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Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

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Page 1: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

Life Insurance Company

Page 2: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

Report on “Progressive Life Insurance Company”

Life Insurance Company

Course: MKT401, Section: 01

Date of Submission: March 28, 2016 (with Permission)

SUBMITTED TO:

Dr. Md Abdul Momen

Assistant Professor,

Business Administration Dept

East West University

SUBMITTED BY:

Md. Rezaul Hoq (2013-2-10-013)

Md. Abdullah Sarker (2012-3-10-044)

Md. Shamim Khan (2012-3-10-081)

Anik Ferdoush (2012-3-10-095)

Md Al Rafiu Ahmed (2013-2-10-018)

Sourav Chowdhury (2013-2-10-005)

Page 3: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

Letter of Transmittal Dr. Md Abdul Momen

Assistant Professor,

Department of Business Administration,

East West University.

Subject: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance

Company Limited.

Dear Sir:

As per the requirement of your course MKT401, we would like to present the report on Progressive

Life Insurance Company, where we have tried to analyze the personal selling activity and philosophy

practice of Progressive Life Insurance Company. We have taken interviews of some of the employees

and then written this report with full and relevant details with recommendations.

We, therefore, would like to appreciate your acceptance of this report.

Truly Yours,

On behalf of all the members of group “UBG”,

Md. Rezaul Hoq

ID: 2013-2-10-013

Section: 1

Course: MKT401

Page 4: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

MKT401, Sales Management, Section 1 – SPRING 2016

Group Name: UBG

The UBG, which is the short form of “Unified Business Group”, is named for uniting each other to a

single business group, so that members can work cooperatively in any business unit at anywhere.

Group Members EWU ID Md. Rezaul Hoq 2013-2-10-013

Md. Abdullah Sarker 2012-3-10-044

Md. Shamim Khan 2012-3-10-081

Anik Ferdoush 2012-3-10-095

Md Al Rafiu Ahmed 2013-2-10-018

Sourav Chowdhury 2013-2-10-005

Page 5: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

Acknowledgement

First of all we like to thank and express our deep attitude to almighty ALLAH for his infinite grace that

we have finished our report successfully against all odds. We sincerely express our thanks to our

honorable faculty Dr. Md Abdul Momen for giving the chance to prepare our assignment that helped

us to gather practical knowledge. It also enhances our skill as well. We are very much thankful to our

teacher for his great help and suggestion regards preparing this assignment.

We would like to thank those employees of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited, who had

given us time from their very busy schedule. Without their help, we won’t be able to complete this

report with such information and with such success.

We are grateful to our seniors, friends and everyone who helped us. It is a matter of happiness that

we could express our gratitude to them for providing us important data and helping in problems.

We also would like to thank those people who also help us in our different problematic situation and

guide us in an arranged way that we could successfully finished our report.

Page 6: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

Executive Summery

Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited, Progressive Life for short, is one of the biggest

domestic life insurance companies and uses personal selling. It was established back in 2000

and after 16 years, it is looking quite unharmed from the overall competitions and national

economic condition. This organization maintains highest possible ethical standards, aware of

value propositions, and committed to provide better services. As the major life insurance

company, it is developing itself to coupe up with the competitions and trying to make the

overall improvement. It have strict policies, standards, and defined roles for every single one

of the employees. It has a large number of employees, and continuously arranging training

activities for them. It is offering many policies with customizability and made the whole policy

lineup suitable for anyone. In our report, we have given an overview of the company and used

many tools to clearly define our report related topics. After all our research, we have given a

clear-cut and complete set of recommendations to help this company to perform even better.

Page 7: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

1

Contents 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................... 3

1.1 Origin of the Report ......................................................................................................... 3

1.2 Objective of the Study ...................................................................................................... 3

1.3 Scope of the Study ........................................................................................................... 3

1.4 Limitation of the Study ..................................................................................................... 3

1.5 Methodology of the Study ............................................................................................... 3

1.6 Persons Interviewed ......................................................................................................... 3

2. Company Overview ............................................................................................................... 4

2.1 Company Motto ............................................................................................................... 4

2.2 Company Values and Strength ......................................................................................... 4

2.3 Organizational hierarchy .................................................................................................. 5

2.4 Benefits for salespersons ................................................................................................. 5

3. Marketing mix with the strategies followed by Progressive Life ........................................ 6

3.1 Promoting ......................................................................................................................... 6

