Foreword

I have been a student of sales since November 11, 1971. I was listening to a brand-new technology called a cassette tape when a guy named Jay Douglas Edwards uttered the sales tip, "If the customer says, 'Do these come in green?' you say, 'Would you like them in green?"' And I thought—cool.

That's the day I realized that there was a science to selling. I wanted to learn more.

I have read all or portions of hundreds of sales books over the past 40 years, but most of what I have learned has come from the spark of an idea gleaned from a book and then somewhat altered once I got out into the field and had to actually apply the strategy. Kind of like you.

All sales books—as well as sales experts—offer some form of valuable information. As a student, it's your job to determine how that information fits into your skill set, environment, marketplace, and customer interactions.

Mastering the World of Selling is loaded with sales experts and business experts offering some of their best ideas and their best strategies and their best tips and their best information.

Eric Taylor cold-called me in 2002, claiming he could put on a public seminar in my home state of New Jersey. He told me that he would fill the hall with people and sponsors and was willing to pay my fee in order to make that happen.

I had worked with many public seminar promoters, most of whom had failed miserably, and at that time it was my decision not to work with any public promoter, but rather to do the seminars myself. ...

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