The Best Sales Books

Flyn’s list of the Best of the Best Sales Books

There are many good sales books and as a sales professional, and especially as a manager, you should read them all. Remember that experience changes us. You can take a book on selling you read a year ago and read it again and it will be a totally different book. Additionally, you can read one description of a technique or idea and not really get it – read another and all of the sudden it makes perfect sense.

A carpenter doesn’t use one tool, he has many. As a salesperson or manager you must have as many sales tools at your disposal as possible so that you can effectively handle whatever comes up.

The following four books are listed because I found them particularly special in one way or another.

• The SPIN Selling Field Workbook, Neil Rackham, McGraw Hill, 1996
This book is a classic. This book gives the reader and understanding and method for discovering what is important to the customer. The method is simple and clear although not so easy to master. You will find a lot of books with similar subject matter – all seem to complicate a powerful and clear process making it more difficult for the reader to understand and thus use.

• Selling to VITO, Anthony Parinello, Adams Media Corporation, 1999
This book contains some real gems. Anthony’s insights into the marketing side of selling are fabulous. Many people would see or read this book and think, well I’m not selling to CEO’s it’s not really applicable. But there is a treasure trove of great ideas that can be applied to almost any level of selling.

• Consultative Selling, Mack Hanan, Amacom Books, 1995
This book takes a completely unique approach to selling and should be read by every salesperson and manager. Obviously, the methods describe should be used completely, but there are many things one can take from the book even in you don’t use the total consultative selling approach.

• The Ultimate Sales Machine, Chet Holmes, Penguin Group, 2007
This is just a fabulous book. It is the first book I have read that really puts forth many of the philosophies I have followed for years. It is directed at a company or manager wishing to improve results, however, each of the ideas can be done as an individual. There is much here to be learned.

Read everything — but I think these are the some of the very best!