Success Books – Successful Reads

The Little Red Book of Selling book by Jeffrey Gitomer is full of bite-sized pieces of  sales information all designed to inspire and encourage the reader to become more of an expert in sales. In it Jeffrey answers the question that a lot of people in sales ask all the time:

What’s the difference between failure and success in salespeople?

It’s not usually technique.  But rather attitude.

Jeffrey outlines the fundamentals that successful sales people do as well as the way successful people think.

The basic fundamentals outlined are:

1. Believe you can.
2. Create the environment.
3. Have the right associations.
4. Exposure yourself to what’s new.
5. Plan for the day.
6. Become valuable.
7. Have the answers your prospects and customers need.
8. Recognize opportunity.
9. Take advantage of opportunity.
10. Take responsibility.
11. Take action.
12. Make mistakes.
13. Willing to risk.
14. Keep your eyes on the prize.
15. Balance yourself.
16. Invest, don’t spend.
17. Stick at it until you win.
18. Develop and maintain a positive attitude.
19. Ignore idiots and zealots.

In the introduction he touches briefly on each of those then he outlines additional principles necessary for true sales success.

But…

He does it in that “in your face” style that Jeffrey is know for.  Just take a look at the titles of the twelve principles he covers:

• Principle 1: Kick Your Own Ass.
• Principle 2: Prepare to Win, or Lose To Someone Who Is
• Principle 3: Personal Branding is Sales: It’s Not You Know, It’s Who Knows You.
• Principle 4: It’s All About Value, It’s All About Relationship, It’s Not All About Price.
• Principle 5: It’s Not Work, It’s NETWork.
• Principles 6: It You Can’t Get In Front of the Real Decision Make, You Suck
• Principle 7: Engage Me and You Can Make Me Convince Myself
• Principle 8: If You Can Make Them Laugh, You Can Make Them Buy!
• Principle 9: Use Creativity To Differentiate and Dominate
• Principe 10: Reduce Their Risk, And You’ll Covert Selling To Buying
• When You Say It About Yourself It’s Bragging. When Someone Else Says It About You, It’s Proof.
• Antenna’s Up!

There is a chapter devoted to each of those principles.  They aren’t chapters full of fluff and sales stories.  But rather, simply full of  sales principles and tips.   I say sales principles because some people will believe that this is more of a book on self-improvement than on sales.   If you are looking for a step-by-step how to sales book.  This isn’t the book for that.

But..

If you are looking for a book that you can pick-up and study for a few minutes every day to help you become better at sales than this is great for that purpose. You could think of it as a daily sales devotional.

The layout of the book makes it quick and easy to read.  It’s printed in full color with key points in bold, and plenty of graphics .

For example, the sidebar contains “red whine” the term he uses to identify the excuses for failure people use all the time.  He counters that with a red selling response.  The solution that great sales people use to deal with those excuses.  One such “red whine” is “Nobody knows me.”  The “Red Selling Response: If you brand yourself people will know you.”

I’ve noticed that people who read this book either hate it or love it.  There doesn’t seem to be much middle group.  Me I really like it.

Would you like to learn how to better communicate your ideas? Would you like to learn how to motivate others with your words?

Yes?

Well, you’re sure to find more than a few ideas on how to communicate more effectively in the book Words that Work: It’s Not What You Say, It’s What People Hear by Frank Luntz.

You see, Frank’s books goes to the core of how the words you use persuade. It contains useful information on how to best organize your words to enable your message to get across, how the meaning of words can change, and how carefully replacing just a single word can change many peoples view on a certain subject.

Dr. Frank Luntz recommends these rules to create more effective communication

1. Simplicty: Use small words.
2. Brevity: Use short sentences.
3. Credibility is as important as philosophy.
4. Consistency matters.
5. Novelty: Offer Something New.
6. Sound and texture matter.
7. Speak aspirationally.
8. Visualize.
9. Ask a question.
10. Provide context and explain relevance.

Not only does the book provide you with some rules of communication, but Words that Work is full of examples that demonstrate how simple words can make a huge difference in politics, business, and relationships.

You’ll find that many of those examples are taken from politics. But as you read, carefully looks at the examples and ask yourself what you can learn from it. Using these methods you’re sure to further your communication skills.

Trickery and Deceit?

No doubt, some people will say to avoid the book as these methods are a form of trickery and deceit.   If you are using words to sell snake oil, than the methods could easily become a form of trickery or deceit.  However, if you are using words to help sell noble ideas and values than how could they be?

So, increase your chances of success, focus on how to be understood, and learn skills to further your success. After all, the words you use can mean the difference between success and failure.

I love to learn, but often find it difficult to fit in as much educational time as I would like. David. S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim have come up with an easy way to easily increase your knowledge. Simply read a page a day from their book The Intellectual Devotional.

