Sales Techniques Quotes

Perhaps the most extraordinary characteristic of current America is the attempt to reduce life to buying and selling. Life is not love unless love is sex and bought and sold. Life is not knowledge save knowledge of technique, of science for destruction. Life is not beauty except beauty for sale. Life is not art unless its price is high and it is sold for profit. All life is production for profit, and for what is profit but for buying and selling again?

Always set your goals higher than you could ever possibly reach. That way, when you barely fall short, you're still better than everybody else.

The principles underlying propaganda are extremely simple. Find some common desire, some widespread unconscious fear or anxiety; think out some way to relate this wish or fear to the product you have to sell; then build a bridge of verbal or pictorial symbols over which your customer can pass from fact to compensatory dream, and from the dream to the illusion that your product, when purchased, will make the dream come true. They are selling hope. We no longer buy oranges, we buy vitality. We do not just buy an auto, we buy prestige. And so with all the rest. In toothpaste, for example, we buy not a mere cleanser and antiseptic, but release from the fear of being sexually repulsive. In vodka and whisky we are not buying a protoplasmic poison which in small doses, may depress the nervous system in a psychologically valuable way; we are buying friendliness and good fellowship, the warmth of Dingley Dell and the brilliance of the Mermaid Tavern. With our laxatives we buy the health of a Greek god. With the monthly best seller we acquire culture, the envy of our less literate neighbors and the respect of the sophisticated. In every case the motivation analyst has found some deep-seated wish or fear, whose energy can be used to move the customer to part with cash and so, indirectly, to turn the wheels of industry.

Marketing is so powerful that it can make even an extremely untalented musician a one-hundred-hits wonder.

Have you ever heard of the “yes ladder?” It’s a sales technique where you get a potential customer to say yes as many times as possible to commit his brain to making a purchase, reducing the likelihood of a flake.

A real salesman knows how to engage Anyone Anywhere Anytime in a sensible conversation.

Empirical evidence suggests that the relationship between the profitability of larger share and smaller share depends on the industry. Exhibit 7-1 compares the rate of return on equity of the largest firms accounting for at least 30 percent of industry sales (leaders) to the rate of return on equity of the medium-sized firms in the same industry (followers). In this calculation small firms with assets less than $500,000 were excluded. Although some of the industries in the sample are overly broad, it is striking that followers were noticeably more profitable than leaders in 15 of 38 industries. The industries in which the followers’ rates of return were higher appear generally to be those where economies of scale are either not great or absent (clothing, footwear, pottery, meat products, carpets) and/or those that are highly segmented (optical, medical and ophthalmic goods, liquor, periodicals, carpets, and toys and sporting goods). The industries in which leaders’ rates of return are higher seem to be generally those with heavy advertising (soap; perfumes; soft drinks; grain mill products, i.e., cereal; cutlery) and/or research outlays and production economies of scale (radio and television, drugs, photographic equipment). This outcome is as we would expect.

Whereas penetration most often means that industry demand will level off, for durable goods, achieving penetration can lead to an abrupt drop in industry demand. After most potential customers have purchased the product, its durability implies that few will buy replacements for a number of years. If industry penetration has been rapid, this situation may translate into several very lean years for industry demand. For example, industry sales of snowmobiles, which underwent very rapid penetration, fell from 425,000 units per year in the peak year (1970-1971) to 125,000 to 200,000 units per year in 1976-1977.6 Recreational vehicles underwent a similar though not quite so dramatic decline. The relation between the growth rate after penetration and growth before penetration will be a function of how fast penetration has been reached and the average time before replacement, and this figure can be calculated.

If we look at the world we see arts for sale. Men use equipment to sell their own selves. As if with the nut and the flower, the nut has become less than the flower. In this kind of Way of strategy, both those teaching and those learning the way are concerned with coloring and showing off their technique, trying to hasten the bloom of the flower. They speak of "This Dojo" and "That Dojo". They are looking for profit.

SELLING HAS BEEN DEFINED AS: THE ACT OF PERSUADING OR CONVINCING SOMEONE TO BUY YOUR PRODUCT, SERVICE, OR IDEA.

a motivated person who was willing to get in front of enough people and simply tell their story would almost always outsell the ‘sales pro’ with the slick closes and fancy techniques.

