Killer Sales Disease Strikes by Jill Konrath

I had a big meeting with a prospective client at 8:30. I was ecstatic because it had taken me forever to get this meeting set up. My initial contact had been months before, but my persistence finally paid off.

Now, with the way things were going, it would take a miracle to get there on time. I turned on the radio and tuned into the station that gave the most frequent traffic updates. If there were more traffic problems ahead, I needed to know right away so I could switch to an alternate route.

They were just starting to give the latest congestion alert when suddenly the announcer broke in.

"Ladies and gentlemen. We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming this morning to bring you some breaking news from the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia."

I didn't need to hear any health alerts. I needed to know where the traffic problems were. I quickly switched to another station. And another. And then another.

It looked like I didn't have a choice. They were all talking about the same thing. I decided I'd better pay attention. Here's what they're saying ....

* * *

"This disease, Featurus Vomititus, has now reached epidemic proportions and appears to be out of control," said the reporter. "In my conversations with specialists here at the CDC, here's what I've learned:

Nearly 90% of the sales population has been afflicted with this highly contagious disease.
Anyone who sells their services to earn a living (like professional services providers, business owner and consultants) can come down with a serious case within minutes of making a sales call.

The most visible symptom of Featurus Vomititus is a forceful spewing from the mouth of product or service descriptors. Those who have the disease seem totally unable to stop themselves from doing this, despite the negative consequences on their sales efforts.

This volatile behavior is triggered by the presence of a catalytic agent, more commonly described as a prospective customer.

Other symptoms include a leaning forward, over-the-desk posture which appears "aggressive" to people talking to the afflicted.

Those sellers suffering from Featurus Vomititus report an overwhelming and compulsive desire to show marketing collateral to their prospects.

Finally, all these symptoms are grossly magnified if the company they work for carries the dominant Nu-Productum Rapturous gene. This genetic condition creates a state of organizational euphoria and delirium brought on by the introduction of a long-awaited new product or service."Interestingly enough, most of those who suffer from this debilitating disease are totally unaware that they have it. For some strange reason, Featurus Vomititus is able to convince the brain that this behavior is totally normal for people who sell.

"Prospective customers seem to have an uncanny ability to immediately detect if a salesperson is a carrier. Most can even detect its presence over phone lines, which protects them from scheduling meetings where they'll be subject to the verbal barrage.

"In the off chance that a disease carrier slips through their gatekeeping, prospective customers arm themselves with a whole slew of objections that seem to work well to ward off the attack.

"That's the latest word here in Atlanta. For treatment tips, we'll now be hearing from a world-renowned sales strategist out of White Bear Lake, Minnesota. Take it away, Jill!"

* * *

"Over the years I've been in sales, I've worked with numerous people who have suffered from severe cases of Featurus Vomititus," said Jill Konrath, author of Selling to Big Companies and SNAP Selling.

"In virtually every patient I've seen, this disease has had a profoundly negative impact on their sales success and income level. Nothing kills sales opportunities faster than the product spewing that's the classic symptom of this disease - and I mean nothing!

"While there's no known cure, sufferers have learned ways to cope with it and ultimately prosper. However, they must be ever vigilant to the re-emergence of symptoms."

Konrath continued, "The leaning forward behavior is generally the first indicator of an upcoming relapse. I coach all sellers to be aware when this urge hits them because it usually means that a product dump is not far behind.

"In our training programs, we teach sellers how to quickly recover by saying something like, 'Sorry. Sometimes I get so excited about our XYZ product. But what's most important is what's going on in your business. Let's get back to that.

"Sellers need to rewire their brains too. They need to realize that no one really wants to buy their product or service. To customers, their offering is simply a tool to help them achieve their goals and objectives.

"To be successful in sales today, sellers need to think about helping customers improve their business," Konrath added. "They need to bring them ideas and insights, not a laundry list of features.

"They need to be able to talk about business issues and value propositions, not the intimate details of their service processes or product capabilities. And they need to ask insightful, powerful questions to demonstrate their knowledge and expertise, as well as their commitment to help their customers."

