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Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
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Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#32His basic premise is that the outcome of any negotiation(especially sales) is inversely proportionate to how intimidated you are by the other person.
His solution is to invest in creating a strong image before selling and using takeaway selling, which is basically taking away the opportunity to do business with you so that they stop thinking about whether they want to buy and start thinking about how to get you to sell to them.
On a side note, Dan Kennedy says,"if you lose a sale because of price, you lose that sale long beforehand." your job is to differentiate yourself and craft a powerful image so they can never even start to compare you to others.
http://www.amazon.com/Winning-Through-Intimidation-Robert-Ri...
Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#33Check out anything by Zig Ziglar -> Napoleon Hill -> Andrew Carnegie and Tony Robbins. People miss that sales is not just technique or what you say but state of mind, belief and confidence. Stay away from sales only focus books. If you really want to learn something check "Mastery" by Robert Greene.
Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#34There are 3 books you should read: SPIN Selling. The Challenger Sale. The Charisma Myth. In that order. You will learn so many jedi mind tricks. Yes, there is such a thing as sales. But do yourself a favor and don't sell shitty products. There's a wide range of incomes among people selling the best products, and the difference is stuff you can at least read about in those books.
I agree with "thinkdevcode" a few messages up. The better solution is find the best solution to the underlying problem. View yourself as a problem solver, rather than a salesman.
Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#35Winning Through Intimidation by Robert Ringer is by far the best sales book I ever read. His basic premise is that the outcome of any negotiation(especially sales) is inversely proportionate to how intimidated you are by the other person. His solution is to invest in creating a strong image before selling and using takeaway selling, which is basically taking away the opportunity to do business with you so that they s…
Be My Guest by Conrad Hilton The Success System That Never Fails by W. clement stone The Ultimate Sales Letter by Dan Kennedy The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Watch all of Brene Browns TED talks about vulnerability. Sales requires trust and trust is built on connection and connection is built by being vulnerable.
Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#36Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#37The one piece of advice I was given years ago: There is no such thing as "sales", and you aren't a "salesman". You provide a solution to a problem. Listen, understand, and then offer a solution. I forgot who told me that but it's fantastic advice. As far as understanding people, the de facto book to read is "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. I'd highly recommend that.
> You provide a solution to a problem. Listen, understand, and then offer a solution. This becomes clear in the classic "sell me this pen" exercise. First find out about the client, what they do, how they would use the pen. Once you know where their focus is, discussing your solution becomes easy and natural.
Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#381. The best book I've read on sales is: "How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling"(1952) by Frank Bettger 2. Everything at Heavybit is excellent, their sales videos are very nice: http://www.heavybit.com/library/developer-sales And an must see video for me was: http://www.heavybit.com/library/video/2015-05-12-jason-lemki...
Re: Ask HN: Best books or videos to get better at sales?
#39There are 3 books you should read: SPIN Selling. The Challenger Sale. The Charisma Myth. In that order. You will learn so many jedi mind tricks. Yes, there is such a thing as sales. But do yourself a favor and don't sell shitty products. There's a wide range of incomes among people selling the best products, and the difference is stuff you can at least read about in those books.
Do you really think it's ethical to give "the jedi mind trick" on someone to make a sale. Really? I agree with "thinkdevcode" a few messages up. The better solution is find the best solution to the underlying problem. View yourself as a problem solver, rather than a salesman.
Read the books and tell me that what they teach is pure trickery. But if you take some of the lessons to heart, magically people might start buying more (maybe a lot more) of what you're selling. It's not because you're being unethical though, you just "know how to sell" aka "know how to structure the delivery of information in a way that increases the odds of an interaction resulting in a monetary transaction".
Sure, think of yourself as a "problem solver" vs a "salesperson" if you prefer ("sales" does have a negative old-timey connotation at this point, which is why it's now often called business development). But that's semantics and it doesn't help the OP get any better at his job if it is indeed in sales (or biz dev, or problem solving, or whatever they're calling trying to generate revenue for a company these days).