The final masters

The book, titled “America’s Twelve Master Salesmen,” was written and published by B.C. Forbes & Sons in 1953.

The book was based on the fact that each one of these master salesmen had one extremely powerful overriding principle or philosophy upon which his or her success was based.

For the last two weeks I have presented the first of the masters, and this week the final three (plus me).

Suppose you could adopt (or adapt) all of these masters’ single-best characteristics into your own set of capabilities. That would be power.

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And so, to challenge the balance of your 2015, here are three more masters’ philosophies from 1953.

n William Zeckendorf Principle: Fact plus imagination plus action.

Will Rogers once said, “Buy land, they’re not making any more of it.” William Zeckendorf took that advice several steps further. He bought it, and developed it. Of course his innovative ideas often met with opposition from city planners, but over time (and a winning track record) he developed a reputation nationwide for successful projects, and was eventually wooed by cities looking for new ideas. He stated the facts, presented the plan – and made it a success with a family tradition: work hard. NOTE: He bought, then subsequently sold The Chrysler Building, the ultimate deco structure in New York City, that at one time was the tallest building in the world.

n Thomas J. Watson Principle: Pack your todays with effort – extra effort. He was a salesman and later corporate officer for NCR under the tutelage of John Patterson. “No. I don’t want to buy a cash register.” “I know you don’t. That’s why I came to see you. I knew if you wanted one you would come down to the office and pick one out. What I’ve come for is to find out why you don’t want one.” Watson realized that to overcome an objection, he had to walk in with answers – this took extra preparation on the part of the salesman – extra effort. Was the extra effort he put into his sales career worth it? He went door to door selling cash registers, and invented creative new ways to approach the customer. After leaving NCR as one of their all-time great salespeople, you may also know Watson for his second career – the founder of another company – IBM. A leading self-made industrialist, he was one of the richest men of his time, and was called the world’s greatest salesman when he died in 1956.

n Elmer G. Leterman Principle: Neglected customers never buy: They just fade away. This principle merges the significance of three relationship factors of customer loyalty – giving value to the customer – staying in front of the customer – and serving the customer. He added to this strategy the personal philosophy of: “I have adhered to a personal rule of trying to do for the other fellow what he can’t do for himself – without any strings attached.”

n Jeffrey Gitomer Principle: People don’t like to be sold – but they love to buy. Unlike the other masters, my statement is not only the philosophy by which I live my sales life, it is also a registered trademark. If salespeople would just stop selling and transfer that energy into creating an atmosphere to buy, you would double your sales.

Well, there’s the list of people and their prime philosophies and principles.

What principles are you known by? What is your primary success strategy?

What would someone say your philosophy was – if they had to boil it down to one sentence? What have you done to live your philosophy, to brand your philosophy, to make your philosophy known to others by your writings and by your actions?

If the answer to these questions is painfully obvious to you, perhaps this should be your year of transition. Perhaps this should be a year where you take a closer look at your bigger picture rather than a frustrated look at your quota and monthly sales achievements. •

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