SUMMARY

General Electric Company (GE Company) is an American Multinational Company. It is a

company that specializes and operates in the areas of the digital industry, power generation,
industrial applications, and ventures in capital and finance. In addition to that, General Electric
company also produces quality products such as lighting products. Furthermore, General
Electric Company aspires and believes that a motivated sales representative that markets the
benefits of an upgraded quality lighting is where the growth and profits lie. Hence, GE Company
created two incentive campaigns called Scale Mt. Sellmore and Run the Sellmore Rapids. It runs
under the banner of GE Lamp and Ballast Upsell Expedition.
The campaigns' main objective was to attract and gain the attention of the distributors
and sales representatives, to support the promotion of upscale lighting products where it offers
improved quality lighting and energy savings. GE Company used the concept of mountain
climbing as a promotion strategy for their campaign. The two incentive campaigns have
segments, and each segment offers merchandise prizes on three plateaus or stages to provide
target sales levels for distributor sales representatives. Moreover, the representative could
choose to claim their prize at each level or continue climbing to reach a greater value up to the
mountain. In the end, when they reach the summit, the winner’s name will be entered in “The
Sky’s the Limit” and will receive an Mt. Sellmore brass paperweight entitled, “I Reached the
Top”. Aside from that, a chance ticket offering 50 trips to a choice of 5 destinations, the trips
award will be individual rather than in groups. In addition, those who made the rapids finish
line at the end of the year also had a chance to win vacation trips on Virgin Island Windjammer
cruise and Grand Canyon white-water expedition.
The promotion of Scale Mt. Sellmore launched in January where they mailed to the
distributors some materials, announcements, catalogs, and held sales meetings. But, the official
opening of the program was in February as a start of a five-month campaign and ended on June
30. The distributors representative signed up and they were given a sales log and claim form to
order any of 12 incentive items where they qualified. Sales Representative had a “Try A Case”
form at first, to start customers on the Watt-Miser or other upscale lines. In order to reach the
first level of Mt. Sellmore, the sales representative had to sell 10 cases of the featured
products, 20 cases on Level 2, and 30 cases on Level 3. Also, to make the transactions easier for
the salespeople, GE’s sales representative verified that there will be minimum paperwork, to
only fill out the claim for listing the customer’s name, invoice number, product code, and a
number of cases, and no invoice copies or other records were required.
For the Run the Sellmore Rapid program, the materials were already in the field as of
July, ready for August 1. The concept was just the same as the first program and merchandise
items were also similar, however, on level 3 it jumped to 40 cases in sales to provide bigger
awards. The winners could earn 5 prizes instead of three including an extra award if the
representatives ended all three rapid levels before September 12.
 In conclusion, GE's upscale products account for about 35 percent of total sales and
during the campaign, the sales increased on average by 40 percent over a year earlier despite
the heavy price and import pressure which corresponds to more than 2.5 million of the upscale
lamps being sold, while the standard of products was flat. All the way up the mountain, down
the rapids it kept the sales representatives' attention on the sales objective and until on the
finish line. Overall, The GE Lamp and Ballast Upsell Expedition was a huge success both for the
General Electric Company, the distributors and salespeople.

MAIN PROBLEM
 Competitive sales representative
 Gain the attention of the distributors and sales representatives to support GE's
promotion programs about the upscale lighting products that offer an improved quality
lighting and energy savings despite the heavy price.
SUB PROBLEM
 The sub problem of the General Electric Company is that, as they increase the sales of
upscale lamps, the standard products are flat.

TIME FRAME

Months Tasks
January Promotion began and Mt. Sellmore announcements, catalogs and
other materials were mailed to distributors.

February Start of Campaign of Mt. Sellmore

March Campaign of Mt. Sellmore

April Campaign of Mt. Sellmore

May Campaign of Mt. Sellmore

June 30 End of Mt. Sellmore Campaign

July Breather before starting down the rapids/ Sellmore Rapids campaign
materials were in the field

August 1 Start of Sellmore Rapids Campaign

September 12 Completion of all three Rapid levels

POINT OF VIEW
Marketing Manager’s POV

 The Marketing Manager is the one in charge of overseeing the effectiveness of the
marketing campaigns and promotion that leads to the organic growth and the rise of the
General Electric Company. The campaign was a huge success it has helped everyone be
more productive by recognizing their success by giving them awards and incentives. It
brought GE a 40 percent increase in sales of the featured products – a satisfaction
results in the execution of a strategy promotion program as it gains the attention of
distributors’ sales representatives for the new featured products making the campaigns
effective. GE works on the toughest challenges to transform imagination through
creativity into innovations.

