CHAPTER 1

Getting the Most out of This Field Guide

Why a Field Guide?

If you are like many sales or business professionals, this is not the firstbusiness book you have had your hands on. However, it may be the first businessfield guide you have encountered.

Personally, I have gained much from reading the ideas expressed by authors inmany fine professional books. Often they give me new ideas to consider as I'mrelaxing on an airplane or feeling contemplative. But generally speaking, it isa one-way affair, with the role of the reader simply being to read the wordsneatly arranged on the pages and having to figure out how to implement the ideasthe book's author suggests.

Field guides are different. They aim to strike a partnership with the readerthrough a collaboration of sorts, with the field guide providing facts, tips,and a frame of reference for the reader, who calls upon them at a time of need.

For example, if you are walking in the woods, you may find a field guide tomushrooms or trees a handy resource. Before you bend over and pick what you hopeis a tasty morel mushroom, you whip out your field guide and examine thepictures and the written description carefully until you feel comfortable withyour skills of identification. You are then rewarded with the most deliciousmushroom you have ever savored and become something of a hero to your intrepidpeers, who remain firmly entrenched in their way of doing things—and offthey go to the grocery store to buy their button mushrooms.

As your knowledge grows, your confidence grows, and you move from elementaryskills to more advanced techniques for identification and problem solving. As aparallel to your business objectives of prospecting for customers, perhaps youwill even use a field guide to prospect for rocks, Civil War relics, or preciousmetals. Over time, your practiced use of field guides results in you havingimproved your confidence, competency, and satisfaction.

The CustomerCentric Selling Field Guide to Prospecting and Business Developmentis designed to help you navigate the same path in the field of prospecting forgold in the form of new business.

While there are words on these pages just as there are on the pages of anybusiness book, as with all field guides the benefits accrue once you apply thetips, tools, methods, and exercises in real-world settings. This book isdesigned to go with you and to be practiced as much as read. There is space foryou to scribble, annotate, and express your thoughts. In a way, you become apartner in finishing this book by customizing it for you.

Learning to Exercise

You probably are familiar with the expression "no pain, no gain." That sayingpermeates our culture for good reason; if you want results, you generally haveto work for them. While it is not my intention to inflict pain on you, it isimportant for you to realize that you will need to apply yourself if you want toimprove at anything. This is true for getting those ripped abs, becoming avirtuoso on the piano, or finishing that marathon. And it is even truer forbecoming truly proficient at the science and art of prospecting and businessdevelopment, differentiating yourself from the masses of salespeople.

Funny thing, though, about the profession of selling; there are far too manypeople who act as if you can walk right into success with no planning, noforethought, and no practice. More often than not, these folks give selling abad name and achieve little success. This strikes me as odd given the lucrativeincomes that many sales professionals can and do earn, either equaling orgreatly surpassing that earned by other professionals such as doctors andlawyers, who, by contrast, study and practice rigorously to earn their keep.

Sure, every now and then someone comes along and succeeds wildly in a salescareer without any formal training. Then again, every few hundred years musicalprodigies like Mozart come around. The rest of us would be well advised toprepare for success rather than hoping or wishing for success, and thispreparation means practicing new skills. This is something I believe in fullyrather than talking about hypocritically.

In my business, I practice and institutionalize every one of the methods andtactics described in this book. Sometimes it is not glamorous or sexy ... moreakin to the way the tortoise runs the race than the hare. But it worksconsistently and has always proved to be effective.

Using This Field Guide

My recommendation is for you to read through this field guide in the order it iswritten. There are several exercises for you to complete along the way, andcompleting these exercises accomplishes three things.

First, it requires you to demonstrate that you have grasped what you have read.If you haven't, then the subsequent materials become more difficult and won't beas clear to you. Writing your own answers allows you to think about what youhave read and how you can apply it to the uniqueness of your selling situation.I have no way of knowing if your aim is to sell commodity products, high-valueintangible services, big-ticket luxury items, and so on. The exercises allow youto take the tips, tools, and tactics described and adapt them to your particularproducts, services, and markets.

Second, it allows you to make an investment in the authorship of this book. Inaddition to my words on the page, the book becomes alive with your words on thepage. Go beyond simply answering the questions to scribbling notes in themargins when you read something that excites, concerns, or inspires you.

Finally, by participating in the book, you will begin a process of planning foryour own success. The elements of the process—reading, thinking, andresponding—will all align to the goal that you are aiming for: improvingyour prospecting...