Layla jumped up and lunged for the paper. Sam held it higher and she collided with him, losing her balance. He circled an arm around her waist to keep her steady, securing her soft body against his chest. Electricity arced between them, warming his blood as he felt the pounding of her unaccommodating heart. "Bastard." She broke the spell, jumping to get the paper. Her body rubbed up and down against his. Too late, he realized the danger. "Is this a sales technique?" he whispered in her ear. "A little demonstration for Hassan about what he can expect in bed? Or is it just for me? Because, sweetheart, if he doesn't marry you after this, I will." Her nostrils flared, and she pulled away. "I wouldn't marry you even if you got down on your knees and begged." "When I'm with a woman, it's not me doing the begging.

Technique #1: Intimidation In person-to-person, professional selling, I very quickly learned the value of intimidation, and I consider Robert Ringer's bestselling book Winning Through Intimidation to be one of the most useful business books I've ever read.

Conversion of sales Queries is never based on the questions they raise, higher conversion is based on keeping the answer closest to the client’s expectations. Cost is one of the factors, but the winning touch is understanding the vision behind the question and keeping the answer as close as possible.

they wanted their son to pursue a career in religion or education, not sales. It seems unlikely that they would have approved of a self-improvement technique called “Truth or Lie.” Or, for that matter, of Carnegie’s best-selling advice on how to get people to admire you and do your bidding. How to Win Friends and Influence People is full of chapter titles like “Making People Glad to Do What You Want” and “How to Make People Like You Instantly.” All of which raises the question, how did we go from Character to Personality without realizing that we had sacrificed something meaningful along the way?

Scott noted that Walmart had similar techniques. It could measure whether a certain item, such as a globe for children, could lift the sale of another item, like a coloring book, if they were placed next to each other on a store display. Both companies had a deep interest in testing these combinations.

I'VE SAVED THE BEST FOR LAST: There is ONE technique that can work to both find the risk, and close the deal. BUT it's a delicate one that requires mastery through preparation and practice. The strategy is called: What's the risk? What's the reward? When a prospect hesitates, you simply ask him or her to list the risks of purchase. Actually write them down. Prompt others. If the prospect says "I'm not sure," you ask, "Could it be ..." After you feel the list is complete, ask the prospect to list the rewards. Write them down, and embellish as much as possible without puking on the prospect. Then eliminate the risks one by one with lead in phrases like: Suppose we could ... did you know that ... I think we can ... Then you simply ask, "can you see any other reasons not to proceed?" One at a time, brick by brick, remove the risks that the buyer perceives as fatal mistakes in his decision-making process. Then drive home the rewards, both emotionally and logically.

Les contes de fées étaient des récits ancestraux, profondément symboliques, remodelés de siècle en siècle par la parole et l'écrit... Aujourd'hui, ils servent de matière première à des œuvres qui, techniquement, n'appartiennent plus au genre du conte de fées. C'est la stratégie des contes pour continuer de s'adapter à notre époque.

Mirroring is a standard technique in sales to get exactly this effect. Here, the salesperson tries to copy the gestures, language, and facial expressions of his prospective client. If the buyer speaks very slowly and quietly, often scratching his head, it makes sense for the seller to speak slowly and quietly, and to scratch his head now and then, too.

Finding a situation that catches the key competitor or competitors with conflicting goals is at the heart of many company success stories. The slow Swiss reaction to the Timex watch provides an example. Timex sold its watches through drugstores, rather than through the traditional jewelry store outlets for watches, and emphasized very low cost, the need for no repair, and the fact that a watch was not a status item but a functional part of the wardrobe. The strong sales of the Timex watch eventually threatened the financial and growth goals of the Swiss, but it also raised an important dilemma for them were they to retaliate against it directly. The Swiss had a big stake in the jewelry store as a channel and a large investment in the Swiss image of the watch as a piece of fine precision jewelry. Aggressive retaliation against Timex would have helped legitimize the Timex concept, threatened the needed cooperation of jewelers in selling Swiss watches, and blurred the Swiss product image. Thus the Swiss retaliation to Timex never really came. There are many other examples of this principle at work. Volkswagen’s and American Motor’s early strategies of producing a stripped-down basic transportation vehicle with few style changes created a similar dilemma for the Big Three auto producers. They had a strategy built on trade-up and frequent model changes. Bic’s recent introduction of the disposable razor has put Gillette in a difficult position: if it reacts it may cut into the sales of another product in its broad line of razors, a dilemma Bic does not face.4 Finally, IBM has been reluctant to jump into minicomputers because the move will jeopardize its sales of larger mainframe computers.

