Page 32 - One Thousand Ways to Make $1000

Kelvinator electric refrigerator. Two other refrigerator salesmen were after
the order too. The landlord couldn’t make up his mind, so he said he would
talk to the tenant and find out what make the tenant preferred. The Kelvinator
salesman went straight to the tenant and explained all the good points of
Kelvinators. The other two salesmen waited a day or two and then came
back. “Sorry, but I bought a Kelvinator,” said the landlord when they
approached him. The Kelvinator salesman had “cinched” the order by seeing
the tenant and then going right back to the landlord and saying, “Your tenant
will be delighted with a Kelvinator, because I have just seen him and told him
all about it.”

Deciding What to Sell

What do you want to sell? Don’t make the mistake of thinking, “I would sell
anything if I had the chance.” The first step in going into sales work is to
decide what you want to sell, and what you think you can sell. You might do
a splendid job of selling electric ranges, yet fail miserably in selling electric
motors. Or vice versa. You could conceivably make a big success selling life
insurance and fail completely to sell accounting machines. Your own
previous experience, your interests, hobbies, education, and background, all
should govern the selection of something you like to sell. If you like the feel
and touch of materials; if you have an eye for style, line, color; if you are a
natural trader who loves to see money changing hands, by all means get into
selling something that is sold over the counter in retail stores. But if you are
the kind of fellow who thinks that a retail merchant is just a “shopkeeper,”
and you can’t get excited about a piece of merchandise and the possible profit
it carries, then forget about selling to retailers.

Do you like automobiles? Are you interested in all the new models that come
out from year to year? This interest may be turned into profit by selling
automobiles. Are you of a mechanical turn of mind? There are a thousand
mechanical devices to sell. And so on through the long gamut of everything
that is made. There are a thousand things you could sell. But find the one
thing you want to sell, and you’ve made your first step toward a career in
selling.