0.1 The Authors

Professor Michael J. Swenson is the Ford Professor of Marketing at Brigham Young University and is an expert in sales force effectiveness, marketing planning, and market strategy. Swenson currently conducts sales management seminars for national companies on the following topics: professional selling, adaptive selling, and coping successfully with job burnout and salesperson rejection. He has worked in sales positions with Xerox and Digital Equipment Corporation. His consulting experience includes work as a marketing strategy and salesperson performance consultant for leading companies worldwide. His research has been published in the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Business Research, Industrial Marketing Management, European Journal of Marketing, and Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management. He is currently the associate editor for the Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management. Professor Swenson received his PhD in marketing at the University of Oregon in 1989.

David B. Whitlark is the J.C. Penney Professor of Marketing and earned a doctorate degree from the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia and a master of business administration degree from the SC Johnson School of Management at Cornell University. Whitlark has published over thirty academic articles and book chapters about sales forecasting, marketing research, and customer value. He is a former VP/director of research at Wirthlin Worldwide, now a subsidiary of Harris Interactive, where he worked with a wide variety of Fortune 500 companies, industry associations, and public service organizations. His areas of expertise are in the following areas: branding, advertising research, survey design, multivariate statistics, and ethnographic interviewing. Over his career, Dr. Whitlark has worked with many leading brands, including Charmin, Pampers, Progresso, Yoplait, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Fiber One, Hamburger Helper, and Chex Mix.

Gary K. Rhoads holds a PhD in marketing from Texas Tech University and is currently the Stephen Mack Covey Professor of Marketing and Entrepreneurship at Brigham Young University. He presently works with start-up companies on crafting marketing strategies that accelerate company growth. He has published articles in the Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Marketing, and Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management and serves on the board of advisors for the Center of Economic Development and Opportunity to help start-up firms in Utah launch successfully. Rhoads is the coauthor of two entrepreneurship books, Stop Think Lead: Managing the Unexpected Bumps in The Road (2012) and BoomStart Marketing: Finding, Funding and Marketing New Ideas (2012), which highlight the best leadership and marketing practices of successful entrepreneurs.