How to Sell Face-to-Face Survival Guide is now available via KOBO in multiple e-book formats,

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9780976840626_W HOW TO SELL FACE-TO-FACE: SURVIVAL GUIDE, a  to-the-point sales how-to handbook, based largely on a consultative selling approach, especially for people getting
started in face-to-face sales, or marketing their skills or services as  consultants, free-agents, career-changers,
or in new business start-ups. 6×9, 125 pages. ISBN:
0-9768406-2-6. 

Available in both  paper  ($9.95) and e-book ($2.99) versions via Amazon.  (A free Kindle reader is available at the Amazon site. Also, it can be read on other types of readers, including iPad, IPhone, and Blackberries via free Apps that are available from this Amazon site.)

 

UPDATE:  HOW TO SELL FACE-TO-FACE: SURVIVAL GUIDE IS NOW ALSO AVAILABLE ON KOBO.  KOBO is "device neutral" — which is a techie way of saying that if you buy via KOBO you can read it on your PC, MAC, iBook, IPad, etc. etc.  KOBO provides free readers/adapters.  Here's the link to Kobo's version of HOW TO SELL FACE-TO-FACE: SURVIVAL GUIDE .

KOBO, in case you haven't heard of it, links with Borders— which I'm sure you have heard of.

BARGAIN! BARGAIN! BARGAIN!

At this point, the e-book of  HOW TO SELL FACE-TO-FACE: SURVIVAL GUIDE is a smidgen cheaper via Kobo than via Amazon/Kindle.  ($1.79 versus $2.99.)

Prospecting for leads and other useful information via cold calling: essential info to be looking for

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In sales skills terminology, "prospecting" often means looking for industrial parks and the like, then doing a quick sweep in order to rapidly scan and flush out potential prospects.

In those sweeps, you speak briefly with the receptionist or secretary to make a quick determination of whether it is worth calling back to see the Decision Maker.

Just what information you are looking for at this early stage of your search for viable leads will vary with your product and the market. The checklist below is a starting point; adapt it to your own uses.

Checklist: The Kinds of Information to be Looking for When Cold Calling

Continue reading → Prospecting for leads and other useful information via cold calling: essential info to be looking for

Cold calling: when you CAN use it as a way to make the sale

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Cold calls as a sales method

Good sales can flow from cold calls. While cold-calling should NOT be your primary way of approaching new prospects, there will be times when it is appropriate as a selling tool.

For example, if you have open time between scheduled calls, consider using it to "smoke-stack" for other leads. (The term arose when sales people would drive around looking for factory smoke-stacks to guide them to industrial prospects. Now most smoke-stacking is done by scanning the list of tenants at the elevators of office towers and entrances to commercial parks.)

You may spot a possible prospect, and knock on the door in the hope

Continue reading → Cold calling: when you CAN use it as a way to make the sale

Cold call selling overview: when, when not, how, why

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Cold call sales overview

Cold call sales involve dropping in on prospects without an appointment, either with the objective of going for a sale, or of collecting research for a later call-back. (Or, phoning people more or less at random is another form of sales cold-calling.)

 The fact is, cold-calls are usually not a good use of your time when selling. You can waste a lot of productive time waiting in reception areas for an opening to see the Decision Maker.


Continue reading → Cold call selling overview: when, when not, how, why

Sales prospecting by phone: when and how to back off if you find this prospect is not viable

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Prospecting, as we use the word in sales, is looking for potential buyers. But sales prospecting is also about screening out those who will not likely be viable prospects, at least not this time 'round.

Keep in mind those prospectors out west in the Great Gold Rush of '49. They spent months and years

Continue reading → Sales prospecting by phone: when and how to back off if you find this prospect is not viable

“Never too late to start a business,” USA Today

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That's the title  of Laura Petrecca's article in USA Today, but actually it's by no means just about "older" Americans: the stats indicate it's "just-plain American" (of all ages) who are starting new businesses, electing self-employment, and otherwise going off on their own as consultants, free-agents, and the like.  Here are some of the key numbers on self-employment from that article:

Continue reading → “Never too late to start a business,” USA Today

Finding prospects: if you find you need to raise your level of contact within the prospect organization

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Situation: you're making a call on a prospect, and you initially think  you are making your sales call to the right person at the right level, but then you get the sense you have come in at too low a level (of budget or authority).

Indicators: Suppose you make your presentation and feel interest on the supposed decision maker’s

Continue reading → Finding prospects: if you find you need to raise your level of contact within the prospect organization

Sales objections: How to handle it if you hear an endless string of sales objections.

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Indicators: It seems that as soon as you demolish one sales objection the prospect raises another, and then another.

What this indicates: A string of relatively insignificant objections, thrown out one after the other,

Continue reading → Sales objections: How to handle it if you hear an endless string of sales objections.

Can you learn to be an entrepreneur? Fortune says yes.

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"Twenty years ago teaching people how to start their own businesses was a
sideshow at B-schools, of scant interest to future consultants and Wall
Streeters. Today entrepreneurship education is everywhere. More than two-thirds
of U.S. colleges and universities — well over 2,000, up from 200 in the 1970s
— are teaching it, and they offer it to all comers: social workers, farmers,
and even musicians. The field is thriving, but have we figured out yet the best
way to teach this stuff? If not, are we at least getting better at it? And can
you even teach someone to be an entrepreneur?"— from the Fortune article,  "Can you learn to be an entrepreneur?"

The article generally comes down on the side of "Yes, you can learn entrepreneurial skills and traits. It doesn't get into just what those traits are (other than developing a "proper attitude toward risk") but the sidebar, "Small-Biz U" gives an overview and slide-show of five programs on small business and entrepreneurship.

The article seems more oriented to entrepreneurship in the larger sense — developing business plans and setting up firms — than it is to opportunities in self-employment, consulting, and free-agency.

Can you learn to be an entrepreneur? Fortune article


Link to related article and slides in Fortune: "5 schools for entrepreneurs"