Conscious customer interaction: A phenomenological exploration of the emergence of sales as experienced by the employee agent of a firm and his loyal customers.

摘要

This study explored the sales interaction between a salesperson and his three loyal customers to discover how the sale emerges based on the interaction experiences of the individuals involved. What was discovered is a pattern, one which connects the individuals and allows access to the meaning of their experiences.; Customers have expanding options to a wide range of services, products and prices, while at the same time many products and services have become commoditized due to global availability of materials and business technologies. This reality presents new challenges that firms can no longer address with traditional approaches to marketing, advertising and sales. The issue is not with the focus of marketing research investigations of human interaction. Whether face-to-face or remote, human interaction skills refinement will remain central to commerce, the exchange of value and goods. In the relentless competition for survival, a key differentiator is becoming the firm's ability to successfully engage with its customers. What needs to be strengthened in the emerging economy are ways to better understand the unique expressions of needs, desires and resources during the engagement between exchange partners.; Anthony Giddens's structuration theory where structure is dynamic, both influencing and influenced by the moment-to-moment content and context of the participants' interaction experience, provided the theoretical framework. Access to the participants' interpersonal experiences during the sales interaction was facilitated by intersubjectivity, advances in neurobiology and the application of quantum logic.; The phenomenological methodology in this study was designed to research experiential interaction processes. Its purpose was to articulate meaning as discovered through exploring the dynamics of these processes in the emergence from individual intentionality through resulting action. Methodological tools for researching the interaction included observation, audio recording, and in-depth interviews with the employee and customer participants at the site of the firm.