Selling is Dead_ Moving Beyond Traditional Sales Roles and Practices to Revitalize Growth - Library

10/4/11 Selling is Dead: Moving Beyond Traditional Sales Roles and Practices to Revitalize Growth - library.nu

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Selling is Dead: Moving Beyond Traditional Sales Roles and Practices to Revitalize Growthby: Marc Miller, Jason Sinkovitz

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Selling is Dead: Moving Beyond Traditional Sales Roles and Practices to Revitalize GrowthBy Marc Miller, Jason Sinkovitz

Publisher: WileyNumber Of Pages: 320Publication Date: 2005-06-22ISBN-10 / ASIN: 0471721115ISBN-13 / EAN: 9780471721116Binding: Hardcover

Product Description: A manifesto for reinventing the sales functionSelling Is Dead argues that selling teams and growth-motivated organizations must change to remain competitive. It presents a new selling framework based onresearch that indicates that buyer behavior can be modeled and that large sales and small sales are fundamentally different. This new framework provides salespeoplewith a practical structure for giving buyers significantly more value for their dollar-value well beyond the products and services being sold. Rather than focusing on oneselling model, regardless of the type of sale, this book offers four different types of large sales and presents specific strategies for succeeding at each. Many salesorganizations are systematically mismanaging their selling opportunities and failing to optimize their markets. Through effective selling models, illustrative case studiesand examples, and real-world anecdotes, Selling Is Dead brings strategy and efficiency to sales-and shows every sales-based business how to reap the rewards.

Summary: If your product/service is not mission critical -- buy this bookRating: 5This is THE best book I've ever read (and I have shelves full of them) on the sales process as it applies to products and services which fall outside of being mission



This is THE best book I've ever read (and I have shelves full of them) on the sales process as it applies to products and services which fall outside of being missioncritical to the buying organization.

If a company has to have some form of what you sell even though they don't have to have your's this book would be of some value. If your offering falls in to theelective category - people like it, think it would helpful, has a wow factor - by which I mean it is a nice to have but the buying organization doesn't absolutely have tohave it in some form to continue doing business this is a must have book.

The writing style is a bit stiff to the point of being slightly academic at points but this is a reflection of the process which has yielded their step by step methodology. Ifyou've been in elective style sales such as much of the software world you will find that this book helps you think more systematically.

I have found help in making this my primary sales process resource and in making the "Advanced Selling" podcast my primary personal motivation resource.

If you are a student of sales you will welcome this addition to your library.

Summary: Selling is DeadRating: 4

As with Spin Selling (Neil Rackham), it's pretty heavy reading, and contradicts a lot of old style selling techniques,so I am yet to see if it works well. But I do admit thatselling has changed a lot over the years, and it could be worthwhile advice !

Summary: Provocative & Practical For Enterprise-level SellingRating: 5'Selling is Dead' offers insightful & provocative perspectives for sales organizations to capitalize on large selling opportunities. It offers readers a disciplined framework inselling. There are two key points of the framework that I cannot agree more: 1)To plan sales activities from prospects' point of view & decision making process, and 2)Todevelop sales people into 'business people who sell'. These two points may seem to be common sense, but I find many sales organizations overlook them or may findthem challenging to be executed successfully; Miller concisely illustrated practical steps (along with some good case studies) to make them happen. Taking Rackham's'SPIN' process to a new level, Miller elaborated a new systematic questioning process called 'FOCAS' (Fact, Objective, Concern, Anchor, Solution), which I also find tobe pragmatic for enterprise-level sales situation.

Summary: Strong Contribution to Effectiveness in Complex SalesRating: 5"Selling is Dead" is one of 10 best books on sales effectiveness published in the United States in the past 20 years. It makes a strong contribution to saleseffectiveness for sales reps and sales managers who are involved in complex sales in major accounts. It is especially valuable for companies that sell innovativesolutions.

Because of its focus on selling innovative solutions, the book cites examples that tend to be skewed toward sales of technical solutions and especially of informationtechnology. But the book also carries useful advice for selling less innovative products and services.

Of course selling isn't dead, literally. But it's changing in major ways, the authors say. Sales teams are underperforming because they are ineffective. The cost of salespeople has risen much higher than their productivity. If selling isn't exactly dead, it's broken. The authors say the main reason is that sellers are generally unable to copewith the quickening pace of innovation.

