Sales Adages

I fancy myself a student of sales with a lifetime of knowledge and wisdom gained in three decades of selling.  Here are a few quippy sales adages I've learned and find fun, inspiring, informative and motivating:

 

  • Sell the sizzle not the steak.
  • Ask people's advice and opinions.
  • You've got to be good enough, to get close enough, to get lucky.
  • When you're green you're growing, when you're ripe you rot.
  • Burn your cool card.
  • Listen!  God gave you two ears and one mouth for a reason.
  • Be funny and make money.
  • It's not the land, it's the man.
  • Knowledge breeds confidence; lack of knowledge breeds fear and distrust.
  • The Law of Averages doesn't work unless you do.
  • The more no's, the more yes's.
  • There's got to be a pony out there somewhere.
  • Stop the hardening of the attitudes...no stinking thinking.
  • What you perceive, you believe.
  • Nothing takes the place of persistence - not even talent.
  • There's no such thing as a born salesperson.
  • Luck is when preparation meets opportunity.
  • First the man makes the habits, then the habits make the man.
  • Beware the grass that looks greener...it may be astroturf.
  • If they are not talking, they are probably not listening either.
  • See the sale from cradle to grave.
  • Don't beat your head against a dead horse.