3.1.1 What is personal selling? ........................................................................................... 6

3.1.2 Advantages of using personal selling ........................................................................ 7

3.1.3 Disadvantages of using personal selling .................................................................... 7

3.1.4 The way Progressive Life meet people ...................................................................... 7

3.1.5 Role of personal selling for Progressive Life .............................................................. 7

3.1.6 Role of sales force for Progressive Life ...................................................................... 8

3.1.7 Other Promotional activities ..................................................................................... 8

3.2 Product and Services ........................................................................................................ 8

3.3 Target Market ................................................................................................................... 9

3.3.1 Current Market Position ............................................................................................ 9

3.4 Places .............................................................................................................................. 10

3.5 Pricing ............................................................................................................................. 10

4. Customer Service ................................................................................................................. 10

5. Customer Value Model ....................................................................................................... 11

Part 1: Understanding customer’s value needs ................................................................... 11

Part 2: Creating the value proposition ................................................................................. 11

Part 3: Communicating the value proposition ..................................................................... 12

Page 8: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

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Part 4: Delivering the value proposition ............................................................................. 12

6. Sales force requirement ...................................................................................................... 12

7. Sales force training .............................................................................................................. 12

8. Personal selling philosophy ................................................................................................ 13

8.1 Personal selling philosophy of the Progressive Life ....................................................... 14

8.1.1 Relationship strategy ............................................................................................... 14

8.1.2 Product strategy ...................................................................................................... 15

8.1.3 Customer strategy ................................................................................................... 15

8.1.4 Presentation strategies ............................................................................................ 16

9. Code of ethics ...................................................................................................................... 17

10. Findings .............................................................................................................................. 18

11. Recommendations ............................................................................................................ 18

12. Conclusions ........................................................................................................................ 18

13. Use of copyrighted materials ............................................................................................ 19

14. References ......................................................................................................................... 19

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1. Introduction 1.1 Origin of the Report

This report has been prepared as the part of the course “Consumer Sales Management”

(Course Code MKT401) of BBA (Bachelor of Business Administration) degree of East West

University. Our honorable course instructor, Assistant Professor Dr. Md Abdul Momen, has

assigned us this report with the authorization of writing this on a group basis.

1.2 Objective of the Study The objective of the study is to know about the practical use of the theories, philosophies,

and concepts of personal selling in the current personal selling practice of Bangladesh.

1.3 Scope of the Study In our report, we tried our best to get the whole idea about the current personal selling

practice in Bangladesh. We researched on the top managements of a particular business

organization that uses personal selling, and we tried to judge how much the theories,

philosophies, and concepts are known, implemented and practiced by their subordinates.

1.4 Limitation of the Study It is impossible to prepare a report without any limitation. We didn’t had much information

and we had to depend on limited numbers of people. We tried our best to get all the

information from the authentic available sources. So, didn’t measured any “carried way”

information. All those information were measured correct by use while preparing this report.

1.5 Methodology of the Study For this report, we had to contact the individuals who can picture the entire organization. We

really had to take their interview and make sure that there are total consistency, as it is our

primary data source. During the interview, we were given various books and notes with

various websites, which are our secondary data source. We had much opportunity to take

interviews, check consistency, and collect other relevant information from various sources.

1.6 Persons Interviewed For this report, we had to take interviews from the following employees of Progressive Life

Insurance Company Limited from the head quarter of Progressive Life Insurance Company.

Piplu Biswas

Deputy Managing Director

Email: [email protected]

Md. Kazemul Islam (Anny)

Assistant Managing Director

Email: [email protected]

Md. Abdul Matin

General Manager

Email: [email protected]

Page 10: Report on personal selling activity and philosophy practice of the Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

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2. Company Overview The Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited, Progressive Life for short, have the following

profile:

