Business Commons^™

As more and more firms decide to outsource their sales function, the entire topic of partnering with resellers has taken on greater importance. An increasing number of firms have turned to the contract sales force, commonly called manufacturers representatives, to handle the sales function for their products. In an increasingly competitive environment where distributors, original equipment manufacturers, and end users have more choices, building and maintaining solid relationships between manufacturers' representatives (reps) and the companies they represent (principals) has become more critical. This paper uses the results of a qualitative study and proposes a conceptual model for building and maintaining …