Brand Sales Strategy in Iran's FMCG Industry: Nature, Antecedents and Consequences

Identifying the nature of sales strategy and its elements as well as factors affecting sales strategic decisions creates competitive advantage for the organizations and ensures the organization's success in sales. So this study aims to present a comprehensive model on brand sales strategy and its antecedents and the relationship mechanism between them. To this purpose, grounded theory was used and data were collected through semi-structured interviews with sales and marketing professionals in Iran's FMCG industry. Interviewees were selected through theoretical sampling and theoretical saturation was obtained after 14 interviews. The results revealed that brand sales strategy includes six dimensions: end-customer portfolio, channel members relationship type, sales channels portfolio, sales outsourcing tendency, product portfolio, and market portfolio. The antecedents of brand sales strategy were also recognized and analyzed in terms of causal conditions, contextual conditions, and intervening conditions. Likewise, to complete the model, brand sales strategy formulation was identified as an action-interaction strategy and its consequences in FMCGs were analyzed.