Texas Christian University’s Neeley School of Business announced Monday, April 30, the opening of a new Sales and Customer Insights Center dedicated to both the sales and customer aspects of marketing, as well as helping businesses understand and navigate the buyer-seller relationship.
The center’s mission is to increase research collaboration, encourage involvement between faculty and the DFW business community, and strengthen student learning through hands-on activities, a news release detailed.
“The Sales and Customer Insights Center will help businesses and our students understand the important interplay and dynamics between the selling organization and the customer,” O. Homer Erekson, TCU Neeley dean, said in the release. “To our knowledge, this will be the first center dedicated to both the sales and customer aspects of marketing. That gives both our business partners and our students an additional edge in today’s competitive marketplace.”
At the center, TCU Neeley marketing professors will provide leading-edge research on selling processes, sales techniques, salesforce management, influence and motivation, plus customer relationship management, customer analytics, consumer behavior, customer lifetime value, and targeting and retention, the release explained.
Minakshi Trivedi, professor and chair of the TCU Neeley Marketing Department, will provide academic support for the center, building on her previous experience with the Center for Relationship Marketing at the University at Buffalo.
“Our expertise covers a range of sales and customer insights topics, due in large degree from our partnerships with companies to solve their relevant business challenges, which then becomes the basis for premium academic research and active classroom involvement,” Trivedi said in the release.
Zachary Hall, an award-winning researcher in marketing strategy and assistant professor of marketing, will serve as director of operations.
“By giving TCU Neeley marketing professors an avenue to share our research with more businesses, the Sales and Customer Insights Center will deliver a deeper understanding of the customer and the salesperson to further enhance our research, students’ education, and our business partners’ ultimate success,” Hall said in the release.
The center will bring the Dallas-Fort Worth business community into the campus and the classroom, as well as provide opportunities for students and faculty to go to area businesses to help improve business practices.
Within the center, students will participate in real-world selling, quotas and performance targets, in addition to acquiring customer insights by analyzing CRM systems, monitoring consumer touchpoints and helping redesign customer experiences.
“Students involved in the center will be better equipped to enter the business world ready for impact,” Trivedi said in the release. “They will have practiced skills in selling, salesforce management, customer insights and customer management in both B2B and B2C domains.”
For more information about TCU Neeley’s Sales and Customer Insights Center, contact Dr. Minakshi Trivedi or Dr. Zachary Hall at SCI@tcu.edu.