Events Date Stamps

Company Name Progressive Life Insurance Company Limited

Area of Operation Bangladesh

Incorporation of the Company 6 January 2000

Commencement of Business 6 January 2000

Registration Certificate for Insurance Business 27 February 2000

Signing of First Insurance Business 28 June 2000

Agreement with CDBL 28 June 2005

Consent Received from SEC for Issuance of IPO Share 5 July 2005

Publication of Prospectus 6 July 2005

Subscription Opens 8 October 2005

Allotment of IPO Shares 21 November 2005

Listed with Dhaka Stock Exchange and Chittagong Stock Exchanges

2 January 2006

First Trading at Dhaka Stock Exchange and Chittagong Stock Exchange

2 January 2006

Holding the first public Annual General Meeting 26 September 2006

Declaration of first policy bonus 31 December 2008

1st Extra-Ordinary General Meeting 29 November 2011

Bangladesh Association of Publicly Listed Companies 19 May 2010

The Progressive Life is one of the best domestic life insurance company. It is specialized on

life insurance and have huge popularity among middle class people. It have a 15,000 strong

sales force with 95 servicing cells all over Bangladesh. It have 36 insurance policies with more

than 100,000 clients. It is head quartered at National Scout Bhaban of Kakrail (Dhaka 1000).

It has banking partnerships with Janata Bank, Sonali Bank, Islami Bank Bangladesh, Prime

Bank, Southeast Bank, Dutch-Bangla Bank, and some others. It have re-insurers like Munich

Re (Germany), GIC Re (India), and SCOR Global Life SE.

2.1 Company Motto

To act operate in obedience of law of the land and in accordance with the national

and international norms.

To provide best services and securities to all policyholders and shareholders

To extend friendly hand to all stakeholders of the company in time of need.

2.2 Company Values and Strength

Values

o Integrity

o Fairness

o Harmony

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o Courtesy

o Commitment

o Insight and Spirit

Strengths

o Transparent

o Quick Decision Making

o Team of Efficient Performers

o Corporate Governance

o Internal Control

o Risk Management

o Diversification

2.3 Organizational hierarchy The organizational hierarchy of Progressive Life is currently:

Director (Chairman of the Board)

Deputy Managing Director

o Assistant Managing Director

General Manger

Divisional Coordinator

Regional Coordinator

o District Coordinator

Branch Coordinator

Branch Manager

o Unit Manager

Filed Associate

2.4 Benefits for salespersons Most of the salespersons are paid with salary with commission per sales. The employees have

other benefits like:

Pension

House Rent

Monthly Allowance

House Rent

Transportation Allowance

Communication Allowance

Medical Allowance

They also have bonuses like:

Bonus on High Performance (Sales + Ethics)

Eid-Al-Fitr Bonus

Eid-Al-Adha Bonus

Other Religious Festival Bonus

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3. Marketing mix with the strategies followed by Progressive Life The marketing mix is a business tool used in marketing and by marketers. The marketing mix is often

crucial when determining a product’s offer, and is often associated with the four Ps: price, product,

promotion, and place.

The following model is the model of strategies followed by Progressive Life for marketing mix:

Figure: Marketing mix with strategies

3.1 Promoting Promoting is one of the biggest activities a business organization have to do on regular basis.

For the Progressive Life, the promotional activities are mainly done with personal selling.

3.1.1 What is personal selling?

Personal selling is the person-to-person communication with the prospect of developing

relationships, discovering needs, matching products with needs, and communicating benefits.

It is viewed as a process that adds value. It is one of the oldest forms of promotion.

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In other words, personal selling is a process of developing relationships, discovering needs,

matching the appropriate products with these needs, and communicating benefits through

informing, reminding, or persuading.

3.1.2 Advantages of using personal selling

Personal selling ensures relatively high degree of personal attention

The sales message can be instantly customized to meet the needs

Allows the sales team to better respond to customer questions and concerns

Good way of getting across technical or other complex product information

Gives the sales force chance to demonstrate the product

Provides an opportunity to build good long-term relationships

3.1.3 Disadvantages of using personal selling

Personal salespersons require high salary, commission on sales, many high allowances, lots of

training and lots of motivation. This is not only expensive, but also very problematic and not

effective in any way for reaching mass audiences.

On the other hand, it poses bad reputation for company if any salesperson do anything wrong.

3.1.4 The way Progressive Life meet people

Progressive Life trains and builds strong ambitious teams. Those teams works to understand,

and predict clients. They have all the information a client may need, and their dress-up and

smartness reassembles the value and respect they are giving to a client. As they are the face

of their organization, they are trained to be perfect and build long term client relations.

The agents, or the personal salespersons are called “Insurance Consultants”. The agents, or

the over-phone service managers employed for clients are called “Client Service Managers”.

