It is not true that new products are manufactured to supply the demand.

There is no demand. Both the demand and the goods have to be manufactured. The public has always held fast to its old-fashioned discomforts, until the salesperson persuaded it to let go.

• There was no demand for the Railroad, and for years many people believed that thirty miles an hour would stop the circulation of the blood.
• There was no demand for the Steamboat, and when Brunei drove the first boat by steam on the Thames, he became so unpopular that the London hotels refused to give him a room.
• There was no demand for the Sewing machine, and the first machine that Howe put on exhibition was smashed to pieces by a Boston mob.
• There was no demand for the Telegraph, and Morse had to plead and beg before ten Congresses before he received any attention.
• There was no demand for the Air-brake, and Westinghouse was called a fool by every railroad expert, because he asserted that he could stop a train with wind.
• There was no demand for Gas-light, and all the candle-burners sneered at Murdoch for trying to have a lamp without a wick.
• There was no demand for the Reaper, and McCormick preached his gospel of efficient harvesting for fourteen years before he sold his first hundred machines.

No, it is not true, as learned theorists have said that every great invention springs into life because it is demanded by the nation. It springs into life and nobody wants it. It is the Ugly Duckling. Everybody prefers dollar to it, until a few salespeople take it in hand and explain it.

• When Frederick E. Sickles first exhibited his Steam steering-gear, all the sailors looked upon it with contempt. “Nobody seemed to take the slightest interest in it,” wrote Sickles.
• When Charles T. Porter first showed his High-speed engine in England, it was not taken seriously by anyone. “My engine,” says  Porter “was visited by every engineer in England and by a multitude of engine-users; and yet in all that six months not a builder ever said a word about building neither it, nor a user said a word about using it. I was stupefied with astonishment and distress.”
• When Bell first showed his Telephone at the Philadelphia Centennial, it was endorsed by the greatest scientists of America and England. It was tested and proved. But the average man called it a “scientific toy” and refused to either use it or finance it. Bell preached telephony for years before the public bought it.

When the new product has been perfected and produced, the manufacturer must step back and make way for the salesperson. The salesperson can’t invent. A sales mind is not in-growing but out-growing. They aren’t manufacturers. Whenever they have tried it, the costs go skyward. But they know how to interest and convince the public.

The truth is that we, salespeople, have done more for progress and civilization than anyone imagines.

We have done more than all the colleges to develop the peasantry of Europe into enterprising American citizens.

We have transformed the “Man with the Hoe” into the person with the computer.

We have given to general public the radiator for the fireplace, the automobile for the push-cart, the computer and voice recognition for the quill pen.

We have put more comforts into everyone’s homes than the king used to have in his palace.

The main thing in selling is to make people want to buy. A selling atmosphere must be created, and if you fail to do that – you will not sell. Simple as that. The professional salesperson makes the customers realize they want what is being offered.

Continue reading in depth on creating the demand: Are You an Order Taker or an Order Maker?

Make People Want to Buy is a post from: The Science and Art of Selling by Alen Mayer

Class 1. The simplest business sale is one in which the customer is so anxious to buy at a specified price that he comes to the salesperson and voluntarily offers her the proper amount of money for the products. As an illustration, take the ticket seller in the box office of a theatre. A line of customers is waiting. Each customer is ready to pay for his ticket as soon as it is given to him. There is only one requirement of the salesperson here – the requirement of accuracy in handling a transaction the details of which are simple and usually so well known by the buyer as to require no selling talk whatever.

Class 2. The customer is not anxious as in the previous case, but is perfectly willing to buy at a given price of any salesperson who may happen to ask for his business. Take as an illustration another kind of ticket seller. Suppose a concert is to be given and a number of people are engaged in contacting potential clients for the sale of tickets. Mr. Smith, a prospective customer, is perfectly willing to buy a ticket to the concert from the first person who asks him.

The salesperson must have knowledge or activity, in addition to meeting the requirement of accuracy as in the first case. For instance, suppose a young student selling tickets for a concert is anxious to sell more than his competitors, but perhaps is not conveniently situated so that he can personally visit as many prospective buyers as others can. He picks up a phone and calls up twenty or thirty people, securing their pledges to buy tickets of him. Thus by directing mental activity, he achieves more than his competitors who use mere physical activity visiting customers in person.

In this second class, the requirements are:

1. Accuracy, as in Class 1, and
2. Energy

In both cases the so called salespeople are merely order-takers.  (Read my previous article Are you an Order Taker or an Order Maker?)