Konrath concluded, "Relapses of Featurus Vomititus are nearly 100% preventable with awareness and pre-call preparation. And the disease does not have to be a sales killer. I've seen sellers experience miraculous recoveries within a short period of time."

***

Jill Konrath, author of SNAP Selling and Selling to Big Companies, is a frequent speaker at sales conferences. For more fresh sales strategies that work with today's crazy-busy prospects AND to get four sales-accelerating tools, visit www.snapselling.com.

The Year I Lost My Brain - And How I Got It Back, by Jill Konrath

Jill Konrath
Snap Selling

It started exactly 12 months ago, right after SNAP Selling came out. At first I didn't recognized the symptoms, but in retrospect, they were there.

I was crazy-busy, running from one "must do" activity to the next. My inbox overflowed. I was constantly online, answering emails, tweeting, blogging, whatever.

Time evaporated before my eyes. At the end of the day, my endless To Do list was even longer. I'd accomplished virtually nothing, yet I'd worked the entire day.

Awash in this swirl of scattered activities, my primary goal was to stay afloat.

On my daily walks, I listened to podcasts and interviews. In the evenings, I plopped in front of the TV, surrounded by my computer, iPhone and iPad. Never disconnected, constantly consuming an endless supply of media.

Then I got hooked on a few computer games. These mindless diversions, my guilty little pleasures, filled up what was left of my free time. Hah! Did I say free time? There was none.

Clearly, this was no way to live. It was an existence, not a life. But things were really much worse.

I was actually losing my mind.

Please don't think I'm crazy. The truth is, if what I described sounds even remotely similar to your life, you're losing your mind too.

It's actually a function of our constant online flitting. There's a ton of research now showing that the internet is actually changing our brain. In short, we're losing our ability to:

• Concentrate: The more we're online, the more scatterbrained we become. We scan, but don't think - and certainly not deeply. And, we're forgetful. Yet we crave more stimuli and keep clicking away.

• Create: When we're caught in this morass, we can't come up with new ideas and rich insights. With our brains are on overload, they're stuck at a low-level of processing.

I felt all of this. I was spinning in place, going nowhere in a constantly distracted state. I even tried to be more productive, but that didn't work either.

Then I finally got away from it all - to a place where I couldn't be reached by phone and had minimal internet access. At first, I was twitchy. Really twitchy. (Going through withdrawal is tough.)

Amazingly, within two days my brain started coming back.

Creative thoughts popped into my mind. Fun ideas emerged. Fresh perspectives surfaced. I wrote everything down so I wouldn't forget - and also to free up my brain to do more important things.

And, since I like how I'm feeling a whole lot more now than I did before, here's the commitment I made to myself:

• I will limit my internet time to 3 hours per day. I refuse to let the internet destroy my creativity and problem-solving capacity.

• I will be unreachable for at least one hour daily. To do my job effectively, I need to think. I can't think when I don't protect my time.

• I will always have one fun project I'm working on. That's what keeps me alive.

• I will stay focused on the activity I'm on. This may be the hardest of all since I'm so used to allowing distractions. I can't tell you how many urges I fought off while writing this article.

Maybe you haven't lost your mind yet. If that's the case, make sure you protect it at all costs.

But if you're at all like me, your brain has already been severely impacted. I urge you to consider reclaiming it. The truth is, it's the key to your personal and professional success.
***
Jill Konrath is an internationally-recognized speaker & bestselling author of SNAP Selling and Selling to Big Companies. She helps sellers land new accounts and speed up sales cycles. To get four free sales-accelerating tools, visit  www.snapselling.com.

          

SalesGiants interviews Paul McCord, author of Bust Your Slump

Paul McCord,
author of Bust Your Slump

Best-selling author, speaker, and leading authority on lead generation and personal marketing, Paul has been training, coaching and mentoring salespeople for over 20 years and managing and consulting with companies for over 15 years.

