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[Illustration: Orison S. Marden]
SELLING THINGS
BY
ORISON SWETT MARDEN
AUTHOR OF “PUSHING TO THE FRONT,” “PEACE, POWER AND
PLENTY,” “THE VICTORIOUS ATTITUDE,” ETC.
WITH THE ASSISTANCE OF
JOSEPH F. MACGRAIL
INSTRUCTOR IN SALESMANSHIP AND EFFICIENCY FOR MANY
LARGE SALES AND INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATIONS
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1916,
BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL COMPANY
Thirteenth Thousand
TO MY FRIEND CHARLES M. SCHWAB
THE MASTER EXECUTIVE, PRODUCER, SALESMAN.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE MAN WHO CAN SELL THINGS 1
II TRAINING THE SALESMAN 6
III THE MOST IMPORTANT SUBJECTS OF STUDY 14
IV MAKING A FAVORABLE IMPRESSION 19
V THE SELLING TALK OR “PRESENTATION” 28
VI THE APPROACH AND EXPRESSION 33
VII THE ABILITY TO TALK WELL 37
VIII HOW TO GET ATTENTION 42
IX TACT AS A FRIEND-WINNER AND BUSINESS-GETTER 47
X SIZING UP THE PROSPECT 62
XI HOW SUGGESTION HELPS IN SELLING 71
XII THE FORCE OF CHEERFUL EXPECTANCY 79
XIII THE GENTLE ART OF PERSUASION 86
XIV HELPING THE CUSTOMER TO BUY 94
XV CLOSING THE DEAL 105
XVI THE GREATEST SALESMAN—ENTHUSIASM 112
XVII THE MAN AT THE OTHER END OF THE BARGAIN 119
XVIII MEETING AND FORESTALLING OBJECTIONS 125
XIX QUALITY AS A SALESMAN 133
XX A SALESMAN’S CLOTHES 139
XXI FINDING CUSTOMERS 148
XXII WHEN YOU ARE DISCOURAGED 155
XXIII THE STIMULUS OF REBUFFS 163
XXIV MEETING COMPETITION: “KNOW YOUR GOODS” 177
XXV THE SALESMAN AND THE SALES MANAGER 184
XXVI ARE YOU A GOOD MIXER? 189
XXVII CHARACTER IS CAPITAL 207
XXVIII THE PRICE OF MASTERSHIP 213
XXIX KEEPING FIT AND SALESMANSHIP 226
APPENDIX—SALES POINTERS 250
SELLING THINGS
CHAPTER I
THE MAN WHO CAN SELL THINGS
Cultivate all the arts and all the helps to mastership.
The world always listens to a man with a will in him.
Soon after Henry Ward Beecher went to Plymouth Church he received a
letter from a Western parish, asking him to send them a new pastor.
After describing the sort of man they wanted, the letter closed with
the following injunction: “BE SURE TO SEND US A MAN WHO CAN SWIM. Our
last pastor was drowned while fording the river, on a visit to his
parishioners.”
Now, this is the sort of a man that is wanted everywhere, in every line
of human activity, _the man who can swim_, the salesman who can swim,
who can sell things, who can go out and get business, the man who can
take a message to Garcia, who can bring back the order, the man who can
“deliver the goods.”
The whole business world to-day is hunting for the man who can sell
things; there is a sign up at every manufacturing establishment, every
producing establishment for the man who can market products. There is
nobody in greater demand than the efficient salesman, and he is rarely if
ever out of a job.
Only a short while ago two companies actually went to law about a
salesman who transferred his connection from one to the other, his
original employers holding that he had no right to do so, as he was under
contract (at a $50,000 salary) to them.
In spite of the fact that thousands of employees are looking for
positions, on every hand we see employers looking for somebody who can
“deliver the goods”; a salesman who will not say that if conditions were
right, if everything were favorable, if it were not for the panic, or
some other stumbling block, he could sell the goods. Everywhere employers
are looking for some one who can do things, no matter what the conditions
may be.
There is no place in salesmanship for the man who waits for orders to
come to him. He is simply an order taker, not a salesman. Live men, men
with vigorous initiative and lots of pluck and grit, men who can go out
and get business are wanted.
It should not be necessary to prove that training is needed for success
in salesmanship or in any business. Yet, because men have been compelled
for centuries “to learn by their mistakes,” to pick up here and there,
by hard knocks, a little knowledge about their work, there has been a
prejudice against trying to teach business by sane, scientific methods.
Besides, in former times, the working man and the mere merchant were
supposed to belong to a low class of society, apart from the noble and
the learned, and little attention was given to their needs. A man, too,
was believed to be born with a natural aptitude for salesmanship or
business building, and this was supposed to be all-sufficient.
To-day there are many men and women attracted by the big profits in
salesmanship, who would like to become salesmen and saleswomen, but they
feel they have not this natural aptitude to insure permanent success.
It is true that, just as certain men and women are born with natural
gifts for music and for art, so certain men and women have, in a high
degree, the natural qualities which enable them to succeed in selling
either their brain power or merchandise. But while it is true that some
people have more natural capacity than others, it is not true to-day,
and it was never true in the fine arts, in athletics, or in commercial
pursuits, that the untrained man is the equal of the trained man.
Man is always improving Nature, or, if you prefer, he is always helping
Nature. Central Park, New York, is more beautiful because the landscape
gardener has been helping Nature; the farmer is the reaper of bigger and
better crops because he is following the advice of the chemist, who tells
him how to fertilize the soil; the Delaware River and Hell Gate have
become more easily navigable, because the engineer has removed obstacles
which Nature had placed in those waters; Colorado’s arid lands are
irrigated, thanks to the skill of the civil engineer; the horticulturist
aids Nature by grafting and pruning; the scientist comes to the help of
human nature with antiseptic methods in surgery; and the inventor shows
Nature how electricity can be put to numberless practical uses.
Let us not fool ourselves; we need to study, we need to be trained for
every business in life. And in these days the training by which natural
defects are overcome and natural aptitude is developed into effective
ability can be obtained by every youth. No matter how great your natural
ability in any direction, in order to get the best results, it must be
reënforced by this special training.
The untrained man may get results here and there because he has natural
ability and unconsciously uses the right methods. The trained man is
getting results regularly because he is consistently using the right
methods.
Business men no longer attribute a lost sale, where it should have been
made, to “hard luck,” but to ignorance of the science of salesmanship.
The “born” salesman is not as much in vogue as formerly. Business is
becoming a science, and almost any honest, dead-in-earnest, determined
youth can become an expert in it, if he is willing to pay the price.
It is scientific salesmanship to-day, and not luck, that gets the order.