"Sales teams rarely falter when selling commodities because buyers see commodities as safe, comfortable, existing applications," they say. "However, once acompany's core business has matured and the market for those commoditized offerings has become saturated, organizations must turn to innovation for growth andsurvival. Unfortunately, there is powerful evidence that the transition of sales teams from selling commodities to selling innovative new platforms is difficult and fraughtwith failure. The real challenge in selling is selling innovation."

The authors' answer, in part, is to develop sales people into "business people who sell."

The authors rightly give credit to Neil Rackham for his prior contributions in "SPIN Selling," "Major Account Sales Strategy" and other ground-breaking work. They thenbuild beyond Rackham's work to distinguish between appropriate selling behavior for what they call "continuous" and "discontinuous" products.

Continuous products are already well known in their marketplace. Some level of demand already exists for them. Many customers are familiar with such products andare likely to know when they need them. They may already have set a budget and established a selection process to acquire them.

Discontinuous products, on the other hand, did not previously exist in their target market. They are so new that no budgets are set for them and decision processes arenot in place to evaluate them. Most prospects have no idea they need them. Such products represent the greatest selling challenge and also the greatest profitopportunity. They are highly differentiated. Because they are not subject to direct competition, they command premium prices. The challenge for the seller is to helppeople recognize that they need them enough to outweigh the cost and perceived risks of buying them.

For sales of discontinuous solutions, the authors propose that sellers use a structured questioning process the authors call FOCAS. The acronym, like Rackham'sSPIN, stands for different kinds of questions: Fact Questions, Objective Questions, Concern Questions, Anchor Questions and Solution Questions. The purpose ofthese questions is to help the prospect recognize his or her latent needs. Having done so, s/he can overcome innate resistance to change and aversion to risk. Onlythen is a sale possible.

For sales of continuous products, the authors propose a significantly different sales behavior. It is more oriented toward helping buyers choose which of several alternateproducts they prefer in a category they already know and understand.

As good as the book is, it could be better in some areas. The authors refer to empirical research they say they've done, but they provide no details on methodology orresults. The book contains a few copy-editing errors and oversights. It seems to take more time than may be necessary to describe the differences between continuousand discontinuous sales. The book also seems to spend excessive energy in explaining the need to sell each type of solution differently. The authors describe FOCASquestions very briefly, and they provide no advice on how to develop or refine them. Nor do they give enough guidance on how to use FOCAS questions in everydayselling situations.

Even so, the book is well worth reading multiple times.

This field is full of books that are little more than thinly disguised, high-priced sales-promotion vehicles whose primary objective is to build the authors' consultingbusiness. While it's clear the authors would also be happy to provide their consulting and training services, this volume is a quality stand-alone effort from a qualitypublisher (John Wiley). It does not invite you to visit the authors' web site to learn how much you can pay for the really useful stuff they've maddeningly withheld fromthe book you bought for $30.00.

With dedication and imagination, you can begin right away applying the principles they teach. When you overlay the ideas in "Selling is Dead" onto the step-by-stepquestion-generation process in Rackham's "SPIN Selling Field Guide," you can start improving your sales effectiveness almost immediately.



question-generation process in Rackham's "SPIN Selling Field Guide," you can start improving your sales effectiveness almost immediately.

Summary: Selling is Dead - couldn't agree moreRating: 5This book reiterates what I've long thought - that selling, at least in the traditional (pushy, gimmicky) sense, is completely outmoded for today's much more complicatedexchanges between buyers and sellers. The title caught my eye and I found that Selling is Dead addressed the issue of growing complexity (especially when dealingwith innovative sales offerings) in a useful and very applicable way.

The authors not only explain the theory behind the work, but also provide plenty of case studies to illustrate, and different questioning strategies for the different types ofsales offerings.

For anyone who A) realizes that selling is dead and wants to take advantage of a better way to exchange offerings or who B) doesn't realize that selling is dead and can'tunderstand why the old tricks aren't working. Great read, and enjoy the humor between the theory!

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Selling is Dead_ Moving Beyond Traditional Sales Roles and Practices to Revitalize Growth - Library

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