I've spent thirty years working with the visualization techniques developed by Dr. Maxwell Maltz, author of the 30-million-copy best-seller Psycho-Cybernetics, and I use those techniques — like “Theater in Your Mind” — to visualize my letter's recipients as living, breathing, thinking, feeling, walking, talking human beings. I visualize their day's experience. How did it start out? What did they do when they first arrived at the office? Do they get their mail presorted? Opened? From an “in” basket? Hand-delivered? When do they get it? Where will they stand or sit when going through it? At that time, what else are they thinking about? Preoccupied with? What do they worry about, complain about, secretly wish for, enjoy? Through this stretch of my own imagination, I try to become one with the recipients of my letter, so I can anticipate their thoughts and reactions.

Shin-shin-toitsu-do includes a wide variety of stretching exercises, breathing methods, forms of seated meditation and moving meditation, massage-like healing arts, techniques of auto-suggestion, and mind and body coordination drills, as well as principles for the unification of mind and body. These principles of mind and body coordination are regarded as universal laws that express the workings of nature on human life. As such, they can be applied directly to an endless number of everyday activities and tasks. It is not uncommon when studying Japanese yoga to encounter classes and seminars that deal with the direct application of these universal principles to office work, sales, management, sports, art, music, public speaking, and a host of other topics. How to use these precepts of mind and body integration to realize our full potential in any action is the goal. All drills, exercises, and practices of Shin-shin-toitsu-do are based on the same principles, thus linking intelligently a diversity of arts. But more than this, they serve as vehicles for grasping and cultivating the principles of mind and body coordination. And it is these principles that can be put to use directly, unobtrusively, and immediately in our daily lives.

Assholes use closers.

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But, the Rule of One does not mean you can’t have a story and a secret and an emotionally-compelling fact in the same lead. It means that the lead is strongest that promotes one compelling idea by supporting that idea with all the appropriate techniques … stories,

That day I walked out of the store with new shoes and an understanding of how emotions can be used to drive a sale. Having me put on a shoe that was way out of my price range, but not pressuring me to buy it, created a big Wow Moment, and it achieved a couple of important things. First, my mind was blown. I couldn’t believe the difference between a good shoe and an amazing shoe, and I was able to feel it for myself. This is a great technique for upselling someone if they have more to spend. You can’t control how much money is in a client’s bank account, but you can control how you present the product to them—and that directly impacts how they feel about it. I

Self-Care is not Selfish Another characteristic common among EMS providers is the desire (sometimes need) to be there for others; to be known as the clutch player, the go-to. More often than not, it means doing for others to the exclusion of doing for yourself. That shit ends right here. The idea of self-care is not just some new age sales technique designed to get people to buy crap they don’t need for problems that don’t exist. Self-care, self-love (not the dirty kind), and self-improvement have become vital to the health and wellbeing, mental, physical, emotional, and even spiritual of everyone living in an ever-crazier world, filed with stressors we could not have imagined just a decade ago. Self-care is not a singular idea and there is no one-size-fits-all approach. Each of us must find and employ the kinds of self-care activities and processes that fit our lifestyles, abilities, and issues.