1) Paul, let's begin by talking about your book, Bust Your Slump. What's the idea behind the book? Why did you write it?

The economy has really played havoc on a great many seller’s pipelines.  Over the past couple of years we’ve seen a tremendous number of people have to leave selling and many more are limping along, just barely hanging on.

I’ve investigated thousands of sellers in slumps and have found they all have many things in common such as the obvious decrease in activity and negative mental attitude, but also that they lose faith in the prospecting methods they have used in the past and that most do not have a solid, proven sales process.

I wrote Bust Your Slump to address these issues, but in particular to present a number of very successful and proven strategies that will increase sales very quickly.  None of the dozen strategies are new or revolutionary.  In fact, they all have a long history of great success.   You could say that the strategies are going back to the basics. 

These strategies include things such as generating referrals, networking, cold calling, mining one’s client base, working orphan files, and the like.  The difference is that instead of just asking for referrals, the book presents a very detailed strategy how a seller can get 30, 40, maybe even 50 high quality referrals to prospects the seller knows they want to get referred to in a very short period of time—within a month.  Another strategy details the single most enjoyable prospecting method there is and how to use that method to generate a pipeline full of business in month.

They key to using the book is to understand that the strategies presented are short-term strategies.  They are by their very nature limited in how long they can work.  For instance, one of the strategies concerns mining the orphan files that might be in the file cabinets in your office.  There is a huge amount of untapped business in orphan files.  The problem is how long will orphan files last?  If you’re in a very large office that has been established for years, you might be able to generate a great deal of business consistently for months, maybe even a year.  But what happens after the orphans run out?

While you’re getting your pipeline and bank account pumped up with these short-term strategies, you also have to be learning and instituting the long-term strategies that will keep you from sliding back into the slump once you’ve milked the short-strategies.

2) In a short sentence, who should read your book? What kind of advice should they be looking for?

The book is aimed at sellers--whether salespeople, professionals, or business owners—who are hurting for business and need to pump up their business quickly, and sales managers who have sellers in a slump.  The book lays out the four steps they must take to bust their slump—realign their thinking, find new prospecting strategies that they can enthusiastically put into practice, increase their activity, and learn new long-term strategies. 

The book concentrates on second step—those strategies they can institute that will quickly increase their sales, and give direction where to find help in realigning their thinking and learning the long-term strategies they must acquire to prevent sliding back into a slump.

3) On the other hand, who shouldn’t? What will readers NOT find in your book?

The book does not present nor does it pretend to present long-term business development strategies. The book is designed to do one thing—help you bust out of your sales slump, period.

4) What's the first thing someone should do after reading your book?

The book is an easy, quick read.  A reader should read all 12 strategies, then pick the one or two, three at the very most, strategies that best fit their market and personality and get to work. This is an action book. No theory. No what if’s. Action.  Not all of the strategies will be appropriate for any one reader.  There are strategies that work B2B, others B2C.  Some work for commodity type situations, others for more sophisticated, relationship driven environments.

 

About your preferences:

5) Besides your own website ( http://www.dynamicsalesgrowth.com), what other sales websites would you recommend? 

This is tough simply because there are so many really fine websites and blogs.  But let me give a few that have a broad range of expert contributions:

• www.focus.com
• www.eyesonsales.com
• www.salesopedia.com
• www.topsalesworld.com
• www.thecustomercollective.com
• www.allbusiness.com

6) What are your preferred sales/business books?

Again, very tough.  I’ll give just a few:

• Selling to Big Companies by Jill Konrath
• The Accidental Salesperson by Chris Lytle
• Coaching Salespeople into Sales Champions by Keith Rosen
• Mastering the World of Selling by Eric Taylor
• SPIN Selling by Neil Rackham
• Question Based Selling by Thomas Freese
• Selling to VITO by Anthony Parinello
• Customer Centric Selling by Michael Bosworth

                             

    

                             

   

           

About you:

7) How did you get started in sales?

