B2B Marketing

Individual Assignment

Author Name

Rahil Doshi (A013)

GROUP 6

Submitted to
Dr. Sreeram Sivaramkrishnan

Submitted in partial fulfilment for the degree of

Master of Business Administration

School of Business Management

NMIMS UNIVERSITY
 Pentagon International Freight Solution Pvt Ltd
Introduction
Pentagon International Freight Solutions Pvt Ltd (Refer Exhibit 1 for more details) is a
Logistics Specialist Company providing both air and sea freight forwarding services to and
from all over the world. With its Headquarters located in Andheri area of Mumbai, it is a one
stop freight solution provider and forwarder for clients, across many countries, especially
India, Italy, Australia and United States of America.
Chairman/ Managing Director: Paresh Bhanushali
CEO: Shantha Martin
Vice President: Mayur Bhanushali
Sales Head: Dhaval Bhanushali

Services
There are two types of brokers in the logistical industry- Freight Forwarder and Intending
Agents. Intending agents are the connectors of the importer and supplier of the companies
across the geographies. They deal on the commission basis with the clients based on
percentage decided by them or prevailing in the market. A freight forwarder, forwarder,
or forwarding agent, also known as a non-vessel operating common carrier (NVOCC), is a
person or company that organizes shipments for individuals or corporations to get goods from
the manufacturer or producer to a market, customer or final point of distribution. Forwarders
contract with a carrier or often multiple carriers to move the goods. A forwarder does not
move the goods but acts as an expert in the logistics network. The carriers can use a variety
of shipping modes, including ships, airplanes, trucks, and railroads, and often use multiple
modes for a single shipment. For example, the freight forwarder may arrange to have cargo
moved from a plant to an airport by truck, flown to the destination city and then moved from
the airport to a customer's building by another truck.
International freight forwarders typically handle international shipments and have additional
expertise in preparing and processing customs documentation and performing activities
pertaining to international shipments.
PIFS Pvt. Ltd. is one of the progressive, efficient, Logistics service provider delivering
services of Freight Forwarding- Sea Freight Forwarding LCL-FCL, Air Freight Forwarding,
Warehousing, Cross Trade, Customs Clearance, Document Processing, Transportation and
Cargo Services from/to India across the globe. PIFS Pvt. Ltd. They are also accredited with
ISO 9001:2008, own licensed MTO, FFI and also a member of Lognet Global.

Customer Segmentation
As a logistical solution provider they do not have any specific segment as a customers. All
the businesses that requires logistical function can avail their services. Their targeting is
usually based on the expertise of the sales person. As a B2B marketer a sales representative
initially segment its market based on the areas and territories. After gaining some experience
and expertise in the field of particular commodities, they group their targets and start
segmenting based on the expertise in that particular domain. Some of the areas are sports
equipment, pipes, tissue paper, electronics, floor tiles, etc For example, if a Sales man had
more clients in the field of electronics, he starts gaining expertise in terms of packaging,
carriers, documentation, etc of the electronic gadgets. So he starts targeting and pitching new
and as well as old clients in electronic area, leveraging and presenting his expertise in it by
giving reference of the shipments done by him. So, in the end they start dividing customers in
their internal team on the basis of the expertise of the each sales executive. So basically, in
the initial years segmenting and pitching clients is based on geographical areas which is later
converted on the basis of the area of expertise. They also use a combination of geographical
and commodity-based segmentation. Some segmentation provided by one of the sales
representative is as follows-
1. There is a good scope of electronic gadgets in emerging economies like India and
China. There are large number of players who want to import and export electronics
from China. So they have made a group of customers who are into electronics good
industry and have their business with suppliers and consumers in China.
2. There are also good opportunities of flooring in growing Indian housing market. As
many players import flooring tiles from Italy, clients involved in import of tiles from
Italy are one of the segment.
3. All the raw materials and commodities used for manufacturing travelling accessories
are imported from Australia and USA. As India is a big market for the manufacturing
and selling of travelling accessories, all the customers involved in those businesses
importing from Australia and USA are grouped together as one segment.
4. India has a great demand of automobile parts and accessories for the manufacturing,
selling and repairs which are imported from the automobile hub Germany. So all the
importers from the Germany for automobiles are grouped together for the purpose of
segmentation.
So basically the segmentation depends on the origin of the commodity, nature of the
commodity, production location and consumption location. It is important to have clients who
trade in products that are high in demand. This helps in generating volumes for the logistics
business which positively affects the revenue of the firm.

