Select Champions Recruitment is the starting point in building a superior sales team. Most problems experienced by sales managers originate in the recruitment of inappropriate people for sales positions in the first place. Selection of the proper salespeople is one of the most difficult tasks you have, but it can account for as much as...

Build a Great Sales Team All work is done by teams. Your job is essentially that of a team builder and a team leader. All teams depend on the peak performance of each team member. Your job is to assemble a superior team first, then to bring every member on the team up to top...

The Role of the Sales Manager The number one role of the sales manager is to generate the sales that are essential to the survival of the company. The sales manager achieves these sales results by working with and through other salespeople. One of your most important jobs is to determine the level of sales...

The Successful Negotiator WHAT ARE the marks of a successful negotiator and how can you tell if you are one? If you observe successful negotiators, you will find several common characteristics and practices. First, they view negotiating as a lifelong process; it is never-ending. They see all of life as a process of compromising and...

Negotiations Are Never Final NEGOTIATION SHOULD be seen as an ongoing process. No negotiation is ever final. If you get new information that changes your perspective on the situation, go back and ask to reopen the negotiation. We talked before about the “Chinese contract.” If you are negotiating with another party with whom you intend...

The Walk Away Method THIS IS ONE of the most powerful tools in negotiation. In fact, you should never enter into a serious negotiation unless you are prepared to walk away if you do not achieve your most important goals in a transaction. Previously, we talked about the importance of developing options (Chapter Twelve) and...

Price Negotiating Tactics IN CHAPTER THREE, we talked about two types of negotiation: the short-term, onetime negotiation and the long-term business negotiation. In the short-term negotiation, your job is to get the very best price and terms at this moment, without concern for whether you will ever see or work with this person again. There...

Persuasion by Social Proof ONE OF THE most powerful influences on thinking is what other people “like me” have done in a similar situation. We are inordinately influenced by the behaviors of other people with whom we identify and to whom we relate. Keeping Up with the Joneses I remember a door-to-door magazine saleswoman coming...

Persuasion by Reciprocation IN HIS BOOK, Influence, Robert Cialdini lists the factors that have the greatest impact on the way people think and respond to you. The most powerful of all influences, in his estimation, is the power of reciprocity. Extensive research shows that reciprocity—giving and receiving—is the most powerful way to gain agreement and...

The Power of Suggestion in Negotiating HUMAN BEINGS are greatly influenced by their environments, and by the power of suggestion contained in people and situations around them. Fully 95 percent of your thinking, feeling, and decisiod-making are influenced by or entirely controlled by your suggestive environment. Your job is 1) to be aware of the...