What are the essential sources of pre-approach ?

There are a number of sources of collecting information on pre-approach. These sources are: Self observation. Local newspapers. Fellow salesman. Prospects. Sales office. Directories.

Members of family and relatives

(i) Self observation

A sale-minded salesman can find prospects everywhere. He may discover prospects while walking on roads, attending functions and travelling in buses. The salesman’s acquaintance enables him to find out prospects everywhere. The salesman is required to join different clubs and activities to discover potential customers in these areas.

(ii) Local Newspapers

Local newspapers serve as a rich source of information for collecting names and addresses of the prospects. Newspapers are full of advertisements. The salesman collects names and addresses of familiar advertising agencies. From, these agencies he collects names and addresses of the potential customers.

(iii) Fellow-salesman

The salesman collects names and addresses of the prospects from non-competing fellow-salesman. By mutual interchange among themselves the salesman are in a better position to collect detail information on prospects. The success of the salesman largely depends on his extracting nature.

(iv) Prospects

Each customer has his own circle of friends and relatives. The customer will furnish every detailed with regard to potential customers if they are asked by the salesman in friendly spirit.

(v) Sales office

The salesman can collect a lot of information of the potential customers from the advertising and research section of the sales office. These sections maintain locality wise detailed and classified information on prospects. The salesman can make better use of this section to collect details on probable customers.

(vi) Directories

Publications like “Who is Who”, trade directories, telephone guides serve as a useful basis for collection of names and addresses of likely customers.

(vii) Members of family and relatives

The salesman has more liberty on the members of family and relatives. They supply all necessary information on various prospects and even they are prepared to introduce prospects personally. A satisfied customer recommends his friends and relatives to go for the product and therefore they give every detail with regard to likely customers.