With each chapter written by a team of sales executives and academics specializing in sales research and theory, Bauer and the editors of this unique volume examine the five major selling trends today and provide detailed discussion and real-world examples of them. Selling is dynamic and companies must be quick to realize when a change in the way selling is done is imminent and adapt themselves to it. Now that sales research is firmly legitimized in the academic community, the views of academics on these problems and issues can be brought to the forefront of corporate attention. As a powerful insight into what’s what in the world of selling, how that world is evolving, and what it all means for corporations engaged in a vigorous sales enterprise, this book will be thoughtful and provocative reading.

It is evident now that little of the academic research in selling was ever making its way usefully to corporate marketing and sales executives. Nor were academics always eager to hear what the corporate practitioners had to say, or to enfold corporate experience into their own thinking and teaching. There was a gap between what was happening in the field and what was being taught in the classroom, while sales managers, trainers, and consultants hunted for new conceptual frameworks to guide the development and implementation of hands-on sales strategy. A series of programs first held in 1990 led to a major breakthrough in the creation of a dialogue between professors and executives. The present volume reflects that dialogue, not only in the topics it covers but in the way the topics are presented: jointly, with academics collaborating with practitioners.