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List Price: $24.95
Our Price: $16.47
Your Save: $ 8.48 ( 34% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Portfolio Hardcover
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 658.81
EAN: 9781591841609
ISBN: 1591841607
Label: Portfolio Hardcover
Manufacturer: Portfolio Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 272
Publication Date: 2007-06-21
Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover
Studio: Portfolio Hardcover
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Editorial Reviews:
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Chet Holmes has been called “one of the top 20 change experts in the country.” He helps his clients blow away both the competition and their own expectations. And his advice starts with one simple concept: focus! Instead of trying to master four thousand strategies to improve your business, zero in on the few essential skill areas that make the big difference.
Too many managers jump at every new trend, but don’t stick with any of them. Instead, says Holmes, focus on twelve critical areas of improvement—one at a time—and practice them over and over with pigheaded discipline.
The Ultimate Sales Machine shows you how to tune up and soup up virtually every part of your business by spending just an hour per week on each impact area you want to improve. Like a tennis player who hits nothing but backhands for a few hours a week to perfect his game, you can systematically improve each key area.
Holmes offers proven strategies for:
• Management: Teach your people how to work smarter, not harder
• Marketing: Get more bang from your Web site, advertising, trade shows, and public relations
• Sales: Perfect every sales interaction by working on sales, not just in sales
The Ultimate Sales Machine will put you and your company on a path to success and help you stay there!
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Enhance your sales
Comment: This book compiles the steps to create an effective sales force. From marketing training to sales activity tracking, this book teaches how to make the most of your sales people.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Chet shares true gems of business growth in here...
Comment: We used one strategy for hiring a top producer from this book 'Word for Word' and it helped us cut through a huge amount of applicants and have the cream rise to the top. We hired this top performer and he has been just that since day one. That is just one of many gems that Chet Holmes shares in this awesome book. Make Today Great! Tom Beal
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Sales = Pestering?
Comment: I am another one who does not understand why this book has gotten so many 5-star reviews. Essentially, I have just finished reading "How to Sell without being a Jerk!" by John Klymshyn and these two books seem to pull at the same topic from two completely different angles.
Chet Holmes take on Sales is, I feel, to wear the client down with repeated calls and sales pitch till they give in. He advocates that someone with High Influence (that is, an ability to empathize with others) and a High Ego (High drive and determination - never say die attitude) is absolutely necessary to be a Superstar Salesperson. At the end of the day, this never say die attitude requires you to push your product (because you feel that it is good for your client, regardless of what he thinks) relentlessly until he gives in and buys from you.
All these is good as long as the product which your client buys works out for him at the end. Alas, I'm into Structured Products Sales in a Private Bank and sometimes we all know that some products do not work out well if the markets are not cooperative! The failure of a product is never covered in any of Chet's materials. All his stories have happy endings - the executive who after 6 months gave in and bought advertisement space (through his relentless selling) and again bought more advertisement space after some more months when the first series of advertisements did not make any impact FINALLY saw the truth in Chet's words when his sales jumped etc etc - Never has Chet's advice been wrong or the products he sold not worked out (or these have been pleasantly omitted).
I think the book has some useful gems to take away and it has helped me address some of the weaknesses in my own selling. However, this 'Take No prisoners' approach may not be for everybody all of the time.
Also, I do not agree with his material on Presentation. He mentioned that it is necessary to have a very dramatic and visual approach to your slides to have your clients at the edge of their seats. In addition, humor is often an effective and useful content to have in your presentation. NOTHING WRONG HERE. However, this presentation style may not be for everyone. I've been trained in presentations and have learnt that doing a presentation with NO SLIDES is also a very effective way to conduct a presentation because then the audience would have to pay attention to you instead of staring at the slides. I'm not saying that one is right and the other wrong - I feel that at the end of the day, YOU would have to decide what is most comfortable ane effective for you and your audience when giving a presentation.
Chet's way is definitely one way to succeed in Sales - he is a living example. But to call his way the Ultimate Sales Machine is just over the top.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Ultimate Sales Book!
Comment: I've read quite a few sales books. Some good. Some lousy. Then occasionally I come across a sales book I consider extraordinary. That would be Chet Holme's book. What's unique about Chet's book is that it targets not only sales professionals who want to get a leg up on their competition, but also sales managers who might be having a tough time finding and keeping great talent.
While reading, I kept a notebook and pen on hand, jotting down one idea after another. My favorite two sections are Chapter 6: The High Art of Getting the Best Buyers, and Chapter 9: The Nitty Gritty of Getting the Best Buyers. These chapters alone are worth the price of the book. Holmes gives a lesson that's often easy for us sales pros to forget- It's far less expensive to market and sell when we're targeting the "best buyers". This is better known as the 80/20 rule. Sales professionals should be spending 80% of their time and energy on the 20% that buy the most from them. Focusing like a laser beam on this group, will bring the most return.
The "how-to" of getting these buyers is where chapter 9 comes in. Holmes provides a system for coming up with your "Dream 100 target list, setting appointments with them. His "Rubik's Cube letter" for sending out to clients is one that will certainly be apart of my "swipe file".
The book as a whole is not about providing tactics, but rather a long-term strategy with systems to implement in your small business right away. These strategies (if implemented) will increase your sales revenue without increasing your expenses.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Book On How To Systematically Sell More
Comment: Loaded with excellent ideas, action plans, and specific tools & tactics.
One of the most practical and useful books on selling and business growth I have ever read.
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