I love the feeling of a jolt of creativity, hitting me when I least expect it – especially when accompanied by a bolt of inspiration at the same time, which is exactly what happened to me recently.
On a flight returning to Los Angeles from the East coast, I was working on my computer trying to finish a new sales article I was writing. Another passenger noticed this and commented that he too was involved in sales. As I looked over at him, he started to introduce himself. I exclaimed, “You’re Tom Hopkins, the king of sales! You’re one of the greatest. Of course I know who you are!” loud enough for even the passengers in coach to cock their heads in interest.
Tom Hopkins
While indulging my over-exuberance, he politely accepted my compliment and we ended up having had a pleasant conversation. I told him I had read every book he had written and that I had established and maintained a hugely successful, international sales force for the marketing company I worked with, based largely upon the principles outlined in his books.
Tom was friendly and seemed sincerely interested in everything I had to say. I realized in that instant two important things that made him the sales master.
a. He sounded (in person) exactly as he did in writing; the complete professional; effortlessly able to make someone like him and trust him; the ultimate goal of any salesperson.
b. In his writing, as I had experienced, he was the consummate professional, friendly, sincere, to the point, all the while sounding just like himself - the goal of any great author.
That brief interchange confirmed for me again why he is so successful in his chosen profession as a salesman and author. He sounds like he writes and writes like he sounds; just honestly being himself no matter what “hat” he was wearing. This fact alone separates him from the over-crowded world of salespeople, and he definitely is one of the greats, and shows that he knows and lives the secret of sales greatness.
On reflection, I saw that this brief interlude gave me a spark of creative thought regarding my own book on the subject of sales. In running into Tom, I was reminded of my extensive study in early years when I was reading everything on the subject in an effort to isolate the basic fundamentals of the area and find out what worked and what didn’t.
His book, “How To Master The Art Of Selling,” is still considered the ”bible” of all sales texts. Other books on the subject seem to pale in comparison and fall into one of several, predictable categories as follows:
- the “How I Done It!” type, a personal recitation of what techniques the author has used to become successful, which may or may not have relevance to your own work;
- the “Sales 101 for Dummies” type, some of which have limited value in terms of isolating basics, others are just too simplistic for practical use;
- the technical, over-analyzed, logical treatises on the subject replete with the requisite graphs and formulas, trying to reduce the human activity of selling to a mechanical process, leaving me wondering who the authors (there are almost always two of them) were considering as their public;
- the “techniques” type where the focus is solely on some glib, stop-gap, tip of the day to memorize, “guaranteed” to close the sale for you today;
- the psychologically oriented texts that get so far involved in the subjective nature of sales, that they occasionally lead you into mental blind alleys with no way out;
- the “new-age” orientated ones that deal exclusively in the touchy-feely side of selling, again with a very narrow span of workability;
- the “bottom-liners,” type which shows you how to deal with professional buyers which may have some limited workability for that specific type of sale;
- the “insiders secrets” types which try to close sales while providing no underlying theory of what you’re applying, requiring that you rely exclusively on what the author gives you; and finally,
- the “ivory tower” types, usually written as a thesis by those who have never felt the weight of a full suitcase after a day of door to door selling; tried to check numerous, weighty banker-boxes full of presentation materials through customs on international flights; had a room full of high-level executives ready for the “song and dance” you were prepared to give and have the projector suddenly quit, leaving you to give the presentation of your exhaustively prepared power-point slide show on your laptop computer!
Dan Jacobs
In any case, after wading through volumes of diverse texts on selling, I reached a point where, within a minute or two, decide whether it is going to be of any lasting value. And yes, I usually can find some value in nearly any book, but only if I already know what I’m looking for.
Otherwise, it’s easy to get lost in the oceans of data where each fact has the same value as any another. The marginal utility of searching though yet another book to find one bit of useful wisdom pales in comparison to getting engaged in the process of selling. That is after all, where the rubber meets the road. No amount of theoretical study of sales can give you the experience of the real thing.
I find that extemporaneous writings or stories by sales veterans contain nuggets of truth and wisdom based on real-life experiences, presented compellingly and to the point without a lot of pomp and circumstance cluttering the message.
Selling is an art, but it is my opinion and experience that there are basic fundamental principles underlying this subject on the order of a science. My goal is to align the subject to fundamental axiomatic basics, that once known and understood, would allow the reader to develop their own unique selling position or artistic style.
The result is that the individual would end up being truly one of a kind in the selling world, by being honestly themselves, which is, in fact, the real “secret” of sales greatness.
For those who aspire to such a lofty position in the profession of sales, my best wishes for a pleasant journey and prosperous future. It is definitely worth the effort!
daniel w. jacobs
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