They usually use the following ways to meet people to convert them as their new clients:

Face to face: the insurance consultants are ready to meet people in-person at any

potential client preferred convenience to discuss requirement and show the product

portfolio, which is may be customized as per potential client

Over the phone: the client service managers are ready to answer any client query and

guide to the nearest and the most qualified insurance consultant

General enquiries: the client service managers are ready to help with more day-to-day

enquiries such as claims, policy information and, extensions etc.

All those are the various forms of personal selling, which were developed to play a very

important role for any business organization that have to directly deal with customers.

There are 95 servicing cells are in all over Bangladesh for the Progressive Life. Those are doing

all the major works of targeting potential clients, contacting potential clients, and making all

of them current clients through personal selling.

3.1.5 Role of personal selling for Progressive Life

Major promotional method

Used for changing the negative perception of people towards insurance

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Helps to increase the demand for insurance services for new and existing clients

Reduces the risks involved for clients while purchasing the insurance services due to

its complex and technical nature

Most effective tool for building long lasting relationship, which is mutually beneficial

for the both insurer and insured

Leads to the creation of new client base and helps to expand the market

Informs and educates new clients about the new and upcoming products

Guides clients to select the policy that suits their requirements and tastes best

3.1.6 Role of sales force for Progressive Life

For the Progressive Life, like most of the insurance and personal selling company, role of sales

force are:

1. Prospecting – finding new clients

2. Communicating – keeping in touch with existing and potential customers about the

product range, their problems, and upcoming news

3. Selling – contacting with clients, answering questions, and trying to close the deal

4. Servicing – providing support and service to clients even after sale

5. Information gathering – obtaining information about the market to feedback into the

marketing planning process

6. Allocating – deciding how available stocks will be allocated when any short of source

3.1.7 Other Promotional activities

Apart from personal selling, Progressive Life try to do advertisements on newspapers, and

television channels. There are very few open billboards used by the organization and very few

budget is allocated for advertising. The main focus for the organization is selling through

personal selling, as it ensures long term relationship with clients.

3.2 Product and Services The Progressive Life is engaged in different portfolio of traditional life insurance business like:

“Ordinary Life”, “Pension Scheme”, “Group Life” including “Health Scheme” and “Micro Life

Insurance” business under the name of “Sujan Bima”. It also operates Shariah based Islami

Bima Prakalpa (Takaful) under the guidance of Shariah Council.

List of insurance policies offered by Progressive Life (as of March 2016):

Ordinary Life

o Whole life Assurance Plan -with profits

o Endowment Assurance Plan -with profits

o Three Benefit Endowment Assurance Plan- with profits

o Joint Life Endowment Assurance Plan- with profits

o Single Premium Assurance Flan - with profits

o Marriage Assurance Plan - with profits

o Child Protection Plan - with profits

o Single Premium Term Assurance (with refund of premium) - without profits

o Pension Assurance Plan- without profits

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o Personal Pension Plan - without profits

o Single Premium Endowment Assurance Flan - with profits

o Anticipated Endowment Assurance Plan-3 Stage - with profits

o Anticipated Endowment Assurance Plan-4 Stage - with profits

o Anticipated Endowment Assurance Plan Multiple Payments - with profits

o Endowment Assurance Plan Biennial - with profits

o Endowment Assurance Plan (with additional benefit) - with profits

o Money Back Term Insurance Plan-without profit

o Education Stipend Assurance Plan - without profit

o Progressive Deposit Pension Scheme - with profits

o Advance Payment Endowment Assurance Plan - with profits

o Endowment Assurance with PDAB benefits - with profits

o Mohorana Bima - with profits

o Hajj Bima - with profits

Group Life and Health Scheme

o Group Life Term Insurance Scheme

o Group Life Endowment Insurance Scheme

o Health Care Group Scheme

Islami Bima Prakalpa (Takaful)

o Single Payment Endowment Assurance Plan - with profits

o Endowment Assurance Plan - with profits

o Islamic Deposit Pension Scheme - with profits

o Anticipated Endowment Assurance Plan -with profits

o Hajj Bima - with profits

Sujan Bima

o Single Payment Endowment Assurance Plan - with profits

o Endowment Assurance (with profits)

o Sujan Deposit Pension Scheme - with profits

o Anticipated Endowment Assurance Plan - with profits

o Hajj Bima - with profits

3.3 Target Market For the Progressive Life, the target market is open. Any group can be its client as it offers 36

different insurance plans with different scale. The insurance size, premium size, and length

can be easily customized, which made the plans affordable for even a poor family.