Class 3. Sales of Class 1 and Class 2 are so simple in their requirements that they need no special attention here. In the first class, the customer is anxious to buy. In the second class he is willing to buy. In Class 3, however, we have an entirely different situation — the customer is neither willing nor unwilling to buy, the matter never having been brought to his attention. Often such customers can use the products or services offered and will buy if the right impression is made. They do not have to be convinced of the value of the products through features and benefits, and the salesperson may so impress such customers with his personality that he can secure the order easily.

For instance, take the same simple illustration of the concert tickets. Two people with these tickets for sale reach the customer at exactly the same time. The customer has not considered the matter yet, but needs no further discussion to bring him to a favorable conclusion. Neither one of the sales people has to argue about the value of the tickets. It is merely a question of which one can make the best impression upon the customer.

A forceful personality is an important requirement of the successful salesperson. While it is desirable for one to have a good proposition, a well-known company, and skill in presentation, there are many cases in which these things do not count so much as personality alone. Personality gives strength to the salesperson’s presentation and inspires in the customer confidence in the company for which the salesperson works. This ought not, however, to discourage anyone from the pursuit of selling products, for there is nothing vague or mystical about a convincing personality; nothing that can’t be acquired through effort and study. Remember – you can improve your personality and make it more effective for the career in selling.

If you have any doubt that this can be accomplished, please consider the following statements before yielding to your doubts:

1. Personality depends upon the development of the physical, intellectual, inspirational, and moral qualities.
2. All these can be improved.
3. The word physical does not refer merely to the height, weight, or strength of a person. It embraces also his general state of vigor and his personal appearance, both of which can be improved by following the common laws of health and cleanliness.
4. By “the improvement of the intellectual person,” reference is made especially to the salesperson’s mastery of the details of his own business, which can be secured through study.
5. The inspirational qualities are those by means of which one inspires himself to greater effort and gathers inspiration from others.
6. The moral elements of personality in the salesperson are the ones that inspire confidence, and these can be acquired by clean living and right thinking.

The requirements of Class 3 are :

1. Accuracy
2. Energy
3. Strong Personality

Class 4. While his personality may gain for the salesperson a meeting with a buyer, there are certain points beyond which mere personality can’t go. Here the salesperson must use, in addition to the requirements already mentioned, a skill in presentation which is based upon his knowledge of the products or services and his ability to convey this knowledge of the products to the mind of the buyer.

The requirements of Class 4 are:

1. Accuracy
2. Energy
3. Strong Personality
4. Presentation

Class 5. This is the hardest class of sale when the customer is absolutely unwilling to buy. After all the powers of energy, personality, and presentation have been brought into play, a final skill is required of the salesperson to enable him to accomplish one of these most difficult sales. This is the art of persuasion.

Suppose you have presented your points with a customer until she is thoroughly convinced of the value of the products, but for some unknown reason she does not buy. In many cases, you must exercise your power of persuasion. Undoubtedly, when buying a shirt or a tie, you have had that peculiar mental impression that you were convinced of the value of the products, but had not yet been persuaded to buy them. This is the frame of mind in which you will find a great many of your customers and the art of persuading without appearing to gush or plead is one of the things you must learn.

The Conclusion

In Class 1 the customer is anxious to buy. The sale is very easy. The only requirement is accuracy.

In Class 2 the customer is willing to buy, but not easily accessible. The sale is easy, but not so easy as before. The requirements are accuracy and energy.

In Class 3, the customer is indifferent. The sale is neither easy nor hard. It requires accuracy, energy, and personality.

In Class 4, the customer is unconvinced. The sale is hard. The requirements are accuracy, energy, personality, and presentation.

In Class 5, the customer is unwilling. The sale is very hard. The requirements are accuracy, energy, personality, presentation, and persuasion.

5 Classes of Sales is a post from: The Science and Art of Selling by Alen Mayer

If you as a salesperson exercise no influence whatsoever upon the mind of your customer, but the customer does all the deciding, you are not a real salesperson. You are an order taker. (Please read my article: Are You an Order Taker or an Order Maker?)

There is a certain proper influence that every mind may have over every other mind. This influence arises from strong personal character, from a knowledge of products and services, and from a knowledge of the science of selling.

Your character, knowledge, and abilities can be improved and strengthened in the interest of your work (and career as a salesperson). First, let us clearly understand the distinction between proper mind-control, and hypnotism or other forms of mesmeric influence.