I was working on a doctorate in philosophy when I came to the realization that all the fuss, all the arguing, all the “research” was nothing but BS.  Nothing was ever going to get done.  Theory was great fun to argue but ultimately it meant nothing.

I decided I wanted to contribute something of intrinsic value, not sit in the clouds looking down upon great unwashed.  Heck, I wanted to be one of the unwashed.

I left the university and started looking for job.  The offer was to sell cabinets and millwork to builders and general contractors.  I knew nothing about selling but liked the idea—and hey, it came with a salary and company car to boot.

I’ve been in sales ever since.  I moved from millwork to financial services.  Discovered that commissioned sales was far more lucrative than salaried sales.  Eventually realized I couldn’t rely on the company I was working for to provide for my training and education.

Over the past 30 years I’ve learned a great deal—and yet have so much more to learn myself.  Sales, I believe, really is the cutting edge of business.  We pretty much see everything first and we’re the ones who really have to figure out how to overcome the market changes, the increased competition, the increasing sophistication of prospects.

8) Most memorable sale? 

Actually my most memorable sale took place with my first sales job. Again, I sold cabinets and millwork to builders.  I had worked diligently to sell the cabinets and all of the millwork for a large, almost 300 unit apartment complex in Dallas.
           
When it came time to negotiate the contract, since I was pretty new, the VP of Finance went with me.  He got stuck on a relatively minor point and the deal fell through. I was furious, but decided I’d continue to build my relationship with the builder.

About a quarter ways through the project the builder was fed up with company who they had signed a contract with after mine fell through.  I sat down with the builder once more and worked out a deal for us to pick up the project and finish it. I was very gratified to have regained a contract I had lost and especially to have successfully negotiated a contract that had been lost by our VP of Finance.

That one experience taught me the power of relationships—and that you never know what might happen even after you’ve lost the deal.

9) Most disastrous sale (or funny situation)?

The most disastrous—and one of the funniest--was when I was wholesaling investments to NASD broker-dealer firms.  There are two sales you have to make when you wholesale investments—the first is to the firm, but the real sale is to the financial advisors to get them to use the product with their clients. 

I was in New York meeting with a pair of Senior VP’s for one of the major wirehouses and had taken them to lunch.  After lunch we were to have a half day introductory session with their major producers.  They had brought in several dozen big producers for the day and had set up closed circuit TV in many of the offices around the county.  They’d invested a great deal of time and money for this kickoff presentation.

Unfortunately while at lunch the bank next door was robbed and the bank robbers had run through the restaurant we were dining in to escape.  The police held all of us in the restaurant until we had been interviewed to make sure that we weren’t one of the bank robbers trying to blend into the crowd.

Needless to say, we didn’t make it back to the office for the presentation. When we did get back, almost three hours late, I found one of the mutual fund product specialists trying to do an introductory presentation on a product he knew very little about.

I took over for the last half hour but the damage was done.  We never had an opportunity to reschedule the launch.  It took months to finally get the product really up and running.  We lost huge sales, as did the broker-dealer. An absolute mess, all due to being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

About your work as a sales expert:

  

10) What is the biggest mistake you see as a sales expert? 

Ingrained, unimaginative, hard headed thinking. The world is changing.  Prospects are changing the way they respond to our attempts to connect with them.  Yet so many salespeople and companies are resistant to the idea that there might be better ways to find and connect with quality prospects than the way they’ve been doing things. 

Instead of looking to find better, more effective strategies, they resort to trying to do more of what isn’t working; thinking that if you do more of what isn’t working it will work.  That’s, as we all know, one of the pop definitions of crazy—doing the same thing and expecting a different result.

11) What is the best sales advice you have ever received?

Sales are built on relationships founded on honesty and a sincere desire to find a quality solution to the prospect’s issues, not on price or trickery.  That advice has served me well.  Yes, I’ve lost some sales based on price or to a seller who was willing to say and/or do anything to get a sale.  But I’ve sold far more and at good margin based on developing relationships whose foundation was honesty and mutual respect.