Imagine a Sapiens group - a tribe of five hundred, say, in bands of twenty-five or so--living around 55,000 years ago in the lowlands near the headwaters of the White Nile in what is today southern Sudan. They are the inheritors of the modern culture that has spread from southern Africa, and they survive with the skillful hunting and fishing techniques developed over the millennia, the close-knit organizations that establish and maintain group harmony, the communications capabilities of at least a rudimentary language, and a healthy diet based on both plants and animals in abundance. But there are other inheritor bands around, for the region is fertile and the climate generally benign, and they continue to grow in population and this means that in time it gets harder and harder to find new fields of tubers, or large herds of impala, or the usual swamp tortoises. Human pressure on the area is pushing it past its carrying capacity, and relations with other bands in other tribes become increasingly stressful as competition intensifies.

Closing is a transfer of enthusiasm.

Believe In What You Sell

this deep belief in the goodness of what you’re selling,

When you ask the prospect to buy, you must confidently expect them to buy.

Confidence in selling comes from knowledge. It comes from practice.

Question number one; does the prospect need what you're selling?  Question number two, can the prospect use what you're selling?  Many

Number three; can the person afford the product?  And number four; does the person want the product?

In some products, especially in real estate, the close is largely determined by how well you present the product to the prospect.

much, the fear of being criticized by other people.

One of the key factors in successful selling is to be prepared to hear a no and continue.

Hello Mr. Jones, this is Brian Tracy.  Would you like to see a method that would enable you to increase your sales by 20 to 30 percent over the next 12 months?

Mr. Prospect, if it's not exactly what you're looking for, there's no charge at all.

It's an effective sales technique in America to put a foolish projection on a desk. And if you're an investment banker, it's an art form.

Vision mission: What was the original market or technology insight that led you to create this company? Customers: Who do you envision buying this product or service? Who will use it? Problem statement: What’s the problem you think you can solve for your potential customers? Use cases: What are the specific ways people will use this product or service to solve their problem? Product/solution: Give a detailed explanation of the technology behind the solution—what does it do now, and what else is it capable of doing? Ecosystem: In many cases there are other companies involved in solving the problem or adding additional value. These companies form an ecosystem around the problem and solution. What are all the companies and where in the ecosystem are the control points where one company has leverage? Competition: Who else is trying to solve this problem—or, if no one else sees the problem yet, who might jump in to compete with you to solve the problem once you identify it? Business model: How will your product or service change business for your customers? Will it increase their return on investment or reduce costs in a significant way? Or does it allow them to do something that couldn’t have been done with prior technology, creating huge value? Sales and go-to-market: Enterprise companies should articulate how the product or solution will make its way to the market. Through a sales force? Through distribution partners? Both? For a consumer company, how will users find out about your solution? From app stores? Search? Viral adoption? Growth hacking techniques? Advertising? PR? Organization: How is the company organized? Who are the major influencers on the company? How are decisions made? What kind of culture will work? Funding strategy: What’s the next funding event? A private financing? An IPO? How much runway does the company have before it needs more money and what kind of funding is in place to execute against the category strategy?

It is easy to ascribe the success of such hokum to the gullibility of another age, until we stop to reflect that the techniques successfully used to sell patent medicine are still routinely used today. The lotions and potions of our times inevitably promise youthfulness, health, or weight loss, thanks to exotic ingredients like antioxidants, amino acids, miracle fruits like the pomegranate and açaí berry, extracted ketones, or biofactors. There is scarcely a shampoo or lotion for sale that does not promise an extraordinary result owing to essence of coconut, or rosemary extracts, or another botanical. As devotees of technology we are, if anything, more susceptible to the supposed degree of difference afforded by some ingenious proprietary innovation, like the “air” in Nike’s sports shoes, triple reverse osmosis in some brands of water, or the gold-plating of audio component cables. For all our secular rationalism and technological advances, potential for surrender to the charms of magical thinking remains embedded in the human psyche, awaiting only the advertiser to awaken it.

In truth, I don’t think elevator pitches even matter that much. It’s one of those sales techniques you hear about, but they never actually happen in the real world. What the story does reveal, though, is that stories don’t have to be long to be effective. They just need to be as long as they need to be.

Sales and Marketing Training Program A well-developed sales network and an effective sales team will result in increased sales. It is important to learn some of the most important foundational techniques, such as ice-breakers, mirroring the customer, handling objections, and assuming the deal. Those new to the business should also be exposed to a basic script, as this will help them develop a smooth flow of conversation. Then, they should work on improving their presentation and communication skills.

