Baseline Selling: How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know About the Game of Baseball (Paperback)

Consultative selling is very effective because it's based on delivering tangible benefits either from the offerings or from a smoother relationship between customer and supplier.

So why doesn't everyone use this approach? It's hard to learn and even harder to master.

Enter Dave Kurlan with his baseball metaphor which makes a world of difference in both areas.

Every step the salesperson should be taking is phrased in terms of making it from home plate around the bases to score. It's not surprising that Massachusetts-based Kurlan would focus on that part. The Red Sox are usually better at scoring than defense.

Mr. Kurlan reports that people trained in this method remember what they are supposed to do about twice as often as with traditional training in consultative selling. I believe that.

Most sales books try to go with acronyms . . . and those just don't stick with me. Even when I can remember the sales acronym, I can't remember what it stands for . . . and what I'm supposed to be doing. But I know about baseball. So do most Americans. But don't expect this approach to revolutionize your sales in the U.K. They play cricket and football there.

Here's an overview: Think of the sales pipeline as the baseball diamond. When you are at home plate, you're nowhere. If you can get someone to give you an appointment or you receive an RFP (request for proposal), you're on first base. You have enough rapport going to have a suspect. To reach second, you have to find if your suspect has urgency, a budding relationship with you and you are able to connect with the prospect better than the competition. To get to third, you finish qualifying the prospect and the prospect finishes qualifying you as you present a solution that is appropriate for the prospect's needs and the budget. You score when you get the first order. If you get a big piece of business, that's a home run. If you get all the business, that's a grand slam. Got it?

Almost all those other wonderful baseball terms come into play. A pick-off attempt is when the competition tries to knock you out of the running and fails. You are picked off when such an attempt succeeds.

Mr. Kurlan realizes that most salespeople are their own worst enemies. He has an interesting Appendix A that identifies the frequency by which salespeople exhibit various unhelpful attitudes and behaviors (such as how long it takes a salesperson to recover from being rejected by a prospect). From this work, Mr. Kurlan reports that 62 percent of salespeople are ineffective. But there's hope. Good salespeople are trained, not born.

Read this book to find out more about how!