Having read Marco‘s yesterday message (no, not this one you sly editor! This one instead), I was trying to help him in finding “something challenging, different”, a new book to read. Here’s my proposal: a very non-technical book, usually boring since the subject (“Sales”), but short, honest and ingenious. The electronic version is free and can be downloaded here.
It’s titled: “UnSelling – Sell less to win more“, by Peter Bourke.
Easily written, well exposed, nice to read, it’s the way I do ‘sales’, in practice, every day. The underlying message (morality?) is that to be a good “UnSelling Professional” -as I like to define myself lately- you have to be prepared and honest, which means being able to create a real trusted, longlife and collaborative relationship between you and your clients.
It’s a book for everybody because “everybody sells”.
Here below some of the quotes I like from the book:
“Nothing but the truth“.
“The challenge with the ‘selling’ approach is that the more we sell, the less we collaborate with the client (and the less they share)”.
“The most successful UnSelling professionals have become students of their client’s business and their industry”.
“If a prospect won’t allow us executive access (and we haven’t been involved in helping them define their initial requirements) you’re likely not a serious for their business anyway”.
“At the risk of being trite: even though the truth sometimes hurts, honesty is clearly the best policy in UnSelling to win more business”.
“In essence -focus on your seet spot and be an expert in that!”
“So often the sales team is inclined to make the prospect believe that the implementation and change management they are about to embark on will be simple and achievable”.
“We adopt the philosophy that effective selling is entirely about the client’s success, regardless of wether we are the chosen solution provider”.
“UnSelling doesn’t stop at contract signing”.
The last one, simply the greatest, could be applied wisely in every life situations:
“Effective listener -we were given 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason- to use them proportionately”.