Persuasion psychology expert Robert Cialdini

Adopting the brutal, anything-goes techniques of Patterson and Range, and adding a few devious tricks of his own, Watson began the systematic annihilation of Hallwood, its sales, and its customer base.

Watson embraced many of Patterson’s regimenting techniques as indispensable doctrine for good sales.

Another useful onboarding technique is to create product-focused battlecards. An example would be a simple one-page PDF which includes the following elements: Product Basics Concise Sales Pitch      Key Questions for Customers (which highlight their pain points and the solutions you offer) Frequently Asked Questions and Answers Common Objections and Responses

This is Mike Kaplan with XYZ Company, the reason for my call is that you recently requested information on______, and I wanted to ask you a few questions to see how I could be of service and then tell you what it’s all about, would that be ok?

The price depends on exactly what your order will be and that depends on what you’ll need. That’s why I want to simply ask you a few questions and briefly tell you about the (product/service) and then be able to work up a price, fair enough?

MASTER CLOSER WANTS TO FIND THE PROSPECT’S BIGGEST PROBLEMS, CONCERNS, NEEDS, WANTS, AND DESIRES THAT HE KNOWS HIS PRODUCT OR SERVICE CAN SOLVE AND/OR FULFILL.

People will remember a story about a product or service for years, but they will forget all the technical details in ten minutes.

You can use a relevant story close is when the prospect is having difficulty making a decision. You can use it in the middle of a presentation, as well. You can tell a relevant story about another prospect who was hesitating about buying this product or service, and they finally decided to do it.

Mr. Prospect, I know you're not in a position to make a decision today.  But could you give me the names of two or three people who you think may be able to take advantage of this offer?

After making sure that they don't have any problems, making sure they're happy, he gets two or three referrals from each.

sales techniques by using them face to face with a live prospect.  When you meet a person who’s not going to buy, develop your skills by using them all.

The key to sales success is to act boldly and to close boldly.

ask. Speak strongly.  Ask as though you expect the person to say yes.

you will succeed, and you will become one of the great sales people of your generation.

Never offer a prospect the choice between something and nothing. Always make it a choice between one of two items.

Why don't you take this little puppy home and just play with it for the weekend.  And if you don't like it, you can bring it back on Monday.” The

just throw it away.  Okay?

The demonstration close is what you use to qualify the prospect with your opening words, and to get a clear statement from the prospect that he is in a position to buy and to pay for this product.

Good sales people are those who question skillfully and listen carefully to the answers.

The Freudian slip concept says that if you ask enough questions and give prospects enough opportunity to talk, they will tell you everything that you need to know to sell them.

really selling when you are asking questions and giving them the opportunity to tell you what they're looking for, what they want, what they need, what they're concerned about, what their worries are. You are only really selling when you are listening attentively.

hot button.

Your job is to discover and then push the hot button over and over again.

The trial close is a technique that a professional sales person asks throughout the presentation to find out how well he is doing.

check close.

Does this make sense to you?  Is this what you're looking for?  Is this what you had in mind?  Is this an improvement on what you are doing right now?

The best thing about a trial close is that the prospect can answer “no” and it doesn't end the presentation.

You continually create mental pictures of what it's going to be like to use, to enjoy, to benefit, and to own the product.

Why don't you give it a try?” is a very subtle way of saying that you still have your options open.

How do you like the house?” If

Which do you prefer?

Back to top Chapter Eighteen - The Take Away Close With the take away close, even before the prospect says yes or no, you begin to suggest that the product may not be available. You might be out of stock. Sometimes people are not even aware that they want the item until you suggest that they may not be able to get it.

I can't afford it.” You immediately respond by saying, “That’s exactly why you should buy it.!” The prospect will react with surprise. “ What? How do you mean?

in July 1925, when E. K. Strong published The Psychology of Selling. This seminal work introduced the idea of sales techniques, such as features and benefits, objection handling, closing, and, perhaps most important, open and closed questioning.

