22 Keys to Sales Success: How to Make It Big in Financial Services

Rating:
Summary: Narrow Your Focus and Do More of What Works
Review: Review Summary: 22 Keys to Sales Success has some very fine material in it. The book would have been much improved if it had focused on one type of sales professional in one type of organization looking for one type of client (a new life insurance salesperson in a small agency dealing with owners of small businesses, for example). That would have allowed the material to have been more focused and customized for immediate use. At the same time, some of the material just doesn't fit certain classes of sales professionals. If you are wise enough to ignore what doesn't fit, this book can greatly improve your success.

Review: The authors are clearly well read and have had a lot of experience going to seminars. The many references to the works of others are appropriate and add depth to this otherwise simple book. From that authority, they provide many helpful suggestions that will be essential to newcomers to financial sales and valuable to experienced people who aren't using the advice.

I thought that the advice to Create Your Compelling Vision, Position with Mission, Energize Your Success, Open the Johari Window, Market Yourself as the Expert, Focus on Clients (Not Compensation), Demand Objections, and Be Your Own Sales Manager were superb. I was skeptical about the strong emphasis on continuing efforts to close, scripts and the suggested ways to get referrals. The material in the book seemed inauthentic to me in these areas as a professional, and I graded the book down accordingly.

It seemed like the book was aimed more at those selling insurance products for life and retirement than anything else. So if that's what you sell, this book is probably good for you. If you are a financial planner who looks at all dimensions of planning, this book is probably too sales-oriented to meet your professional standards. If you are an attorney, you will probably find much of what the book says to be appalling in its commercial focus.

One of the ironies of this book is that the authors suggest that you focus in as narrow a niche of services and customers as possible. I wonder why they didn't follow their own advice in writing this book.