In the near future, Government of Bangladesh is about to make a law that will make having

insurance mandatory for all of its citizens. This will open a massive opportunity for Progressive

Life, as then they can offer wide range of insurance policies from cheap to expensive.

3.3.1 Current Market Position

The Progressive Life is not the market leader. It is not even one of the market challenger. It is

the market follower. It is offering its plans to mainly to attract general clients, who are not

very rich. Its corporate clients are not big multinational organizations, but there are some

educational institutions and hospitals.

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3.4 Places The Progressive Life have 95 servicing cells all over Bangladesh. Most of the locations are very

strategic. Those locations, which are not in a very strategic place, are about be very strategic.

3.5 Pricing The Progressive Life have 36 different customizable insurance policies. So, the pricing varies

for many factors. But below there are the top 10 uncustomized policies with default pricing:

1. Whole life assurance plan with profit

Age (20-55) and premium range (23.90 to 226.00)

2. Endowment assurance plan with profit

For 10 years age (20-48) and premium range (107.30 to 109.80)

3. Three benefit endowment assurance plan with profit

For 15 years age (20-45) premium range (72.10 to 80.30)

4. Joint life endowment assurance plan with profit

For 10 years age (20-48) premium range (2.80 to 5.30)

5. Single premium assurance plan with profit

For 12 years age (20-48) premium range (858.90 to 944.70)

6. Marriage assurance plan with profit

For 12 years age (20-48) premium range (71.00 to 72.50)

7. Child protection plan with profit

For 12 years age (20-48) premium range (95.30 to 104.00)

8. Single premium term assurance (with refund of premium) without profit

For 15 years age (20-45) premium range (5430 to 15470)

9. Pension assurance plan (without profit)

For age of 50 age (20-44) premium range (121.23 to 2812.47)

10. Personal pension plan (without profit)

For age of 50 age (20-38) premium range (130.41 to 871.26)

4. Customer Service Customer service is the highest priority for any insurance company. Insurance is a service

oriented product and have to deal with clients on very regular basis. So, only the best service

providing can differentiate the best insurance company.

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5. Customer Value Model

Figure: Customer Value Model

There are 4 parts that Progressive Life is following to create customer value:

Part 1: Understanding customer’s value needs Different customer will have different needs, perceptions, and emotions towards insurance.

Some may think it is not necessary, some may think it is very important. Some may have good

feelings towards the Progressive Life, some may prefer its competitors. So, the Progressive

Life had taken some market research activities all by their own before. Those activities were:

independent market survey, tracking of economic condition of people, and surveying agents.

Those activities helps Progressive Life to communicate and observe customers.

By talking with them, and by observing their actions, and reactions, the insurance agents of

Progressive Life can capture data to clearly understand what is important to clients and what

the opportunities are for convincing them.

Part 2: Creating the value proposition According to Investopedia, a value proposition is a business or marketing statement that

summarizes why a consumer should buy a product or use a service. This statement should

convince a potential consumer that one particular product or service will add more value or

better solve a problem than other similar offerings.

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The Progressive Life is creating value proposition by offering customizable premium payment

schedule, responding fast in after sales services, adjusting claims fast, and ensuring security.

It is also offering various kinds of discounts and free services occasionally to add more value.

Part 3: Communicating the value proposition Communicating the value proposition is like educating the target market. For Progressive Life,

the communication toward its market is a very important. There is a very good competition

in the current insurance industry of Bangladesh. This is what is making communication with

the market very important. The Progressive Life have taken some initiatives very recently like

increased promoting, increased number of representatives, fair or event participating, and

sponsoring event. It is also trying to be present on social networks. All those activities are just

taken for communicating the value proposition.

Part 4: Delivering the value proposition The Progressive Life is one of the most trusted insurance service providers of Bangladesh. It

has relatively huge number of customers with service range of allover Bangladesh. So, in

terms of delivering the value proposition, the Progressive Life is one of the mentionable

examples. It has wide range of customizable policies, good after sales services, strong contact

with clients, and goodwill of being one of the best domestic insurance service providers.