Proper mind-control

If you arrange your thought and presentation logically, so as to lead your customer into the proper attitude toward your products or services, you are well within your rights. So is the salesperson who introduces new and overwhelming arguments, and he who studies methods of so impressing his personality on a customer as to inspire confidence.

Certainly you can’t justly criticize a salesperson for studying his customer’s face and manner in such as way as to find out the exact minute when he would be most likely to consent to a purchase, or for any other studious effort to learn exactly when to urge his strongest points. The salesperson must learn when his argument is at its best, and, conversely, when the customer’s mind is in its most receptive condition. That is the minute for action. You must be able to recognize it when it comes, and must practice every possible method of bringing it about. You must compel the buyer to minimize any objections in his mind and to become enthusiastic over the advantages that you have presented.

This is proper and legitimate mind-control. It has nothing to do with hypnotism, mesmerism, making a sale to an intoxicated or demented person, or any other unfair method of taking advantage of an abnormal condition of the buyer’s mind.

The following are examples of legitimate mind-control:

1. A salesperson finds a buyer opposed to his product because he does not understand its features (and benefits). A simple explanation of benefits compels the buyer to change his mind.
2. A salesperson finds that a buyer is impulsive and enthusiastic. He therefore describes his products enthusiastically and secures the order “on the spur of the moment.”
3. A salesperson finds it difficult to secure the buyer’s signature to an order. He watches his customer’s face until it shows a keen interest, then hands him pen and paper with a request to sign, at exactly the right moment.
4. A salesperson learns that his customer is inclined to favor those salespeople for whom he has a personal relationship. He therefore cultivates a feeling of friendship between himself and his customer, and uses it to secure an order.

These are simple examples, but they make the meaning clear. You will no doubt be able to add many similar examples from your own knowledge, such as the use, at the proper time, of the names of well-known customers of yours.

The formula for developing a mind control is very simple.  It is a study of the five senses and the manner in which they influence the mind, and a constant effort to apply in practice what you have learned.

Next post in this series will be about using the five senses in selling – please subscribe to my blog to be notified when a new post is published.

Mind Control in Selling is a post from: The Science and Art of Selling by Alen Mayer

“Results are the only things that count. We are perfectly willing to pay a salesperson $100,000 a year if they deliver the goods; we are willing to pay $750,000 a year if that person delivers, and a person’s earnings from $7500 a month up to almost anything is in their own hands.”

The heads of ninety-nine out of every hundred companies employing salespeople reflects that sentiment. Often the main limit to the salesperson’s earning power is a self-imposed one.

I am sure you know the question in the mind of the person starting out with a cell phone in one hand and an expense check in the other is: “How can I sell?”

The question in the mind of the salesperson producing now is: “How can I increase my sales?”

Understand in advance, please, that we offer no theories. The source of the methods offered herein derives from the operation of thousands of successful salespeople in varied lines the country over.

These people are working more than the average salesperson because they are better than the average. And here is what they have found produce real results.

Are You an Order Taker or an Order Maker?

Let’s take a look at the order-taker, not as a negative example, and not as an object of pity, but only to make a point.
Chris the “order-taker” visits on Smith, Brown, Jones, James, and Robinson. They are not in the market. Then she opens her portfolio in Harrison’s store and Harrison buys.

Mind you, she didn’t sell anything. Harrison was ready; the order taker had the goods, showed them and took the order. Why? Simply because the prospect was in the market, ready to buy.

She encountered a favorable situation; she was standing directly under the apple with a bushel basket when it dropped from the tree. That is what makes it possible for the order-taker to exist. If the order-taker calls on enough people they are bound to find a certain percentage needing what is sold and ready to order.

Let’s leave the subject of order taking. Let’s deal with the problem of the person who really sells.

What is it? What’s the difference?
Simply this – the salesperson must create a specialized situation, and place people in the market who didn’t feel that way when they walked in the store. It has been said that sometimes a good salesperson sells to buyers who don’t think they want what they buy.

The reason why is this: the good salesperson makes the buyers realize they want what is being offered.

Let this sink in deeply. The order-taker canvasses looking for people who want to buy. However, the professional salesperson tries to make every person he or she calls on wants to buy.

The order-taker accepts the advantage of the situation he finds. But the order maker, a professional salesperson creates specialized situations to suit his purpose.

Now, the question you should ask yourself is:

Are You an Order Taker or an Order Maker?

Are You an Order Taker or an Order Maker? is a post from: The Science and Art of Selling by Alen Mayer