Today's MBA of Selling and doing Business

I just read , The Mackay MBA of Selling in the Real World, "Harvey Mackay's economic stimulus plan."

It's custom-tooled to boost the take-home pay of sales pros, from novices to veterans.

It is also great for Business owners in day to day revenue building.


Right now, war is raging between the old school of pound-the-pavement sellers and new age techno-mavens.

Should you still smile-and-shoeshine your way to prospects? Or do you poke the traffic of today's 200-million Tweeters?

Truth is: You better master both. And this book lays out the two worlds with 100 percent ease-of-access.

Coaching legend Lou Holtz, who wrote the introduction, calls Mackay a "playing-field psychologist without rival."

I met Lou Holtz once and he really brings home the importance of knowing your customer, and clients and how to respond to them.

I found a few tips that I think readers are going to find most valuable in this book.

Nothing can ever beat a hungry fighter with a positive attitude.


Success is 90 percent mental, and your attitude determines your altitude.

I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else.

The difference between failure and success is doing a thing nearly right and doing it exactly right.

Selling is a skill, and you need practice to perfect it.

Practice makes perfect . . . not true.

You have to add one word: Perfect practice makes perfect.

The Beatles performed together live 1,200 times before their 1964 breakout success!

* Confidence can do, well, . . . almost anything!

* I will beats IQ nine times out of 10.

* Believe in yourself or no one else will.

* Do your homework on your clients, I have used "The Mackay 25" checklist on how prospects communicate.

* Know the channel of choice. Some cell phone hounds are strictly texters.

If the customer is a company, do you Google for breaking news? Are you tracking the vast resources of the Invisible Web?

Stay true to yourself at your very best. You can't play outside your range. At the Super Bowl, play the game that got you there.


* Person-to-person contacts remain the single most reliable way to build a durable sales base.

* Learn the new one-two punch of sales. Master the one-on-one, in-person sales closing. But use giveaways like webinars to woo and pre-qualify prospects. Precisely designed pre-qualification programs allow you to create a range of pitch-perfect approaches to reach the total market.

* Recognize that a stint in sales is essential experience for more-and-more CEOs. In all businesses and organizations, everyone is a sales person of one sort or another.

Mind the new twist to the old sales stereotype: Rather than being flamboyantly egocentric, modern sales successes are listening-driven and customer-centric. And because many products are so much more complex, more sales are the work of well-oiled team approaches.

Sales mastery isn't just a profitable business skill.

It's also a great tool for living life well.

Salespeople learn resilience is indispensable. They know failure is not falling down, but staying down.

The Mackay MBA of Selling in the Real World is one of his best books ( I have all them all and he has signed them all for me). . . with advice you can take all the way to the bank.

Bottom line: You can't direct the wind, but you sure can shift the sails.


John Hacker 949-275-3247