Each day of the week is devoted to a specific topic:

• Monday – History
• Tuesday – Literature
• Wednesday – Visual Arts
• Thursday – Science
• Friday – Music
• Saturday – Philosophy
• Sunday – Religion

Of course there will be plenty of topics in the  The Intellectual Devotional that you already know about, but chances are that you will learn something new on that subject. For example, during the first week you’ll learn about…

Monday – Day 1 (History) The Alphabet

Did you know that the Egyptians developed the alphabet as an easy way to communicate with their slaves, and when these slaves eventually migrated back to their home country they took the writing system with them?

Tuesday – Day 2 (Literature) Ulysses by James Joyce

Did you know the novel Ulysses by James Joyce was banned from the United States for nearly twelve years due to the sexual imagery.

Wednesday, Day 3 (Visual Arts) – Lascaux Cave Paintings

The creators of the painters made use of perspective, they painted the figures high on the wall, and a manner that would not be distorted to the viewers below.

Thursday – Day 4 (Science)  Cloning

You’ll read about Dolly the Sheep.  However, did you know that Dolly’s
telomeres (a thin strand of protein at the end of the chromosomes) are the same as the mothers.  A newborn sheep would normally have much longer telomeres.  Telomeres seem to help protect our cells and get thinner as we age. So there could be some truth to all those science fiction stories of clones aging quickly.

Friday – Day 5 (Music) The Basics of Music

I played the Viola for many years so I have some musical background. However, I did learn that in India the musical pitches are chosen from a collection of twenty-two possibilities, and the distance between the steps on a scale are sometimes are larger and sometimes smaller than those used in the Western world.  This makes the differences between the pitches in Indian music very subtle.

Saturday – Day 6 (Philosophy) Appearance and Reality

I learned about a group of philosophers called the Presocratics. While I had heard of each of these philosophers before I didn’t know they believed the world was vastly different from what the experienced.  For example, Thales held the belief that all reality was ultimately composed of water, while Heraclitus believed the world was built from fire.

Sunday – Day 7 (Torah)

Torah scrolls are written in Hebrew by hand. They contain 304,805 letters and make take more than a year to produce. If a single mistake is made, the entire scroll becomes invalid.

I recommend this book for several reasons.

1. It’s a great way to expand your knowledge about a wide variety of subjects.
2. Each day’s reading is a quick read – just one page.
3. The things you learn can be a great way to start a conversation.  This is a lesson I learned from my teenage son.
   can always tell when he has been reading the book as he uses the things he learned to start a conversations with me.  He just revealed to me that one of his major motivations to reading it is to find something interesting to talk about, and interesting ways to start a conversation.  Personally I think that is brilliant, but then I think he is brilliant most of the time.  Interestingly the 2nd and 3rd book in the series uses the words “converse confidently” in the title.

One thing that would have improved the experience for me would be additional illustrations, particularly for the art subjects.  For example, when reading about the Lascaux Cave Paintings it would have been wonderful to have an illustration to look at.

Genre:  Daily Lessons/Devotional
Published by Rodale in 2006.
Hardcover;  364 pages.
List price is $24.00
ISBN: 1-59486-513-2

>>Currently available at Amazon.com for $16.32

Also from David. S. Kidder and Noah D. Oppenheim

• The Intellectual Devotional: American History: Revive Your Mind, Complete Your Education, and Converse Confidently about Our Nation’s Past (Hardcover)
• The Intellectual Devotional Modern Culture: Revive Your Mind, Complete Your Education, and Converse Confidently with the Culturati (Hardcover)

A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini, is the perfect book to read if you are feeling sorry for yourself. You’ll quickly be grateful for what you do have.

The story, set in Afghanistan, chronicles the lives of Miriam and Laila, two women whose intertwined lives are forced upon them.

Miriam’s childhood isn’t an easy one.  Because she is an illegitimate daughter she is forced to live on the outskirts of Herat, in a small hut.  Her mother, and provider, has a terrible view of life due to the circumstances she finds herself in. Her father lives in town with his wives, and many children who partake in a lavish lifestyle that is such a contrast to Miriams.

As sad as Miriam’s childhood is her life doesn’t get any better. Upon her mothers death she is married off to an man who is both physically and mentally abusive. Things escalate when Mariam is not able to have children. Her husband takes a second wife in an effort to get a son.

Over time Mariam and Laila develop a friendship while war tears the country apart as the countries leadership is transferred from one political group to another.

The story is filled with tragedy after tragedy, but beautifully outlines the resiliency of the human spirit and the strength of friendship.

Want to create a buzz about your business?  Do you want your businesses message to spread through viral marketing?  Yes? Then Word of Mouth Marketing, by Andy Sernovitz is an essential read.  In fact, it should be an essential read for any business owner.

The marketing strategies presented in Word of Mouth Marketing will work for the home based business.  The marketing tips presented in this book will work for those in multi-level marketing as well as affiliate marketing, for those that own a corner store, and for those who manage marketing campaigns in a large corporation.

If you put some of the marketing tips learned in the book to use  you could get a much larger return on your money.  You see, according to Andy Sernovitz “word of mouth marketing is the most profitable marketing you can do. ” It brings a larger return, but costs practically nothing.”