Selling in Tough Times

This is one of Tom Hopkins's many excellent books on how to be successful in sales. He shows how returning to basics--prospecting, qualifying, selling, servicing, and relationship building--is the best way to earn business and loyalty in a pessimistic environment. The advice is organized in compact mini-lessons on a wide range of skills and habits--such as soothing customer fears, staying positive, understanding cycles in your industry, and knowing the specifics of relentless customer focus. The author's narrative performance has moments of relaxed spontaneity and some charming phrasing signatures. But in much of this recording, his enthusiasm is expressed with such a small range of clichÄs that his sincerity and the richness of his advice are too often crowded out of the listening experience. T.W. (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine

December 21, 2009
Hopkins (How to Master the Art of Selling
) lobbies for a return to basics to maximize sales in an economic downturn. He starts from the very beginning, defining what a selling career entails and detailing the different types of salespeople. He encourages readers to step back and reevaluate their positions in the economy, and to make a plan for when the climate improves. The first step is to save existing business by going the extra mile, making human contact, and initiating loyalty-building campaigns. Hopkins shows how to quickly tell if a client is right for you, reduce sales resistance, woo clients from the competition, and cut costs while continuing to appear successful. Each chapter ends with a short summary to help extract and reinforce key ideas. Part self-help book, part motivational guide, this book provides valuable advice for selling professionals struggling in the current economy as well anyone hoping to emerge from the recession primed for growth.

June 15, 2010

Hopkins (www.tomhopkins.com), author of the national best seller How To Master the Art of Selling (1980) and the engine behind a plethora of sales-training products and seminars, gears his latest work toward all those struggling to sell services or products in the current economy and wanting to come out on top. The author himself reads, doing an excellent job of it: his positive attitude and inspirational tone make the sound sales strategies and techniques he shares infinitely more palatable. The practical exercises and sample seller-buyer conversations are especially helpful. Recommended for all business students and practitioners. [Audio clip available through www.hachettebookgroup.com; the Business Plus pb edition is scheduled to be published in February 2011.--Ed.]--Ilka Gordon, Siegal Coll. of Judaic Studies Lib., Cleveland

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