12) What advice would you give to someone just starting out in sales?

Be proud of your profession.  So many sellers try to hide what they do.  They create all kinds of titles for themselves to hide the fact they sell.  Selling is the foundation of society.  No one would have anything if it weren’t for us sellers.  We are the ones who give the scientist working on a cure for cancer to have the time and resources to do his research; we are the ones that provide the dollars for teachers.  If it weren’t for us there wouldn’t be a single home, car, medicine, loaf of bread, or anything else. 

Don’t be ashamed of what you do.  You truly are the engine of the world’s commerce.

13) What are you working on right now that makes you feel energized? What's your next big project?

I’m doing a great deal of work with companies, as well as individual sellers and business owners, helping them get their sales teams back on track using the strategies contained in Bust Your Slump. 

But I’m also working on constructing a comprehensive format to help sellers develop their own public image and reputation through the use of traditional PR strategies, social media, and traditional media.  Certainly there are a number of resources that discuss these resources, but there really isn’t anything that not only combines them all, but that really gives detailed actionable guidance on how to use the resources and how to move from a local to a regional then national format.

It’s a big project that meshes prospecting, personal marketing, PR, marketing, and technology into a single, highly focused message.

***

To know more about Paul McCord, author of Bust Your Slump, please visit http://www.powerreferralselling.com/index.html

You can buy his book (Amazon) here: Bust Your Slump: A Dozen Strategies to Fill Your Pipeline in 30 Days

SalesGiants interviews Ken Thoreson, Your Sales Management Guru

Ken Thoreson,
Your Sales Management Guru

Ken Thoreson is a sales leadership and sales management guidance speaker, consultant, author and executionist. He's also Your Sales Management Guru!

1) Ken, what kind of customers do you usually work with and how do you help them exactly?

During our 13 years of consulting, Acumen Management Group has worked with hundreds of  B2B clients; they have been in early stage to high growth to turnaround situations.

Specifically we assist our clients in building a business and sales strategy with a focus on execution. We like to say we operationalize the business strategies. Our belief is to build a prescriptive approach to the strategic sales management aspects of an organization rather than allowing opportunistic or ad hoc systems and operations to exist. 

We focus on the tough job of sales management; hiring/recruiting top talent, building sales compensations plans that drive results, creating management systems to help build predictable revenue, teaching leadership/management skills and building a culture of high performance. We use our experience, our process, and tool set to make a difference in our clients business and personal lives.

2) In a short sentence, what companies should be interested in your consulting services? 

Our ideal client companies are frustrated in not achieving predictable revenues, are not winning market share or are growing so rapidly they cannot build the infrastructure  necessary to support their sales channel.

The other level of companies we serve are major vendors that use independent dealers, VARS, resellers to go to market. We create Partner Facing programs to assist the vendor companies in building a stronger channel organizations, increasing loyalty and partner profitability. Our clients in this segment are Microsoft, Cisco Systems, Ingram, TechData, etc.

3) On the other hand, who shouldn’t? What will companies NOT find in Acumen?

Acumen is not a marketing or lead generation firm and we are not a sales training organization, we have a close eco-system partnership with firms that can perform those services.  We focus typically on the weak link in most firms, the sales management function.

4) Besides your website (http://yoursalesmanagementguru.com/), what other sales websites would you recommend? 

Acumen’s main web site: www.AcumenManagement.com offers :

• a White Paper on the Job of Sales Management: the 40 actions sales management must do to build predictable revenue,
• free assessments on sales management, sales compensation and your overall business operations,
• free video’s on hiring salespeople,
• free video on building sales  training programs and on-boarding new hires as well, 
• radio interviews on several topics related to sales management and leadership.

We also have a complete list of free articles on general sales management topics and 5 hours of Sales Management training on DVD’s and our Interactive Sales Managers’ Tool Kit.

5) How about your preferred sales/business books?