6. Sales force requirement The Progressive Life have over 15,000 sales representatives or agents and most of them were

handpicked. So, the requirement for the sales force is very important for Progressive Life

insurance. Few years back, there wasn’t much requirement for a personal sales person. But,

now a days, this personal sales persons have to qualified, then have pass assessments, and

then have to do a lots of training.

For any applicant, educational requirement is at least a Bachelor degree from any discipline.

The applicant have to be very confidence, should have good sense of dressing, good sense of

reacting, good sense of understanding, and good sense of customizing. The applicant also

have to technologically advanced, and very knowledgeable. Additionally they should have:

Ability to identify and react accurately to the behavior and emotions of customers

Identify other people’s feelings objectively without necessarily agreeing with them

Ability to establish rapport easily and put people “at ease” in their presence

Good listening skills, as listening is very important

Curiosity, as many questions require more than a yes or no answer

7. Sales force training The Progressive Life is more like a training institute apart from an insurance service provider.

It arranges weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annually training on various topics.

Trainers are most of the time hired from other human resource training centers, and the topic

is selected based on the requirement felt by the top management.

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Most recent training topics (not limited to):

"Know Your Organization" Training

"Know Your Industry" Training

Initial Personal Selling Training

Personal Selling Philosophy Training

Client Relation Training

Ethical Training

"Know The Policies" Training

Value Addition Training

Presentation Training

Personality Training

Strategic Training

8. Personal selling philosophy

Figure: Personal selling philosophy and its interrelations

As mentioned before, personal selling is the person-to-person communication with the

prospect of developing relationships, discovering needs, matching products with needs, and

communicating benefits.

Philosophy is actually the study of the nature, causes, principles of reality, knowledge, and

values based on logical reasoning.

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The development of a personal selling philosophy for the information age involves 3 major

prescriptions:

1. Adopt marketing concept

2. Value personal selling

3. Assume the role of a problem solver or partner

8.1 Personal selling philosophy of the Progressive Life The Progressive Life have adopted marketing concept quite well. It is aware of the needs of

its customer base, it is monitoring the fulfillment of their needs, and it is trying to satisfy them

with value addition.

The Progressive Life have 15,000 personal sales persons. The sales persons are trained to be

a problem solver. They are concerned with the benefits of clients and making the relationship

ready to go further.

Figure: Strategic and consultative selling model

8.1.1 Relationship strategy

The Progressive Life knows that the relationship adds value. So, the personal sales persons

are trained to maintain high but comfortable contact relationship with their clients.

The legendary win-win philosophy is adopted over the win-lose philosophy to retain clients.

And there are heavy training activities are done to personal salespersons to ensure that.

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Every personal salesperson is trained to have a professional image. They can professionally

handle almost any situation and have commitment toward themselves and their clients.

Every salesperson is trained to maintain high ethical standards. High ethics are rewarded, and

made clear that ethics matters. For achieving sales quota, it is prohibited to use any kind of

unethical means. Because, Progressive Life understands the importance of retaining clients.

The Progressive Life understands the 4 major key groups of relationship strategies. So, it is

open for any personal salespersons to contact with higher authority for any problem. It is

open for any personal salespersons to contact with any manager for any problematic event.

Every receptionist have logs, and they can help any one’s client at any time. The support stuffs

are ready to give any kind of support to close the deal, and the top management is able to

track down any personal salespersons through daily reports, which made contact with top

management and sales agents easier.

8.1.2 Product strategy

The Progressive Life have 36 different insurance policies. Those are also customizable, and

presentable in any positive manner. So, becoming a product expert is mandatory for every

salesperson of the Progressive Life. Because, salespersons have to understand the needs of a

customer, then they have to customize and present that in such a manner that is not only

make the salespersons knowledgeable but also creative.

Every salesperson are trained to know all the information of the Progressive Life. They are

also trained to know and understand the competition around them. This is what is really

needed for a salesperson. Their training is meant to make them perfect at the competitive

filed, as they are the people who will represent the Progressive Life.

The Progressive Life have customizable policies with plenty of gaps for adding value. So, every

salesperson is trained to know how to configure value added solutions. They are always aware

of the cost for the benefits and the overlapping it with value addition.

8.1.3 Customer strategy

The Progressive Life have few very well designed customer strategies. They are aware of the

buying behavior, buyers’ behavior, and the prospect base.