Sales Representative’s POV

 The lack of motivated salespeople will potentially hold back the entire company from
producing work to the highest standard and meeting the targets. This innovative
campaign that introduces a new product aligned with industrial technology
development will increase productivity and efficiency. The company's campaign has
gained recognition for its success that attracts more sales representatives to register
and participate in GE's campaign. The challenging games arouse the competitiveness of
every sales representative to perform better at doing their job. Being one of the few
people to sell upscale products and getting the opportunity to have fun while working
because of the games and campaign's incentives would be fun and motivational. Getting
prizes and such for doing a job well done is very rewarding. A good sales strategy in
promoting the product improves and increases the profits and growth of the company.

Distributor’s POV

 A well-designed strategic campaign that can expand the products to reach a mass
audience of retail outlets – as a distributor, I would find these incentive campaigns as a
chance to participate in something recreational that could bring actual profits. It is like a
win-win situation.
ACTION PLAN

Action Plan No. Task Person Responsible Time Frame

1 Look for ways to maintain the stability Marketing Manager 1 month for strategy
of upscale and standard products plan

2 Creating a plans or steps for product Marketing Manager 1 month for strategy
development plan

List down the ideas for possible Marketing Team 1 month for strategy
solutions plan

Gathered the information Marketing Team 1 month deliberation

for strategy plan

Improving the sales promotion Promotion Manager, 1-3 month

5 strategy Sales Manager preparations

Identifying the new strategy or ideas to Promotion executive, 1-3 months

strengthen the brand new and Sales Representative preparations
standard products models through
6 marketing mediums or platforms area
and customer needs’

7 Discuss within the team

8 Implementation of the promotion Sales Representative 1-5 months for

program on the new product models evaluation of
strategy
SWOT ANALYSIS

STRENGTHS WEAKNESSES

Upgraded/ Upscale lightings Weak Revenue Growth of Standard Products

Incentive Campaigns Costly Rewards

Environmental initiative Not-Tech savvy

Good Management and Strong Culture Expensive Products

High Quality Standards/ Control High Labor Costs

OPPORTUNITIES THREATS

Commercial Advertisements Competitors in the same industry

Market Growth Price Competition

Mergers and Acquisition New Entrants with same strategy

Expansion to new countries Economic Crisis affecting Buyers

Affiliate Partnerships

RECOMMENDATION
Media Platform- Digital Advertising
As shown in the Action Plan, we came up with choosing the Marketing Manager as the
one who's responsible for making solutions and strategies for our problem. This being said, as
marketing manager, they somehow control what needs to be done in the marketing
department. Moreover, one of our recommendations is digital advertisements.
We all know that General Electric Company is a well-known enterprise for its products
and services. Though, despite its fame, GE Company lacks the advertisements it needs to
promote their services and products, specifically digital or online advertisements on all media
platforms. We therefore recommend the implementation in the marketing department to
effectively collaborate with the publicity, media, and advertising departments in creating digital
advertisements, advertising campaigns, and other work that needs to be done in order to reach
the company's target audience.
Through the use of Digital Advertising, there are factors that can be seen to execute
further the products and services like a Tradeshow Marketing where the company showcases
and demonstrates their new products and services. It is open to those people who register,
company representatives or members of the press. With this type of audience, these events
facilitate meaningful conversations between companies, competitors and consumers alike to
support the latest innovation products.

CONCLUSION
GE Company is an innovative company with a big vision. They strived throughout the
years, but that doesn't erase the fact that this company has faced its own challenges and
conflicts too. In this case study, we learned numerous things about the General Electric
Company. In which we had the opportunity to discover the company's strengths and
weaknesses, where we learned from the problems and applied various ways, solutions, and
strategies that can be applied, which can be the company's opportunity to grow and improve
more. We were also able to address particular threats in the company that can hinder the
company's performance. Furthermore, the company doesn't just imagine things but also works
to make things happen. They came up with new ideas and innovative ways of developing and
producing its products, this innovative process allowed GE to reinvent their ideas to market
their products. That being said, we have found that the main problem of the GE Company is
competitiveness of the sales representatives which resulted in its implementation of the
incentive campaigns. Competitiveness is a good thing, but too much is bad so we came up with
adjusting the incentive campaigns for all of the GE Company's products, where the prizes would
be their own merchandise products at too much cost.
All in all, they easily reached the company goals with this kind of campaign and also the
incentive campaigns are somewhat advantageous to the company. Presently, the world is
characterized by technology which increases the speed and scope of knowledge turnover within
the economy and society. A recommended strategy that can be implemented to further
generate the company’s success and future is to expand the sales of the business through the
use of media platforms particularly on Digital Advertising. A revenue generation of a company
revolves around the efficient sales strategy. It outlines how the Sales and Marketing orchestrate
their efforts to achieve key business goals or objectives. A technique that lets a company or a
business to constantly improvise and exceed its target sales.
QUESTIONS
1. What do you think accounted for the dramatic success of GE's promotion program in
gaining distributor selling support? Explain.
- The dramatic success of the promotion in gaining distributor selling support has
been due to good salesman strategy. There were great deals offered such as
vacations packages. There was proper campaigning of the product conducted by the
company. The promotion including selling of catalogue free of cost and providing
demonstration.
2. Do you think that "fun and games" are really necessary in promoting a "serious" product
such as industrial lighting? Why or Why not?
- In promoting a featured product, there are some strategies that the company will do
in order to achieve the target goals for the growth of their business so in GE’s
Company, they made an incentive campaign as a strategy in order to promote their
new industrial products and the result gave a satisfaction to the distributor and sales
representative as they encouraged and motivated them to support and collaborate
to the campaign.