Many of your closing techniques are ways of getting the person to tell you what is stopping them from making a decision.

This  assumption close is one of the most powerful

We weigh the pros and cons.

in favor of a decision, and compare them with the reasons against making the decision.

Good teams engage directly with end users and customers every week, to better understand their customers, and to see the customer's response to their latest ideas. Bad teams think they are the customer. Good teams know that many of their favorite ideas won't end up working for customers, and even the ones that could will need several iterations to get to the point where they provide the desired outcome. Bad teams just build what's on the roadmap, and are satisfied with meeting dates and ensuring quality. Good teams understand the need for speed and how rapid iteration is the key to innovation, and they understand this speed comes from the right techniques and not forced labor. Bad teams complain they are slow because their colleagues are not working hard enough. Good teams make high‐integrity commitments after they've evaluated the request and ensured they have a viable solution that will work for the customer and the business. Bad teams complain about being a sales‐driven company. Good teams instrument their work so they can immediately understand how their product is being used and make adjustments based on the data. Bad teams consider analytics and reporting a nice to have.

a 2003 study, which demonstrated that consumers’ preference for an online retailer increases when they are offered competitive price information.[xxxvi] The technique has also been used by Progressive, the car insurance company, to drive over $15 billion of annual insurance sales, up from just $3.4 billion before the tactic was implemented.

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s s i o n o f R a t i o n a l S o f t w a r e C o r p o r a t i o n i s t o e n s u r e t h e s u c c e s s o f c u s t o m e r s c o n s t r u c t i n g t h e s o f t w a r e s y s t e m s t h a t t h e y d e p e n d o n . We enable our customers to achieve their business objectives by turning software into a source of competitive advantage, speeding time-to-market, reducing the risk of failure, and improving software quality. We fulfill our mission with the Rational ApproachTM, a comprehensive softwareengineering solution consisting of three elements: • A configurable set of processes and techniques for the development of software, based on iterative development, object modeling, and an architectural approach to software reuse. • An integrated family of application construction tools that automate the Rational Approach throughout the software lifecycle. • Technical consulting services delivered by our worldwide field organization of software engineers and technical sales professionals. Our customers include businesses in the Asia/Pacific region, Europe, and North America that are leaders in leveraging semiconductor, communications, and software technologies to achieve their business objectives. We serve customers in a diverse range of industries, such as telecommunications

o n o f R a t i o n a l S o f t w a r e C o r p o r a t i o n i s t o e n s u r e t h e s u c c e s s o f c u s t o m e r s c o n s t r u c t i n g t h e s o f t w a r e s y s t e m s t h a t t h e y d e p e n d o n . We enable our customers to achieve their business objectives by turning software into a source of competitive advantage, speeding time-to-market, reducing the risk of failure, and improving software quality. We fulfill our mission with the Rational ApproachTM, a comprehensive softwareengineering solution consisting of three elements: • A configurable set of processes and techniques for the development of software, based on iterative development, object modeling, and an architectural approach to software reuse. • An integrated family of application construction tools that automate the Rational Approach throughout the software lifecycle. • Technical consulting services delivered by our worldwide field organization of software engineers and technical sales professionals. Our customers include businesses in the Asia/Pacific region, Europe, and North America that are leaders in leveraging semiconductor, communications, and software technologies to achieve their business objectives. We serve customers in a diverse range of industries, such as telecommunications, banking and financial services, manufacturing, transportation, aerospace, and defense.They construct software applications for a wide range of platforms, from microprocessors embedded in telephone switching systems to enterprisewide information systems running on company-specific intranets. Rational Software Corporation is traded on the NASDAQ system under the symbol RATL.1

A major difference between a Closer and a Presenter is that the Presenter typically gives a complete presentation and may not create a single closing opportunity or, when she does, she often misses it.

