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THE SALES BIBLE

Jeffrey Gitomer

Practical sales information you can read daily and use immediately.

Table of Contents
Read it from cover to cover. Open it anywhere and learn what you need for the moment. Use it the minute you read it.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

the rules. the Secrets. the Fun. Preparing to WoW! the Prospect Please allow Me to Introduce Myself Making a Great Presentation objections, closing, and Follow-up. Getting to YeS! Woes and Foes all Hail the King customer Spreading the Gospel Networking Success by association(s) Prophets and Profits Up Your Income! can I Get an amen?!

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Expanded Table of Contents

Part 1 tHe rUleS. tHe SecretS. tHe FUN.
1.1 GeNeSIS 35
Whats so new about a 15-year-old book? Itll never happen. So, whats in it for you? 8.5 ways to use this book. The old way of selling doesnt work anymore sort of. Post-It note your way to achievement.

1.2 tHe BooK oF rUleS 49

39.5 Rules of Sales Success. Sales Success Formula AHA!

1.3 tHe BooK oF SecretS 57

Why do salespeople fail? Are you born to sell? no, you learn to earn! Whats wrong with this sale? Its you, Bubba! The bridge between positive and negative. How the customer wants to be treated, honestly. How a salesperson wants to be treated, honestly. The elusive hot button. How do you find it?

1.4 tHe BooK oF BIG SecretS 77

More sales are made with friendship than salesmanship. Your best prospects are your present customers. Make a sale on Monday. Your personal mission statement.

1.5 tHe BooK oF HUMortHe BIGGeSt Secret 89

A funny thing happened to me on the way to a sale!

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Part 2 PreParING to WoW! tHe ProSPect

2.1 tHe BooK oF WoW 93
The WOW! factor. Use it to land a big sale. Are you using the WOW! factor? Remember me? Im a salesman. Just like all the others.

2.2 tHe BooK oF QUeStIoNS 103

To sell or not to sell, that is the (power) question. Can you close a sale in five questions?

2.3 tHe BooK oF PoWer 111

You are now under my power (statement).

Part 3 PleaSe alloW Me to INtrodUce MYSelF

3.1 tHe BooK oF INtrodUctIoNS 115 The 30-second personal commercial how to write it. The 30-second personal commercial how to deliver it. got a referral? Heres the perfect approach. 3.2 tHe BooK oF cold callING 125
no Soliciting, the funniest sign in sales. get to the decision maker on a cold call. Opening is as important as closing. The cold call is fun. If you think it is. Elements of a cold call that can make it hot.

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Part 4 MaKING a Great PreSeNtatIoN

4.1 tHe BooK oF PreSeNtatIoNS 137
Want to make the sale easier? Establish prospect rapport first. 12.5 ways to make the prospect confident enough to buy. Where and when to establish buyer confidence. Sales words and phrases to avoid at all costs. Honestly. Physically involving the prospect = more sales. Slide show stupidity. Thats not you is it? Or is it?

Part 5 oBJectIoNS, cloSING, aNd FolloW-UP. GettING to YeS!

Will the real objection please stand up! Real-world objections. Real-world solutions. Objection Prevention. The sale starts when the customer objects. I want to think about it. We spent our entire budget, honest. I want to check with two more suppliers. I want to buy, but the price is too high. Im satisfied with my present source. I have to talk this over with my... Call me back in six months.

5.1 tHe BooK oF oBJectIoNS 153

5.2 tHe BooK oF cloSING 177

What are the 19.5 early warning signals that the prospect is ready to buy? When you answer a prospects question, avoid two words Yes and no. How to ask a closing question. The Puppy Dog Close. Let the dog chase you. Eat dessert first! The most powerful close in the world is not a close.

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5.3 tHe BooK oF PerSISteNce 191 Sales tools are a vital part of the follow-up process. Youve been selling since you were a kid! Oh, no! not voicemail! Leave a message and Ill be glad to return your call. not! Cant get an appointment?

Part 6 WoeS aNd FoeS

6.1 tHe BooK oF laMeNtatIoNS 203
When bad sales happen to good people. 18.5 characteristics of sales career failures.

6.2 tHe BooK oF coMPetItIoN 209

Dancing with the competition? Watch your step.

Part 7 all HaIl tHe KING cUStoMer

7.1 tHe BooK oF cUStoMer ServIce 213
The secret of great customer service. Outstanding customer service is a powerful sales tool. Customer complaints breed sales. If you handle them correctly.

8.1 tHe BooK oF coMMUNIcatIoNS 221 A weekly sales meeting is a place to create new sales. The sales letter work, if you get it write. Want to close more sales? Listen more closely! Learn to listen in two words. Shut up! There are 100 billion buyer types. go figure. 8.2 tHe BooK oF exHIBItIoNS 237
35.5 trade show success rules.

Part 8 SPreadING tHe GoSPel

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Part 9 NetWorKING SUcceSS BY aSSocIatIoN(S)

9.1 tHe BooK oF NetWorKING 243

networking the challenge of making success contacts. networking 101. How to work a room. networking 102. How to milk a room. Establishing rapport when working a room. The Official networking game.

Part 10 ProPHetS aNd ProFItS

10.1 tHe BooK oF treNdS 257

The new breed of salesperson. A non-salesperson. Whats Bob Salvin got to do with it? Lots!

Part 11 UP YoUr INcoMe!

