• Info • Category : Business •

© 1985 by Shadow Lawn Press
ISBN 0-06-015424-1
354 pp., charts, tables, illustrations
6 x 9, cloth
Harper & Row

For the prospective sales representative, for the manager or field representative seeking a new and better job in sales, and for top executives and their staff, Birnes and Markman have examined the profit centers of major American businesses and selected the five best companies to sell for in each of twenty basic industries. The companies have been rated on the basis of

• Salaries and commissions
• Personnel policies
• Compensation scales
• Health and insurance benefits
• Incentive programs
• Opportunity for advancement within the company and the industry
• Technical and promotional sales support
• Product information and training
• After-sale customer support
• Company operating philosophy
• "Corporate culture"

Also provided here are overviews of the twenty basic industries as well as information on current trends within individual companies which may act in favor or against its sales force, such as mergers, divestitures, and profit incentives.

The authors have based their ratings on extensive research, conducting hundreds of interviews with field representatives, company and sales management and support personnel, and customers. They have gathered facts and statistics from industry studies, trade journals, company brochures, magazines and newspapers, and government studies.

As well as providing accurate and up-to-date economic analyses through tables, charts, and diagrams, the authors have captured the enthusiasm of those interviewed and created a book rich in personal stories and anecdotes. Selling at the Top is an invaluable guide for salespeople at all levels of experience who want to know if the grass is greener on the other side of the fence.

Selling is the bedrock of American industry. Good products have failed in the marketplace and products of lesser quality have succeeded due to the ability -- or lack of same -- of the sales force.

Highly qualified people have been rejected as candidates for jobs because they couldn't sell themselves effectively, and candidates with lesser qualifications have been hired because they could. Products are sold. Services are sold. People are sold. But what is selling all about? Is there a single, universal way to sell? Can soda be sold the same way that beer can be sold? Can cars be sold the same way that F-111 fighters can be sold? Are there universal principles of selling that apply across the board? Do principles of selling change through the years or are there immutable truths?

I got my start in advertising by selling myself: my abilities, my enthusiasm, my dedication. But I've said that if today I were to interview Jerry Della Femina when he was first starting out, I wouldn't hire him. Why not? Selling -- both in and out of the advertising industry -- has become highly specialized. The science of demographics has been refined to an art.

Technology has impacted on advertising as well as on every other industry. If you want to sell -- products, services, yourself -- you've got to keep current. You've got to know what's happening today. It's been said that you don't really sell; you find out what people want and what they need. And then they'll come to you for it But the key is to find out what people want and need.

One of the bedrock principles of my agency is that we talk to people&emdash; the people who are buying the products and services our clients are selling. We talk to our clients about their business. I insist that my people learn our clients' business well enough to go work for the client. It's hard work, and you've gotta be creative -- and original.

Creativity is the key ingredient in all selling -- not only in advertising. Stale doesn't sell bread and it won't sell any thing else either. It's been said that in advertising all your creativity is gone by the time you're thirty five. I say that creativity -- independent thought and original ideas -- can be eternal. As eternal as the spirit of the men and women who are willing to dedicate themselves to being the best that they can be, and who are willing to get up every morning and do their jobs with the same bright enthusiasm that they had their very first day.

Creativity is not a gift. You won't find it under your Christmas tree. You can't buy it Creativity is effort ... and sweat. Creativity comes from the willingness to fail and to pull yourself up and try again. Creativity comes from the willingness to hear a thousand no's and to keep striving for that one yes. Creativity is guts.

President
Della Femina, Travisano & Partners