“A must read for every aspiring entrepreneur. A clear guide to effective and realistic selling for those with a “big idea” who wish to achieve success for their products and to avoid costly and ineffective pitfalls in their quest. The framework balances entrepreneurs’ creativity with a foundation of solid business principles.” --Jim McCann, Founder, 1-800-FLOWERS
Noted entrepreneur, business executive and entrepreneurship professor Cheryl Mayberry McKissack shares the essential inside information every entrepreneur needs in order to found and grow a new venture, with special emphasis on the most critical skill every entrepreneur must master: selling.
The Power of Direct Selling. Direct selling is not an industry per se nor is it merely a go-to-market business model and channel to reach consumers. It is bigger than any of this - direct selling is people. The ability for people with entrepreneurial spirit to build a successful business, whether it be from the ground up or by representing a company's product, is at the heart of direct selling and it is people who made (and continue to make) direct selling the successful marketplace that it is today. The direct selling marketplace is comprised of mission-driven and socially responsible companies offering a wide variety of product and services, and the list of direct selling companies is abundant with entrepreneurs who built their businesses by utilizing an independent salesforce channel to market and sell their products or services directly to consumers. Possibly one of the most prominent of these entrepreneurs is Mary Kay Ash, a legend as a glass-ceiling breaker and a woman who built a very successful business with a go-to-market strategy of direct selling. Unlike Mary Kay Ash, however, not all aspiring business owners are willing/able to invest their savings and time on a start-up business. These micro-entrepreneurs desire to have the economic and social benefits of managing their own businesses but do not want the startup costs and demands associated with traditional business planning. As such, becoming a direct selling distributor offers a low-risk, low-cost pathway to micro-entrepreneurship. The traditional barriers to small business ownership are removed when a micro-entrepreneur builds a direct selling business that is backed by established brands. These established brands, several of which are featured in this book, offer the micro-entrepreneurs quality products, business training, and technological resources to achieve a self-determined metric of success. Framed within the context of entrepreneurship and an historical overview of the long-term sustainability of this business model, this book is intended for practitioners who want to read about the breadth and depth of direct selling. Importantly, this book provides considerable depth in terms of three particular issues associated with direct selling: Compensation, Ethics & compliance, and Global reach. For scholars, this book is built on a strong foundation of valid and reliable research endeavors. The authors have published research on direct selling in high quality, reputable and peer-reviewed academic and practitioner journals. Thus, this book can add foundationally to the research efforts of academics who are conducting research in a wide variety of topics (such as sales, women empowerment, business strategy, ethics, distribution models, gig economy, and global entry - to name a few), as well as to members of the press who want reliable and valid content upon which to build their stories. The book's content is also particularly informative for policymakers at the local, state, national, and international levels. For students, reading this book will offer a variety of insights, particularly related to the intricacies of channel selection and design. Direct Selling: A Global and Social Business Model is a collective project from eight academics and practitioners who have dedicated much of their careers to understanding direct selling as both a go-to-market strategy and a channel of distribution and to capturing the people who are the foundation of direct selling. The pages of this book bring together a wealth of research and knowledge that can inform a broad spectrum of constituents about the economic and social benefits of direct selling, while also providing detail and clarity on key issues related to direct selling as a sustainable business model.
"After I sent my team to the Question Based Selling program, not only was the feedback from the training outstanding, but we experienced an immediate positive impact in results."—Jim Cusick, vice president of sales, SAP America, Inc. "Following the program, even our most experienced salespeople raved, saying QBS was the best sales training they have ever experienced!"—Alan D. Rohrer, director of sales, Hewlett Packard For nearly fifteen years, The Secrets of Question Based Selling has been helping great salespeople live you deliver big results. It's commonsense approach has become a classic, must-have tool that demonstrates how asking the right questions at the right time accurately identifies your customer's needs. But consumer behavior and sales techniques change as rapidly as technology—and there are countless contradictory sales training programs promising results. Knowing where you should turn to for success can be confusing. Now fully revised and updated, The Secrets of Question Based Selling provides a step-by-step, easy-to-follow program that focuses specifically on sales effectiveness—identifying the strategies and techniques that will increase your probability of success. How you sell has become more important than the product. With this hands-on guide, you will learn to: Penetrate more accounts Overcome customer skepticism Establish more credibility sooner Generate more return calls Motivate different types of buyers Develop more internal champions Close more sales...faster And much, much more
There are approximately 35 million business to business sales reps in the country selling everything from books and computers to furniture and flooring. They know as well as anyone that selling to other businesses is not the same as selling to consumers. Businesses have different budgets, needs, demands, and expectations from those of general consumers. That means an entirely different skill set is required of business to business sales reps. How to Say It: Business to Business Selling is the only book of its kind that caters exclusively to business to business sales professionals. Its short chapters provide tips and strategies tailored especially for the unique business to business selling process. You'll learn how to: Motivate Yourself to Sell Craft an Elevator Pitch Find Hot Sales Leads Make a Cold Call Use Voicemail to Sell Give a Sales Presentation Write a Sales Proposal Give a Product Demo Negotiate the Best Deal Close a Sale Create a Powerful Sales Process Sell to Top Executives Build Sales Partnerships Get a Customer Referral Accelerate Your Sales Cycle With How to Say It: Business to Business Selling you can sell business to business like a seasoned pro.
