KOREASCHOLAR

New product promotion is an expensive and time-consuming process that suffers from a high failure rate. Scholars have examined the relationships between product introduction and sales force management, but the importance of the sales force in selling new products can still be further explored (Fu, Richards, , Hughes, , & Jones, 2010; Spanjol, Tam, Qualls, & Bohlmann 2011). The purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of perceived sales management controls on a salesperson’s new products sales performance (i.e., electronic goods) in a business-to-business context. In addition, the direct, mediated, and moderating influences of market orientation on sales performance will also be investigated.Through the literature reviewed (e.g., Evans, Landry, Li, & Zou, 2007; Matsuo, 2009; Matear, Osborne, Garrett, & Gray, 2002), this paper proposes its hypotheses. In terms of the antecedents of sales performance, this research focuses on the effects of innovativeness (Matsuo, 2009). Second, based on the works of Evans et al. (2007) and Matsuo (2009), this study proposes that management controls (i.e., behavior-based control, knowledge-based control, and output-based control) both directly and indirectly affect sales department performance by first influencing innovativeness. Third, this research intends to examine the effect of organization psychological climate, which is market orientation, on the innovativeness and performance of sales departments (Matear et al., 2002). Finally, this study investigates the moderating effects of an organization’s market orientation on the relationship between sales innovativeness and performance (Matear et al., 2002).EMBA and MBA students were recruited as interviewers to gather data. The companies involved in this study were electronics product manufacturers that were publicly listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange. A total of 315 complete responses were obtained. The target research question was “what are the determinants of a sales department’s new product sales performance?” This study used partial least squares (PLS) to examine the proposed model.This research found that sales department innovativeness is positively linked with new product sales performance. For the effectiveness of management controls, the results show that sales management controls (i.e., output-based control, behavior-based control, and knowledge-based control) positively affect department innovativeness but cannot influence performance directly. As for marketing orientation’s influences, this current research confirmed an organization’s market orientation-ness cannot positively affect sales department’s innovativeness and performance when selling new product. However, market orientation can positively moderate the relationship between innovativeness and performance. Based on the findings of this research, managerial implications have been put forth.

• Annie Chen(University of Westminster)
• Norman Peng(University of Westminster)
• Kuang-peng Hung(Ming Chuan University)