Sales Pitching
Clients are pitched generally in 3 ways- cold calling, existing customer references and
google. Cold calling is most effective way of pitching which on an average provides 1 % of
conversion. But in B2B as size of client is more important the conversion rate isn’t given
much emphasis by the sales person. Total sales value is more important than total number of
clients. They also resort to references by clients to other businesses. This usually helps when
they want to pitch new customers and gain credibility. This is also more effective when the
market is slowing down as cold calling gets less effective during a weak demand. Google is
used when they want to enter completely new geography. See the whole flow in Exhibit 2.
Pricing
After the sales pitching, customers are followed up till the enquiry is received. Clients come
up with their shipment orders and its details about the location, size of order, type of
commodity, date and time, etc. After that PIFS sales executive contact the suppliers and
receive quotation from them. Using Cost-plus pricing, they add up their margin which is
between 5-10% and give quotation to their clients. Usually their prices are competitive
enough, which prevents negotiation from the client’s side in their case. There are some cases,
especially while tapping new clients, they had to hit on their margin. But that practise is also
normal in that industry for acquiring new customers. As the same client may benefit the
company with more orders in the future. After getting a price a client may compare it with
others in the industry and finally select the best price and gives the order.
Price is always quoted only after the confirmation with the agents. In very rare cases when
there are repeat purchases or regular orders, they might not confirm it with the agents.

Costing
PIFS is a member of WCA (World Cargo Association) which regulates the price quoted by
the suppliers to the Freight forwarders. PIFS has 4 to 5 approved agents from WCA to whom
they ask for the quotation. Best price from this agents is selected and given the contract.
Selection of agents is changed from order to order based on the price they quote. This prices
are used as the base price for cost-plus pricing.

Freight Forwarding
Suppliers Customers
Agents

Decision Makers
Earlier, in the PIFS client’s organisations, decision makers were the proprietors or the owners
of the business. Currently those organization have a logistics team of 5 to 6 members. The
team is leaded by the logistics manager. He is the decision maker and approver of the price
quotation sent by the PIFS. They approve the quotation and finalise the contract after which
the process is handled by the other team members.

Customer Relationship Management

As soon as the order is converted and prices are fixed, the bait is passed on to the Customer
Relations Department, who keep on updating the customers by sending them the Weekly
Status Reports of their shipment via email in the form of the excel sheets. All the queries
during the goods in transit are handled by Customer Relations officer. This helps in reducing
the errors during the transit and also keeps the customer at the ease. When the goods enter
India, the documentation team comes into the play. They make arrangements of all the
required documents for the goods to be produced against various authorities like custom and
clearance department, etc. Every shipping line has different procedures to be followed.
Documentation team have personnel who are specialised in it. All the instructions related to
documents are informed prior to the clients, so that the can make all the necessary
arrangements. After the documentation the goods are shipped to the destination provided by
the client on the given date and time.

Some of the critical points PIFS keep in mind for build relations with the
customers:
1. Provide updates about each and every movement of their good to the customers on
regular basis. It is done via e-mail providing a regular spreadsheet about all the orders
and shipments. As there are multiple orders with multiple deliveries at multiple dates
and time, a regular detailed spreadsheet is sent weekly to all the customers. They term
is as a WSR( Weekly Status Report)
2. No facts about any mistakes or any mishaps should be hidden from the customers.
There are chances of loss in transit, or some manual mistakes. Hiding it and cheating
it will make them lose the customer for whole life. But informing on time and try to
mitigate the same might save the customer. Also it will not lead to much loss of
goodwill in the market.
3. Provide fair and competitive prices. Stay updated about the prices by the customers
4. Keep updating clients about the holidays in India and other countries so that they can
plan their shipping taking into account those days. Maintain regular contacts with
sending wishes and gifts during the festivals.

Some of the critical points that can lead to loss of customers:

1. Delay in shipment
2. Increasing the price over and above the price fixed during the order

Some Customers of PIFS

They have successfully served big companies like Godrej Industries,Videocon, Hyundai,
Kirloskar, Raymonds, Hettich India, Assa Abloy, Hafele India, Carrefour, Tele Brands,
Arvind Mills, Alok Industries, Sanmar Group, Indo Japan Ltd, Art Yarn India Pvt Ltd,
Pentair, Tag Off Shore, Great Off Shore, Potain India, Clarks, Inc5 Shoes, Ncs Group and
many more covering electronics, textiles, industrial goods and machineries, construction
materials, automobiles, travel accessories, etc.
Exhibit 1- Pentagon International Freight Solutions Pvt Ltd

Address: 201, Twin Complex, Phase-1, Marol Junction Opp. Fire Brigade, Andheri East,
Mumbai, Maharashtra 400059
Phone: 022 2920 9849

Exhibit 2- Regular flow of order

When goods reach India or

Enquiry from the customers- are going to be shipped from Weekly Status Report is sent
they send prices along with India, documentation team regularly by CRM team to
their requirements handles all the update the client
documentation work

Requirements are forwarded As the order is fixed, CRM

Completion of the shipment
to the agents to get the department handles the
and collection of the pament
quotation from them whole shipment jouney

Quotation given to the

These prices are then sent to
customers keeping other Enquiry to get the repeat
sales representatives
departments, especially CRM orders and continuation of
tocommunicate them with
department, in loop via e- the existing chain of orders
the clients
mail