A Research Agenda for Sales presents a roadmap of the future of sales. Eight recognized sales scholars discuss ideas that scholars are exploring and that firms can use for success in hypercompetitive markets with demanding customers. Featuring original research and current developments in the field, the chapters focus on critical topics and provide answers to important questions by company leaders and sales scholars.
An artist doesn't need to starve for their passion. Outdoor shows, brick and mortar locations, the internet and the availability of more venues has made it easier for creative entrepreneurs to showcase and sell their work. Selling artwork is, however, a competitive endeavor, and that has forced artists to produce beautiful and quality work that is competitively priced. To be successful with your ambition, you need to crunch the numbers, gradually build your business and create sales in low-cost venues before you move on to bigger arenas.Selling artwork or anything for that matter is an important business skill. Not everybody possesses the gift or talent to venture into the life of selling. However with this in mind, we should at least be able to sell one thing: and that's ourselves. For an entrepreneur, your ability to convince potential buyers that you are someone capable of doing business with is vital for success. There's no secret between the connection of art and money. A shocking idea is one that states that no artist is destined for starvation and poverty. If you are a passionate and creative artist, you can make some good money from your work, feel great about it and generate a massive following of supporters for your career. And that's true! You may ask yourself why so many artists falter in the quest to make a living from art? The positive thing however is that many artists fail simply not because they don't have the creativity or talent to produce great work, but rather because they haven't been adequately trained to represent themselves properly to build customer bases and actually sell their amazing work. If you look at it this way, the olden day way of generating fame and fortune as an artist was about receiving favors of gatekeepers. Starting with patronage systems in Europe all the way to museums and galleries of our modern days. The olden way was simply about groveling for endorsements for outsiders, who at the time collected massive percentages of what artists earned in exchange for representation. This was of course very effective for the gatekeepers. Although the olden day method still works for a fewer number of artists, the drawback is its zero-sum game, which makes it hard to break in. The good thing is that there are more clear alternatives.
Entrepreneurship emphasizes practice and learning through action, helping students adopt an entrepreneurial mindset so they can create opportunities and take action in uncertain environments. The updated Third Edition aids in the development of the entrepreneurial skillset and toolset that can be applied to startups as well as organizations of all kinds.
Freedom. It's the ability to do whatever you want, whenever you want. It's the ultimate reward of selling your business. But selling a company can be confusing, and one wrong step can easily cost you dearly. The Art of Selling Your Business: Winning Strategies & Secret Hacks for Exiting on Top is the last in a trilogy of books by author John Warrillow on building value. The first, Built to Sell, encouraged small business owners to begin thinking about their business as more than just a job. The Automatic Customer tagged recurring revenue as the core element in a valuable company and provided a blueprint for transforming almost any business into one with an ongoing annuity stream. Warrillow completes the set with The Art of Selling Your Business. This essential guide to monetizing a business is based on interviews the author conducted on his podcast, Built to Sell Radio, with hundreds of successfully cashed-out founders. What's the secret for harvesting the value you've created when it's time to sell? The Art of Selling Your Business answers important questions facing any founder, including— • What's your business worth? • When's the best time to sell? • How do you create a bidding war? • How can you position your company to maximize its attractiveness? • Who will pay the most for your business? • What’s the secret for punching above your weight in a negotiation to sell your company? The Art of Selling Your Business provides a sleeves-rolled-up action plan for selling your business at a premium by an author with consummate credibility.
Joe Girard was an example of a young man with perseverance and determination. Joe began his working career as a shoeshine boy. He moved on to be a newsboy for the Detroit Free Press at nine years old, then a dishwasher, a delivery boy, stove assembler, and home building contractor. He was thrown out of high school, fired from more than forty jobs, and lasted only ninety-seven days in the U.S. Army. Some said that Joe was doomed for failure. He proved them wrong. When Joe started his job as a salesman with a Chevrolet agency in Eastpointe, Michigan, he finally found his niche. Before leaving Chevrolet, Joe sold enough cars to put him in the Guinness Book of World Records as 'the world's greatest salesman' for twelve consecutive years. Here, he shares his winning techniques in this step-by-step book, including how to: o Read a customer like a book and keep that customer for life o Convince people reluctant to buy by selling them the right way o Develop priceless information from a two-minute phone call o Make word-of-mouth your most successful tool Informative, entertaining, and inspiring, HOW TO SELL ANYTHING TO ANYBODY is a timeless classic and an indispensable tool for anyone new to the sales market.