For salespeople: I have been recommending Jill Konrath’s latest book: SNAP Selling.  Obviously our recently published books from our “Your Sales Management Guru” brand have been well received, they are The Sales Management Guru’s Guide to Hiring a High Performance Sales Team, The Sales Management Guru’s Guide to Sales Management and the Sales Management Guru’s Guide to Build Sale Compensation Plans. They are packed with great practical insights and tools for sales leaders. 

About you:

6) How did you get started in sales?

Right out of college, I was hired by Burroughs Corporation, in the computer business and in those day’s they had a great sales training program. Extremely thorough and it set the basis for everything I have done. I then worked for a small independent entreprenurial organization as a sales manager and VP of Sales.  From there I became a VP of Sales for a North American based vertical software organization that sold our solutions through a network of channel partners. Those two experiences gave me a basis for understanding small business as well as more complex aspects of sales leadership.

7) Most memorable sale? 

There are quite a few, but one that sticks out was  a nearly a million dollar order from a major corporation, I was told I had the order on Friday morning, I offered to pick it up, but the client told me he would mail it to me, he was located about 45 minutes to an hour away from my office..  The man died over the weekend from an heart attack and in the transition a merger took place and I never received the PO!... A lesson learned! PICK UP THE ORDER and stay  with it. I was fairly young and what a difference that would have made... but it taught me an important lesson.

8) Most disastrous sale (or funny situation)?

I recall as a sales manager helping a young rep at the end of December, the rep had been told the PO was done, and on her prospects desk. In calling the prospect we learned from his voice mail, the “buyer” had left for the holidays.   We took a lesson from an old movie” All The Presidents’ Men”, we started dialing all the phone numbers that had similar phone numbers to our buyer.  Finally someone picked up the phone; we sold him on walking over to this person’s desk and finding the PO and faxing it to us!  That order put the young sales rep over her quota for the year!  Everyone felt good and I felt great because we didn’t quit, we were creative and it worked!

                       

 About your work as a sales expert:

  

9) What is the biggest mistake you see as a sales expert? 

Our work as a sales management consultant puts us in a position to see many mistakes made by owners or sales managers. The number one mistakes however  is simply a lack of focus on hiring. We do not see a systematic approach to “Hiring the best-not the best available”. A sales manager should  spend 20% of their time in hiring, interviewing and on boarding properly.  With great people, great things happen. We like to say that for each hire, you need to interview a minimum of 5 individuals and you should be advertising for talent at all times-consider it your marketing campaign for building your company.

A Sales Management Guru hint: the great salespeople may not be looking when you are, so you must always be interviewing. Our book provides many tips and tools to improve your odds in hiring. Remember if you lose a salesperson, it could take you 90 days to find their replacement and another 90 days for them to build their sales pipeline-that is 180 days or 6 months without their revenues adding to your quota goals-that is why the life span of most sales managers is less than 18 months.

10) What is the best sales advice you have ever received?

Two that I recall:

“You must know the difference between presenting and selling”. 
“The 3 laws of selling: emotion, emotion, emotion. You must have it, you must transfer it and you must have the prospect ready to take action based upon it.”

  

11) What are you working on right now that makes you feel energized? What's your next big project?

Well, with 4 books being published and my consulting practice in good shape and our Sales Leadership Workouts organized  (workshops) , the next big action item is our motivational  Keynote programs where I share my experiences, but also the concepts of creating both personal and professional success.  I call it “No Regret’s, a Do-over Recipe for Personal and Professional success. It ties in with my Sales Management consulting, my life experiences, my love of cooking along with solid idea’s to help others find success. In one of my new books, that I co-authored with Stephen Covey; Success Simplified I highlight how to Create a Menu for Life.

  

12) What is the best testimonial/comment you have ever received? 

Great question: thinking back on our many comments and the quotes from our website, it might be: "If I were to condense my opinion of the value received from you over the years into one thought it would be that you provide detail upon detail in our conversations – not abstract theory but practical, useable information

13) Any last comments?

