Sales Force Training at Arrow Electronics

Sales Force Training at Arrow

Electronics

1. How would you describe the go-to-market strategy for Arrow?

Arrow’s reason for being is that they allow the producers of the products t hey sell to have a

limited or no sales force focusing on producing, developing and inventing products. Arrow has

no production or rights and Kaufman describes in the case that Arrow’s strength lies in their

employees and their skills. They effectively act as an agent/distributor for the producers of the

products they sell.

Arrow uses the direct sales force as their go-to-market strategy:

Source: The complete guide to accelerating sales force performance, Page 6

The direct sales force strategy has historically and is still based on the personal relationship

with the customer, a “wine and dine” approach. When a sales person leaves Arrow the

relationship with the customer often weakens or in worst case scenarios it perishes totally.

Arrow also uses a telesales sales approach but with their own employees, where the branches

uses the “sprouts” they are given to train. The “Sprouts” will call customers that aren’t

considered important or customers that have a good relationship with a competitor or in the

extreme situations they will make cold calls. Some customers in the industry also call the

distributors (Arrow) directly in order to get the best price. Their contact will be with the sales

and marketing representatives that place the order, cancel or changes the order or gives

delivery terms and price quotes.

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The customers are served by the branch GM, the area sales manager or a field sales

representative. Typically between 10-20 customers per field service representative.

When Kaufmann developed the “Sprout” program the intention was to change the usual

approach of creating a personal relationship with the customers based on sales people taking

the customers out for dinner, giving football tickets etc. He wanted a more professionalised

sales...