Little Red Book of Selling

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1. robomartinSep 2023
   > What should I read, watch or listen to in order to catch up on today's approach to selling, do you have some recommendations?

   It really depends on where you are in this journey.

     Seth Godin
       Permission marketing
       Tribes: We need you to lead us
       All marketers are liars
       This is marketing
       Etc.
     
     Ries & Trout
       Positioning: The battle for your mind
       The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing
       Etc.
     
     Scientific Advertising - Claude Hopkins
   
     https://www.foundingsales.com/
     
     The Little Red Book of Selling - Gitomer
   

   Learning to use online channels, in my opinion, requires a lot of work. Companies like Google have useful material. Frankly, this subject is wide and deep. I got into it starting about twenty years ago.

   Perhaps others can suggest books or courses/videos on best practices for online marketing and optimization that are more up to date.

   I'll warn you that at some point in my journey I hated the fact that I had more business books by my bed than engineering books. It was frustrating until I reached what I call "cruise altitude" and had enough capabilities and understanding to do well.

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2. verdvermSep 2023
   The Challenger Sale - Matthew Dixon & Brent Adamson

   The Little Red Book of Selling - Jeffery Gitomer

   Crossing the Chasm - Geoffrey Moore

   To Sell is Human - Daniel Pink

   These are all especially good if you are a technical person first

   You'll learn the most by trying to sell every day, building that habit as a technical person is probably the bigger challenge than the selling part.

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3. jppopeMay 2022
   Wow... this is a much MUCH bigger question than you think it is. My answer will be obviously extremely incomplete.

   Sales was my first profession. I was good at my work. After a decade, I decided I wanted a change of pace and moved into programming. I very much miss selling and will probably go back someday.

   I got my start as a concert promoter selling concert tickets for my friends bands. I eventually tried most of the major categories of sales: SMB, Enterprise, Retail, Door to door, Patent sales, etc but ended up preferring mostly retail and SMB because the sales cycles were quicker and it made the job a little more fun. Enterprise tends to be the best paid, but much slower and often feels more like project management than a sales gig.

   ---

   To answer your question"sales" isn't just sales. There are many different types, approaches, techniques, skills, cultures, etc. If you are inclusive of any job performed by a "compliance professional" (Cialdini) or where there is a transaction involving two or more people, sales is the largest profession in the United States.

   If you are just looking to get started I'd recommend 1) To actually sell something 2) get reading the literature.

   As far as actually selling something: try reselling something at the farmers market, or go door to door and sell basic manual labor... those two things have high demand which you should be able to land a sale or two right away to get a vibe on a basic process.

   As far as literature here are a couple of classics:

     - Influence
     - the little red book of selling
     - SPIN selling
     - Secrets of closing the sale
     - The challenger sale
     - The presentation secrets of steve jobs (for presentation skills)
     - The rules of the game (neil strauss)
     - Nudge
   

   Once you get your feet under you go find a strong team with a great product and good leadership, or hang out with sales people and have them tell you stories.

   (sorry for the terrible and short answer)

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4. verdvermOct 2020
   The Challenger Sale

   To Sell is Human

   The Little Red Book of Selling

   Crossing the Chasm

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5. nunezSep 2020
   A big part of sales is handling rejection. There are books that help you detect buying signals and shape conversations in your direction, but dealing with rejection is a big, big part of sales.

   If you want to start selling on your own, I would have a goal to talk to at least _x_ people per day about your product. Ask questions more than you talk at them. A LOT of people will think that you’re crazy, but some will entertain your ask and might even give you useful information.

   If you want some help, you should hire (or ask) a salesperson and go out on cold calls/pitches with them. Observe more than you speak.

   As far as books go, “The Little Red Book of Selling” is a classic along with “Spin Selling.”

   Last thing I’ll add here: if conversation with people that you don’t know is difficult for you, that is the first thing I’d focus on. People need to trust you to buy from you; that trust is built through rapport. 2020 is a terrible year for this since the best way to practice conversations is through meeting people outside, but when things stabilize, I’d go to Meetups, conferences, and the like and try to meet x people per day, just like the goal above.

   Source: Me selling myself when pick-up artistry was a thing, then using those same skills when I built my (failed) startup. Eventually landed me jobs in consulting.

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6. verdvermOct 2019
   The Challenger Sale

   To Sell is human

   The little red book of selling

   They ask, you answer

   Nudge

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