The role of sales management is tough. You report to the President, you must work with your peer group of other managers and you must lead your  team! Everyone in the company knows who you are and how well you are performing. It takes work, a positive attitude and insight.  Our newsletter might be of value to your readers: “Why Sales Managers Succeed”, each month I focus on the Personal, Professional and Organizational aspects of sales leaderships. They can  subscribe (free) at our website, www.AcumenManagement.com

***

To know more about Ken Thoreson and Acumen Management, please visite www.AcumenManagement.com or his blog http://www.yoursalesmanagementguru.com

SalesGiants Interviews Hank Trisler, Author of No Bull Selling

Hank Trisler, author of No Bull Selling

At 73, Hank Trisler has seen it all. And he tells it how it is.  According to Hank, selling isn't very complicated. It's not exactly nuclear physics. We all know people less intellectually gifted than we are who consistently sell at high levels. Selling is hard work, but it's simple. People selling well know that customers buy based on two principles:

1. People buy on emotion and justify the purchase with fact,
2. People buy for their reasons, not ours.

In this interview Hank Trisler, author of No Bull Selling, shares with us what he’s learned with all his years of practice.

About your book:

1)      Hank, let’s start by talking about your book No Bull Selling. 

       Who should read it?

NO BULL SELLING is written in large print and little bitty words. People new to selling will find the examples clear and the assignments manageable. Assignments? Oh yeah, you start selling on the first day. Grizzled veterans will get back in touch with techniques that made them great in the first place.  That’s more than one sentence, but there’s a little something there for everyone, even non-sales folks.

2)      On the other hand, who should’t read it? What will salesprofesssionals NOT find in your book?

Those looking for easy answers and “canned pitches” will be disappointed. The pay is far greater for asking the right questions than for knowing the right answers, so I have not attempted to include the answers in my book.

3)      What is the book’s greatest lesson?

There are two primary lessons in the book. The first is to shut up and let the customer buy. The second is that this is not brain surgery. You have to forgive yourself your stupid mistakes and keep on keeping on.

4)      What should people do after they finish reading the book and put it down?

Don’t put the book down. There are exercises at the end of the chapters. You’re talking to suspects, prospects and customers the first day and every day thereafter. Never stop doing that.

5)      What are your favorite sales books?

Tough question, as there are so very many good ones. I have long loved, How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling by Frank Bettger. People Buy You by Jeb Blount and Snap Selling by Jill Konrath lead the list of current offerings.

       

    

  

About you:

6)      How did you start your career in sales?

I don’t think I really ever had a choice. My Dad was a salesman and I just always assumed I’d sell.

7)      What was your most memorable sale?

Damned if I know the most memorable sale. I’ve long since spent all the commissions I’ve earned and that’s what was most memorable. I don’t look at selling as some sort of art form, but rather a business. I don’t have any of my customer’s heads on my office wall, either.

8)      How about your first sale?

I sold my first big truck to a fellow named Ralph, who owned a lumber yard in Renton, WA. I didn’t know that HD springs stood for Heavy Duty springs and didn’t want to get surprised when the truck came in, so I didn’t order them. When we put a load of lumber on the truck, it just squatted. Wouldn’t roll an inch. The whole story is in NO BULL SELLING, if you need it. There have been countless other disasters, but there’s little point in dwelling on them.

About your work as an expert:

9)      What is the biggest mistake you see as a sales consultant?

No problem here. Talking too much is the runaway winner. Salescritters fear silence and run their jaws to keep from seeming stupid and prove just the opposite. Talking too much leads them inexorably into a whole string of problems, many of which can simply not be overcome.

10)  What project are you working on right now that makes you feel energized?

Your question is a good one and makes me realize that, at 73, I have pretty much run my race as far as acquisition is concerned. I’ve been most of the places I wanted to go and have owned most of the things I really wanted. You’re absolutely right, I need a project and I’ll get one week after next.

11)  What is the best testimonial you have ever received?

I have a wife and children and grandchildren who all claim a certain affinity for me. I guess that’s my greatest testimonial.

***

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