arnold, and Grant 1999).

It should be noted, however, that while some research suggests frontline employee ambidexterity will prove challenging (March 1991; Gupta, Smith, and Shalley 2006; Raisch and Birkinshaw 2008), other studies maintain that employees can simultaneously accomplish conflicting sales and service goals (Mom, Van den Bosch, and Volberda 2009; Patterson, Yu, and Kimpakorn 2014; Sok, Sok, and de Luca 2016). In addition, as it relates to performance, ambidexterity has been shown to positively influence branch performance (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2015) and sales growth (He and Wong 2004; Auh and Menguc 2005; Zhiang, Yang, and Demirkan 2007), but negatively affect organizational efficiencies and sales productivity (de Jong, de Ruyter, and Lemmink 2004). With inconsistent findings at the employee level and conflicting conclusions on the positive versus negative effect of ambidexterity at the firm level (Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2012), it is clear that additional research in this area is critical.

Given the evolution from a product-dominant to a services-dominant perspective (Vargo and Lusch 2004), the introduction of service-sales ambidexterity on the front line, and the inconsistent findings related to service and sales interactions, this special issue attempts to address critical research gaps by exploring the effect of competing organizational climates on sales and service performance outcomes; the implications of the simultaneous pursuit of sales and service goals at an individual level; the “dark side” of B2B relationships when buyers perceive service complacency; and the role played by exemplary service in customer buying decisions. In the following section, we summarize each of the articles included in this special issue. Following this overview, we provide implications and suggestions for future research at the intersection of sales and service.

Overview of the articles published in this special issue

The first article, by Ogilvie and colleagues, focuses on how employees reconcile sales and service climates, which have been shown to lead to possible conflicts, and how this affects important performance outcomes (e.g., customer satisfaction, helping behavior, effort, and sales performance). Combining archival customer-satisfaction data with survey data completed by employees and managers, this research suggests that sales and service climates interact in both positive and negative ways to affect performance. Specifically, results are found to be contextual in that performance outcomes differ according to which climate is perceived to be most salient. For example, under a “strong” sales and low service-focused environment, employees believe customer service is less important and customer-satisfaction scores are low. However, when service climate is perceived to be high, customer satisfaction is also high. Managers are cautioned to pay close attention when requiring salespeople to pursue dual goals (i.e., service-sales ambidexterity) as doing so can potentially affect organizational and employee-related outcomes. Finally, Ogilvie et al. propose several interesting areas for future research regarding the effect of multiclimate systems on frontline employee performance.

In another article that investigates ambidexterity, Agnihotri and colleagues consider implications of the simultaneous pursuit of sales and service goals by a salesperson. They focus on whether sales-service ambidexterity helps salespeople customize interactions in order to meet customers’ needs and whether conflicting/dual expectations yield positive or negative consequences. Utilizing 162 B2B, matched salesperson-customer dyads, the authors present evidence that pursuing sales-service ambidexterity may yield both positive (e.g., increases adapting selling behaviors) and negative (e.g., increases perceptions of role conflict) consequences, which in turn positively and negatively, respectively, influence customer satisfaction with the employee. Possible extensions to this research, including a full-scale development for sales-service ambidexterity, are offered.

In the third article, Friend and Johnson consider how customers’ perceptions of complacency on the part of the supplier play out in B2B relationships, providing novel insights into the often-overlooked “dark side” of long-term B2B relationships. The results suggest that long-term relationship management (service) requires intensive time and resource investments, which previous literature (Reinartz and Kumar 2003) argues will pay off in lifetime value/customer value. The down side of this approach is that as the exchanges persist over time, it is possible that relationship quality may deteriorate as sellers become complacent and potentially negligent toward their counterparts. The level of comfort that arises on the part of the supplier (i.e., complacency) in B2B relationships might be the very reason for customers’ ultimate defection. Therefore, this article attempts to gain a better understanding of how supplier complacency, notably service and sales complacency, can lead to customer defection. Results from qualitative interviews with 56 executives across 35 defection cases indicate that B2B supplier-customer relationships must be viewed as dynamic and evolving. This research identifies thematic representations of service complacency (service rigidity, inadequate service resources and attention, and service problem resolution apathy), which emerge in the service-provision process, as well as sales complacency (sales response apathy, sales detachment, inappropriate sales foci), arising from attempts at customer retention during the sales-renewal process. This research provides important suggestions for managers for combatting the occurrence of factors that ultimately lead to customer defection.

