Heart AND Sell Book Review

📅 12th February 2022 | 2022 Sales Book Reviews

Don’t forget what motivates you

Published in 2017 by Shari Levitin, Heart AND Sell is packed to the rafters with great content. I really do love those sales books which actually have in print what salespeople need to say to customers. And Heart and Sell is one of them.

Read on….

What’s New

Although aspects of The 10 Universal Truths aren’t new, the way Shari maps out what each means is new-ish! Any sales professional of some years standing could easily identify with what is laid out in the books introduction. This is followed by my favourite passage on the entire publication. It’s entitled Have You Fallen Into Sales HELL? Hell being a mnemonic – E stands for ego (as you may have guessed)

Each one of the 10 Universal Truths has it’s own chapter including an action plan. Those whose listening skills could do with a bit of brushing up will appreciated the ‘listening skills checklist’ at the end of the chapter on integrity. There are twenty questions, each with a multi-choice answer which will certainly make the reader think about how they interact with their customers.

What’s Old

Overcoming objections, or as it’s now more commonly known, answering concerns is explained in the Chapter 9. It has a curious heading, “Removing Resistance Takes Persistence” and the author explains that there are six real objections, as opposed to excuses (this is where the Status Quo Bias kicks in). A couple of pages are given over to “don’t try this at work”. An amusing take at what not to do when faced with an objection – ideal reading for the rookie sales person.

There are mentions in the book to F.A.B (Features, Advantages & Benefits) and the well-known USA radio station W-IFM (what’s in it for me) – sorry but those two are a bit 1980’s for my liking.

Also old and yet still very effective are stories. Talking about a customer of yours who has benefitted financially by installing your product or by using your service will always make your customer stop and think, particularly when there’s a written testimonial to hand.

What’s Better

Universal Truth No. 4 is all about fear and rejection and hearing the dreaded ‘no’. Shari gives a mention to Andrea Waltz, whose book Go For No! was reviewed here in 2020. The whole schtick of that book is to increase the number of your no’s which in turn increases the number of yes’s. Shari Levitin argues that hearing the word ‘no’ is very often the start of getting to ‘yes’. In the same chapter, there’s anecdotes and stories about the fear of rejection and how to by-pass the door being metaphorically slammed in your face. The pizza story is just magnificent.

What’s Worse

There’s very little in this book which can be described as ‘worse’. I liked her take on “emotional connection” questions or the authors third-level questions but from my perspective these are another take on the SPIN methodology from the last century.

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Heart AND Sell is another superb sales book which new entrants to the world of B2C and B2B selling would thoroughly enjoy (as long as they carry out the actions described in each chapter!)

Tags: sales training