David Ogilvy Quotes

If a vacuum cleaner salesman rings your front door, he will be selling HIMSELF first. The vacuum cleaner is secondary.

The worst fault a salesman can commit is to be a bore...... Pretend to be vastly interested in any subject the prospects shows an interest in.

When one has the right swing and enthusiasm, selling is not unlike hunting, a veritable sport. To scare up the game by preliminary talk and to know how long to follow it, to lose your gain through poorly directed argument, to hang on to game that finally eludes, to boldly confront, to quickly circle around, to keep on the trail, tireless and keen, till you have bagged some orders, there is some satisfaction in returning at night, tired of the trail, but proud of the days work done.

The mistake so many marketers make is that they conjoin the urgency of making another sale with the timing to earn the right to make that sale. In other words, you must build trust before you need it. Building trust right when you want to make a sale is just too late.

The best of merchandise will go back to the shelf unless handled by a conscientious, tactful salesman.

I'm not much of a salesman. I prefer the soft sell and the honest approach.

I still remember the five points of salesmanship: attention, interest, conviction, desire and close.

When you are truly interested in other people, you will learn what they are interested in and if they have a need for your product. If they like you, and most people like folks who take an interest in them, they'll help you find people who do need what you have to sell, even if they don't.

What creates success on HSN is great product, a great story and a great storyteller.

If you develop a dialogue with me and take an interest in me, I'll want to give you the business. It's human nature.

Ninety percent of selling is conviction, and 10 per cent is persuasion.

Our theory is, if you need the user to tell you what you're selling, then you don't know what you're selling, and it's probably not going to be a good experience.

Customers must be delicately angled for at a safe distance - show yourself too much, and, like trout, they flashed away.

To succeed in sales, simply talk to lots of people every day. And here's what's exciting: There are lots of people!

Concentrate on the activities of prospecting, presenting and following-up; the sales will take care of themselves.

I know that obviously, that if you want to get the story, if you want to get close to somebody, if you want to find out what is really the truth or what's really interesting, you have to create a trust between these two things, between the journalist and the subject.

To sell is above all to master the art and science of listening.

Good salesmanship is nothing more than maximizing the positive and minimizing the negative.

Make a habit of dominating the listening, and let the prospect dominate the talking.

The definition of salesmanship is the gentle art of letting the customer have it your way.

The notion that you would initiate a new product without preparing the way by persuasion and advertising and salesmanship is fantastic. It's an integral part of the system.

Friendly makes sales - and friendly generates repeat business.

You can't learn anything if you are doing all the talking. Sales people should always be developing their earQ, not their IQ. The only way to create a successful sale is to understand that knowledge from listening does not become power until it is used. And ideas without action are worthless.

The goal of a marketing interaction isn't to close the sale, any more than the goal of a first date is to get married. No, the opportunity is to move forward, to earn attention and trust and curiosity and conversation.

The Unsuccessful Salesperson says, the other guy has the best territory. The Successful Salesperson says, every territory is the best one. The Unsuccessful Salesperson says, that company will never buy. The Successful Salesperson says, I can make that company buy.