The fourth article, written by Meyer and colleagues, investigates how customer comfort and perceived salesperson expertise enhance customers’ satisfaction with the salesperson and delight with the service encounter, and how this ultimately affects repatronage. Surveys from 375 customers regarding their experience with a salesperson in a brick-and-mortar retail store suggest that customer comfort and perceived salesperson expertise positively affect customer delight and satisfaction with the salesperson. However, while customer delight does, in fact, lead to repurchase intentions, satisfaction with the salesperson does not. Utilizing interpersonal needs theory (Schutz 1958) as the theoretical grounding, Meyer et al. point out that firms should prioritize fostering employees’ ability to successfully share expertise and develop the “soft skills” necessary to engender customer comfort in a transaction-based environment. Further, the authors offer suggestions for managers of brick-and-mortar retailers for increasing customers’ perceptions of exemplary service (e.g., tailoring sales training to focus on identifying customer needs and offering specific solutions to meet those needs) and salesperson expertise (e.g., helping employees to build deep knowledge of the industry, firm, and specific offerings to stimulate perceptions of expertise).

In the final article rounding out the special issue, Schwepker Jr. reviews the influence of psychological ethical climate and leader-member exchange on the commitment to superior customer value, which in turn, he suggests, influences unethical intent and performance. Consistent with our special issue, the authorfinds that the ethical climate encourages commitment to superior customer value, which in turn ultimately influences salesperson performance. This article reinforces the notion that service and sales are closely intertwined. The author also notes that such commitment to superior customer service decreases unethical intent, which has potentially deeper implications for practice and research.

Discussion and implications for future research

As noted earlier, organizational research has long found the interaction between the firm and the external environment to be of consequence. This is of particular interest to marketers since it is often marketing personnel who are on the front line of the boundary between the firm and the environment. As S-D Logic (Vargo and Lusch 2004) exerts more influence over both research and managerial practice, it becomes even more incumbent to think of sales and service as functions that coexist rather than as separate, unique firm actions. To these points, some organizations have already implemented means to assist frontline employees in managing the dual goals of focusing on assisting the customer (service) as well as increasing purchasing behaviors (sales). For example, Target approaches service to the customer with an end goal in mind by having employees ask customers, “Can I help you find something?”; thereby, employees highlight their focus on helping the customers but have the potential of adding an additional sale.

The research in this special issue provides a better understanding of the coexistence of and the relationship between sales and service. However, there are several additional avenues for future research on this topic that may be undertaken in order to more fully understand the intersection between personal selling and service provision. For example, research could be undertaken to investigate ways to enhance cross-functional coordination between sales and service roles and personnel and how to ensure better information flows between the functional areas. Extending this thought process, research might identify how sharing information between sales and service personnel regarding postsales service can enhance future sales activities.

The articles in this issue also add to previous literature that suggests there are both positive and negative effects of sales-service ambidexterity. Thus, research that identifies potentially optimum levels of ambidexterity might prove to be fruitful areas for investigation. Furthermore, as little of what occurs in organizations happens at a singular level, academicians and industry professionals might both benefit from a better understanding of sales-service research from a multilevel perspective as suggested by Agnihotri et al. in this issue. For example, research in this issue by Ogilvie et al. might be extended by focusing on additional levels of sales and service climate (e.g., at the business-unit or organizational level).

At the employee level, research might explore additional outcomes of salesperson ambidexterity, as well as potential traits and characteristics of frontline employees who exhibit the ability to manage ambidextrous roles. Other factors, such as how technology integration affects the capabilities of frontline employees, as well as the overall organization, to better address the sales and service functions, might be considered.

As salespeople often collaborate with other sales professionals in their organizations (e.g., sales teams), the effect of ambidextrous teams likewise provides fodder for future research at the business-unit level. Finally, at an organizational level, firms will likely be interested in research that explores potential tradeoffs between sales and service provision. For example, to what extent can a positive service experience compensate for a less-than-optimal sales experience and vice versa?

Expanding on Friend’s study into the potential “dark side” of sales-service research, future explorations might consider whether the negative effects of long-term B2B relationships (e.g., complacency) might be reversed. Further, following from Meyer’s article, research might consider the negative effects of excellent service provision. In other words, can there be “too much of a good thing” (e.g., delight), and will this create unrealistic expectations for frontline employees to uphold?

While we believe this special issue provides a good introduction to research regarding the sales-service interface, this area remains relatively unexplored. Thus, we call for additional research that might expand upon our current understanding of how to simultaneously integrate personal selling and service provision in research and practice.

Acknowledgments

We extend a thank you to all the authors who submitted manuscripts to the special issue as well as the many colleagues who helped by reviewing an article. We also recognize Jessica Ogilvie (Ohio University) and Kristina K. Lindsey Hall (University of Alabama) for their assistance in the preparation of this special issue. Finally, particularly thank the editorial staff of JPSSM for their willingness to allow us to do this special issue and for their help throughout the process necessary to bring it to publication.