I asked Thomas what his special technique for sales was as a kid. He said he didn’t have any. It was simply that “I was willing to be rejected. That’s what allows you to be a good salesperson. You have to be willing to be rejected.” It

These techniques do not create greater value, except in impulse-buy categories such as soft drinks and confectionery, because most of them are easy to copy. The simplest way to increase sales volume is by dropping your prices, and the easiest way for competitors to recover their lost sales volume is by copying your strategy and dropping their prices even lower. Hence

Consumers can now scan the code on the product when they are running low, and it will be ordered and delivered within hours to their home, completely side-lining all the tools and techniques of competing manufacturers who would wish to get the consumer to brand switch. Tesco’s Homeplus in South Korea also launched a campaign that engages shoppers to buy products using QR codes. Homeplus created virtual billboards of their store aisles in subway stations, allowing passengers to shop while they waited by scanning the products’ QR codes – the groceries being delivered when they arrived home. The goal of the campaign was to help Homeplus compete with the number-one retailer, E-MART, without increasing their store numbers. Since the launch, their online sales have increased 130%, making them the top online retailer in South Korea, and a close second offline.

You learn more sales techniques from rejections than you can ever learn from approvals - provided you analyze the reason for the rejections; most of the time it’s not the cost involved but your failure to understand the need & create the utility.

If you come across as a salesperson trying to sell something desperately, you are bound to fail, the most successful sales come to those who acts as a guide & pretends to be on the client’s side.

One interview technique that I’d used to sort the good from the bad was to ask a series of questions about hiring, training, and managing sales reps. Typically, it would go like this: Ben: “What do you look for in a sales rep?” Candidate: “They need to be smart, aggressive, and competitive. They need to know how to do complex deals and navigate organizations.” Ben: “How do you test for those things in an interview?” Candidate: “Umm, well, I hire everybody out of my network.” Ben: “Okay, once you get them on board, what do you expect from them?” Candidate: “I expect them to understand and follow the sales process, I expect them to master the product, I expect them to be accurate in their forecasting. . . .” Ben: “Tell me about the training program that you designed to achieve this.” Candidate: “Umm.” They would then proceed to make something up as they went along.

Encouraging quality communication will make it easier for you to establish rapport, gather information, and increase understanding. You can use this “fishing” technique for personal relationships, social events, sales calls, and professional correspondence.

Since we know people like to do business with people who are most like themselves, consider this: Excellent sales people understand that "matching and mirroring" another person’s body language is a powerful technique and subliminal way to develop trust, build rapport, and make their clients more comfortable and engaging. Subtly mirroring the postures, gestures, and body language of your client inspires a kinship of commonality.

A key technique in implementing this approach is the concept of takt time,3 which precisely synchronizes the rate of production to the rate of sales to customers. For example, for a bicycle firm’s high-end titanium-framed bike, let’s assume that customers are placing orders at the rate of forty-eight per day. Let’s also assume that the bike factory works a single eight-hour shift. Dividing the number of bikes by the available hours of production tells the production time per bicycle, the takt time, which is ten minutes. (Sixty minutes in an hour divided by demand of six bikes per hour.) Obviously, the aggregate volume of orders may increase or decrease over time and takt time will need to be adjusted so that production is always precisely synchronized with demand.

One version of Borrowed thinking is a technique I call the Different Lens. To begin, brainstorm a list of people, industries, or perspectives. Examples may include: an archaeologist, a 4-year-old, someone living 200 years in the future, Elon Musk, a Navy SEAL, a zoologist, Brad Pitt, Picasso, a professional bowling champion. The more diverse and strange, the better. Next, take a stack of index cards and write one name or role from your list on the back of each. You’re now armed for a Different Lens brainstorm session. First, clearly articulate the real-world challenge you’re facing. Perhaps it is developing a new product to combat a competitive launch. Maybe you’re looking for a way to improve closing rates throughout your sales force, attract and retain Millennial workers, or reduce error-rates in your manufacturing plant. Once the challenge has been identified, turn over one card. If the card reads “architect,” the group brainstorms how an architect would approach their real-world challenge. Once the ideas start to dwindle, flip over the next card and look at the problem through the next lens. Instead of thinking about how your competition is solving this problem, think about how Beyoncé would slay it. Before long, you and your team will see the problem in a whole new light, and by borrowing the thinking from others, you’ll gain a fresh perspective that will lead to the innovative solutions you seek.