BUSINESS TO BUSINESS MARKETING

Business-to-Business Marketing

Business-to-Business Marketing

Sales Resource Opportunity Grid

Various organizations adopt different measures for the management of their sales force and SBUs. One of the better methods adopted and implemented by the by the marketing managers in the contemporary business organizations for the purpose of sales force allocation to different territories and customers is known as Sales Resource Opportunity Grid (SROG). This grid, basically represents the planning and control units (PCU) or portfolio which comprises of the customers, products, territories, or potential buyers which are ranked as the opportunities in context of sales potentials for the industrial marketers (Philip, n.d.). This paper shall discuss the SROG model for the 3M Canada.

SROG at 3M Canada

The company, 3M Canada is the first subsidiary of the US company ans was established in 1951. It belongs to the parent company 3M that was established in the United States during 1902 and operates in more than 60 countries. The company later opened a packaging and manufacturing plant at London, which made abrasives, tapes and adhesives. 3M Canada manages each product through its product managers who are responsible for the quality, sales and marketing issues. The company makes full use of the SROG to manage its resources and sales.

The management at 3M can draw up the Sales Resource Opportunity Grid by making a template in Excel, which depicts its various business lines across the top and the company's current customers on the left. The company then, puts its annual sales value of every service or product each customer in the period of last 12 months and totals it up on the right hand of the grid. of the better methods adopted and implemented by the by the marketing managers in the contemporary business organizations for the purpose of sales force allocation to different territories and customers is known as Sales Resource Opportunity Grid (SROG). This grid, basically represents the planning and control units (PCU). This chart will ultimately make apparent the cross-selling gaps and the company's management is able to locate the places of the best opportunities. The following figure represents the Sales Resource Opportunity Grid for the 3M Canada:

Figure1: Sales Resource Opportunity Grid (SROG)

The figure given above presents the grid, which is utilized by 3M Canada, operating in various countries across the world, to assist its marketing manager for the allocation of salesperson based on the strong opportunities that are available to the organization from the PCU. It aides the company in making alterations in its sales territories, modifying the size of the company's sales force, looking into the number f salespeople available to the company and making decisions regarding the sales calls' allocation (Steve, 2008).

When the company is offered high opportunity and assigned sales resource of high level by the PCU, the direction of the sales resources should be moved to enhance the organization's position along with benefiting from the high opportunity PCUs. On the contrary, it can also move the resources to other ...