Anybody can replace a light bulb, but it takes a motivated sales rep to market the benefits of
upgraded quality lighting. And that’s where the growth and profits lie for General Electric Company and
its lump distributors.

To focus attention on its upscale products, GE created a pair of incentive campaigns for
distributor salespeople, featuring fun themes of ups and downs: first. “Scale Mt. Sellmore . . . and then
“Run the Sellmore Rapids.” Distributor salespeople handle approximately 50 lines in most cases, so the
campaign’s goal was to catch their attention and hold a share of their minds for GE’s upscale lighting
products. They had five months to reach the “summit,” and then a July breather before starting down
the “rapids.” The combination brought GE a 40-percent increase in sales of the featured products.

The twin promotions ran under the banner of “GE Lamp and Ballast Upsell Expedition.” Each
segment offered merchandise prizes on three plateaus to provide target sales levels for distributor reps.
The salesperson could claim a prize at each level or continue climbing to reach greater value up the
mountain.

At the summit, the winner’s name was entered in “The Sky’s the Limit!” sweepstakes offering 50
trips to a choice of five destinations. These champion climbers also received a Mt. Sellmore brass
paperweight inscribed: “I Reached the Top.”

At the end of the year, those who made the rapids finish line also had a chance to win vacation
trips, including a Virgin Islands Windjammer cruise and a Grand Canyon white-water expedition.

The promotion began in January, when Mt. Sellmore announcements, catalogs, and other
materials were mailed to distributors. GE’s own sales force of 300 visited distributors to pitch the
program, put up posters, and hold sales meetings.
 The distributor signed up his people, and they were given a sales log and claim form to order
any of 12 incentive items where they qualified. To reach the first level of Mt. Sellmore, the sales rep had
to sell 10 cases of the featured products. Level 2 was reached at 20 cases, and the level 3 goal was 30
cases. Backing the sales effort, sales rep had a “Try-A-Case” form to start customers on the Watt-Miser
or other upscale lines.

To keep the salespeople concentrating on selling, with a minimum of paperwork, they had only
fill out the claim form listing the customer’s name, invoice number, product code, and number of cases.
This was verified by the GE sales rep, and no invoice copies or other records were required.

Each rep could claim up to three awards during the five-month campaign. Thus, when a
salesperson sold 10 cases, he or she had to decide whether to take the incentive now, or continue to the
next level.

Five choices were offered at level 1: a poplin jacket, knife set, binoculars, electric drill, or GE
clock-radiotelephone. At the next plateau, the sales rep could earn a disc camera, clock-radio, four-piece
luggage set, or a fishing kit. At the summit, a salesperson could select a wristwatch, cordless phone, or
Spacemaker TV set.

Every time the sales rep earned a summit-level award by selling 30 cases of lamps, one sweepstakes
chance was entered. Ten trips were awarded by drawing in each of five sales regions. Trips were
individual, rather than in groups, and each winner could choose between Colorado, New Orleans, Las
Vegas, Orlando and Disney World, or the Bahamas. Each trip was for four days and three nights, with
$200 spending money thrown in.

The Mt. Sellmore climb ended on June 30, and in July the Sellmore Rapids campaign materials
were in the field, ready for an August 1 start. The concept was the same, with three plateaus of
merchandise prizes and a sweepstakes for a choice of adventure trips. Merchandise items were similar,
and level 3 jumped to 40 cases in sales to provide bigger rewards. And now winners could earn up to five
prizes instead of three, including an extra reward if they completed all three rapids levels before
September 12.

In both campaigns, the sales objective emphasized increased movement of the upgrade lighting
products and promoted relighting, not just replacing lamps. Convincing commercial and industrial
buyers that “The time is right to relight” requires creative selling by the distributor rep.

Approximately 15,000 reps are in the field, and more than 14,000 registered to participate in
GE’s campaign. Of this number, 3706 of them earned awards, with many earning more than one – for a
total of more than 6,200 incentives given.

Ge’s upscale products covered by the incentive program offer improved lighting quality and
energy savings. These products are more profitable, and they account for about 35 percent of total
sales. During the campaign, however, sales for GE’s upscale lines increased an average by 40 percent
over a year earlier, despite heavy price competition and import pressure. More than 2.5 million of these
upscale lamps were sold, while sales of standard product were flat.
 The GE Lamp and Ballast Upsell Expedition was a big hit with distributors and their salespeople
from the start. All the way up the mountain and down the rapids, exciting incentives kept the reps’
attention on the sales objective and on the finish line.