The pipeline of success.

11.1 tHe BooK oF NUMBerS 267

Part 12 caN I Get aN aMeN?!

12.1 tHe BooK oF exodUS 273

Dads teach sales success without knowing it. Commit yourself! Afterword... When I grow up. Your past and present hold the key to your future.

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everyone wants to succeed at sales. Most people dont. Its not that they cant. Its just that they dont know how.
Jeffrey Gitomer

The Sales Bible

Part 1 The Rules. The Secrets. The Fun.

Begin Now!
The Sales Bible is a success tool. A place where you can get insight about all facets of sales. There are also rules. To succeed at sales you must: Know the rules Learn the rules Take ownership of the rules Live by the rules The Book of Genesis reveals a story of the new way of sales, talks about a few of the basic rules, and presents a surefire way to achieve any rule, sales goal, or career goal Dont just read it. Use it. Go for it. Whatever the mind can conceive and believe it can achieve.
Napoleon Hill

P Whats so new about a 15-year-old book?........................ 36 P Itll never happen. ................... 37 P So, whats in it for you?............... 39 P 8.5 ways to use this book ............ 41 P The old way of selling doesnt work anymore sort of .............. 44 P Post-It Note your way to achievement ................................ 46

Genesis

1.1

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Whats so new about a 15yearold book?

Every year, my understanding of the selling process and the buying process increases, or should I say takes a quantum leap. If youre reading this passage, you may have also read one of the books in my Little Book series. For that, I thank you. But for this, its a challenge.

The Sales Bible started out as a definitive sales resource 15 years ago. Before e-mail. Before websites. And when cell phones were 50 cents a minute. Times have changed. So has The Sales Bible.
In this NEW EDITION, you will be upgraded to Sales Bible 3.0. Not just newer and better. More insightful. More actionable. And more compelling for you, the reader. Dont worry, I havent left out the fun. In fact, Ive added more of it. This new edition is laced with Randy Glasbergens laugh-out-loud view of the sales profession and its realities. Ive spent years developing these strategies and ideas that you can implement in minutes, become proficient at in hours, and master in days.

This new edition of The Sales Bible is for you to read, enjoy, put into practice, and profit from. Now that you own it, take advantage of it.

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Itll never happen.

Where did this book come from?
As with most sales, it started when I got turned down. An article published about me and my sales skills in The Charlotte Observer in the spring of 1992 made my phone ring off the hook. I went running back to the paper to offer my services. I want to write a weekly article on sales, I trumpeted. Not only did they turn me down, they said, Itll never happen. I said, No, itll never happen here. That same morning one hour later I struck a deal with the Charlotte Business Journal to publish a weekly column on selling skills. I called it Sales Moves.

Next time someone tells you never, remember that means not for at least one hour.
My name is Jeffrey Gitomer and Im a salesman. I dont have a Ph.D. Im a college dropout. I dont live in an ivory tower. I live in Charlotte, North Carolina. I learned to sell in New Jersey and New York, where I grew up. I was in multilevel marketing when it was called pyramiding. I have cold called every office in downtown Charlotte, and Ive cold called Fortune 500 company presidents and made the sale. Ive made $1 sales and Ive made $1,000,000 sales. Im a salesman who has been on the street for almost 30 years. Sometimes face up, sometimes face down. I love to sell. Sales Moves first appeared in Charlottes business journal on March 23, 1992. The column was an instant success. It soon found its way to Dallas, Atlanta, Denver, Princeton, and a number of other cities. Mark Ethridge, publisher of the Charlotte Business Journal, Pulitzer PrizeWinning journalist, and my good friend and supporter, said that publishing Sales Moves was his most impactful marketing decision of 1992. WOW!

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People began to call, and still do every day, from all over the country. Papers wanting to publish the column. Readers thanking me for helping them make sales. I found out that salespeople were hanging my weekly article on the wall in their offices. They were copying the column and passing it around. They were mailing it to friends and co-workers in other cities. They were using the column to lead sales meetings. My daughter, Stacey, bought a car in Charlotte. Everyone in the dealership reads my article. When she got to the closing room (alone), they said, Were giving you the best deal of the year because we dont want your dad to write anything bad about us. The first day I wrote an article, I knew I would write a book. It was a natural progression. My good friend and mentor, Ty Boyd, suggested the same thing. Encouragement means a lot to a salesman. Im grateful for his; Im grateful for yours. The material I use is mine. Im drawing on my 40 years in selling experience, 16 of which have been in consulting. Ive listened to thousands of hours of records, tapes, and CDs. Ive read everything I could find. Ive attended every seminar that time would permit. My mission is to learn as I teach. I seek to learn something new every day. Ill continue to write my weekly column to provide you with info that you can use to make more sales out there in the trenches. Today. I know what youre up against. I know how hard you work. I know how frustrating it can be. I will help you. I began the construction of the first edition of this book in August 1993. After countless late hours in the office, a week at Beech Mountain, NC, and a week at Hilton Head Island, SC, with my Macintosh, my ace critic, editor, and friend, Rod Smith, and my cat, Lito, I was done. I thought it would be a snap. 700 man-hours later snap. Heres The NEW Sales Bible, edited by my partner and alter ego, Jessica McDougall. It has plenty of whats new and keeps the tradition intact. Thank you for being my customer. I hope this book makes you as much money as it will me.