It have the open space for developing one-to-one marketing strategy. This is very important

to redeem buying and buyers’ problem. As all buying situations are not the same now, the

salespersons are trained to handle. The buying process is a systematic series of actions, a

series of defined and repeatable steps, and it is intended to achieve a positive result. So, the

salespeople are trained be clear on how decisions are being made.

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Figure: Modern customer strategy model, which is also use by Progressive Life

8.1.4 Presentation strategies

The Progressive Life have customized presentation strategies. The salespersons are trained

to pose the best image they can afford and represent their organization with full confidence.

It is a reality that many good products are not sold just because of bad presentation. So, as

an insurance company, Progressive Life have lessons for salespersons training that help them

to do: prepare objectives, developing a presentation plan, and provide outstanding service.

Figure: The six-step presentation plan

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The Progressive Life have different nested lessons for pre-approaching, approaching, and six

step presentation plan.

The Progressive Life maintains contact through phone, internet, mail, email, and face-to-face

communications. It offers huge discounts, sends gifts to long-term clients, and arrange special

meeting with the clients of an area at a time.

9. Code of ethics The Progressive Life strictly follow their code of conduct to maintain high ethical standards.

If the agents can’t manage any policy within three months they get knocked

Agents with long period job have been provided a 10% fund in their entire working life

if they don’t give the policy money back to their consumer agency will reduce that

amount of money from their fund and give that money to consumer they couldn’t

return

If any agent play wrong with any member regarding policy without further notice they

are disclosed from company

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10. Findings In our research, we have got the entire picture of the organization. We think have found all

the major flaws, good facts, and important elements to prepare this report. We have found

that the ethical standard of this organization is quite high when compared with other same

level organizations and we really appreciated the consistency of the interview answers. We

also found that the personal selling philosophy practice is very modern and an advantage for

this organization.

11. Recommendations There should be more promotional activities (Digital Ads and Printed Ads)

There should be more communication between clients and the organization

Should use CRM (Consumer Relationship Management) software

Should provide more gifts to long-term running clients

Should establish “Progressive Life” as a brand and word of mouth

Should earn more international recognition to use in brand marketing

Should hire more educated and smart employees

Should establish high ethical standards and make a trust worthy image for the brand

Make a system for top managers to know about current condition at any time

Internally, the organization should be more digitized

Externally, the organization should use more attractive graphics designs

The website should be more informative

12. Conclusions The Progressive Life Insurance is one of the biggest domestic life insurance service provider

company of Bangladesh. From is establishment till now, it is doing business with high ethics

and by maintaining personal selling philosophies. This organization is one of the mentionable

domestic business organizations in terms of value preposition, and it is thriving for get even

better. The Progressive Life have completed its 16 years of operation with success and we

hope, with our recommendations, it will perform even better than it is performing now.

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13. Use of copyrighted materials To make this report, we had to use some copyrighted materials. The list of copyright material

with holders are given below:

Calibri Sans-serif Humanist Font: Copyright © Microsoft Corporation

Figures (images and info graphs): Copyright © Pearson Education, Inc.

Page design: Copyright © Microsoft Corporation

14. References Association, C. P. (2010, March 10). 5 Characteristics of Successful Salespeople (Part 1 of 6).

Retrieved from CPSA - Canadian Professional Sales Association:

https://www.cpsa.com/articles/5-characteristics-of-successful-salespeople-%28part-1-of-

6%29

Chimoriya, B. (2014, December 8). 10 Advantages of Personal Selling. Retrieved from Wise Blog:

http://www.wisenepali.com/2014/12/10-advantages-of-personal-selling.html

Davis, K. (2004). Organization Behavior: Human Behavior at Work . New Delhi: Tata McGraw-Hill

Publishing Company Ltd.

Huppenthal, J. (2006, January 1). Today's Personal Selling Philosophy. Retrieved from Northern

Arizona University: http://www2.nau.edu/~rgm/ha400/class/professional/concept/text-sell-

mkt.html

Lanning, H. M. (2005, May 29). Communicating the Value Proposition. Retrieved from DPV Group:

http://www.dpvgroup.com/articleswhite-papersbook/articles-white-

papers/communicating-the-value-proposition/

Lanning, M. J. (2006, September 18). Value Proposition Definition. Retrieved from Investopedia:

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/v/valueproposition.asp

Manning, G. L. (2016). Selling Today: Partnering to Create Value. Mumbai: Pearson College Division.