Sales Dogs – Blair Singer

Foreword:

- There are different types of sales dogs, some are good, some are bad
- Great leaders are great communicators

Chapter One – Are You A Sales Dog?:

- Questions to ask yourself:

o Do you get a “rush” when a prospect says “yes” to you?
o Is the “hunt” sometimes better than the reward?
o Would you give up a little commission for additional fame, accolades and
recognition?
o Do you have a natural persistent streak in you?
o Do you have a soft spot for a good story?
o Do you have a tendency to try to convince others?
o Do you find that when you are talking in a group about something that you are
interested in your voice gets louder and that you naturally get more dramatic?
o Do you experience ranges of emotion from being a legend in your own mind to
being a complete klutz?
o Do you have fun occasionally “people watching”?
o Do you spend time trying to figure out other people’s psychology?
o Do you love to win?

- Herman’s Lessons
o Sometimes you have to break the rules
o There is no such thing as a lack of connection
o Your competition’s greatest weakness is the day they land a deal

Chapter Two – Why Sales Dogs?:

- There are many connections to the way dogs act and the way sales people act.

Chapter Three – Identifying The Breed:

- Know what is the best way for your breed

- Five different types of sales dogs:
o Pit Bull – most aggressive, used car salesman, sheer power and fearlessness
o Golden Retriever – willing to do anything, customer service, more you give more
they buy, long-term relationships
o Poodles – impress, live the life of luxury, extremely well-connected, centre of
attention
o Chihuahua – technical wizards, incredibly bright, not too slick, best product
knowledge, all-nighters, passionate about product, love information, deliver proof
o Basset Hounds – constant, dependable, strong and loyal long-term relationships,
always look middle-aged,

Chapter Four – Big Dogs:

- only eats prime rib, a legend, in the spotlight, exaggeration, have big hearts,
Chapter Five – The Right Pooch for the Right Prey

- You should enhance the skills that sales dogs already have
- Find out the type of sales dog and nurture their qualities
- Sales training is extremely important

Chapter Six – Strengths of the Breeds:

Pit Bull – “When in doubt, make a decision anyway. Making no decision can be
catastrophic, while even a bad decision creates movement, action and can be corrected
upon.”

Retriever – Always be the first to give! The person who gives first always has the
advantage. It creates a subconscious obligation to return the favor.

Poodle – Learn to speak well to groups and practice this art as often as you can. Learn
how to present yourself physically through grooming and attire.

Chihuahua – Learn how to learn! Learn from your mistakes. Analyze what you are
doing.

Basset Hound – Master the art of building rapport: Learn to listen, Learn to match body
language and modality of the person you are talking to.

Chapter Seven – Play to Your Strength:

- Assimilate the behaviors and skills of excellent salespeople

- Play your own strength, but understand and incorporate the skills of other breeds

Chapter Eight – SuperMutt Conditioning

- Do not think that you always have to do it “My Way”

- Training is extremely helpful for becoming a better salesperson

Chapter Nine – Managing the Kennel

- Encourage the salespeople

- Give praise, be specific

10 Basic House Rules

1) Clean up your messes
2) Take responsibility, no finger-pointing, personal insults, or complaining
3) Be accountable for your results
4) Do not bad mouth others on the team
5) Never take undue advantage of another’s support or position
6) Don’t seek sympathy for poor results, lay blame, or expect handouts. Earn your own
meal ticket.
7) Be honest and operate with integrity in all manners. Full disclosure in all cases.
8) Respect each person’s territory, no conflict of interest, stay focused on the tasks at hand.
9) Be clear on a common definition of being a professional and all agree to always meet and
maintain that image.
10) Celebrate even small victories, both yours and others.

Puppy Training:
- Start by giving your salespuppies small, easy tasks that will allow them to achieve early
wins.
 - Have them learn about the industry in which they will be working
- Have them just make phone calls
- Throw them some bones

Checklist for motivating high-performance salesdog teams:

1. Celebrate all wins! Actively acknowledge all participation and tasks well done.
2. Establish the Code of Honor (house rules) and “call” breaches cleanly.
3. Debrief all wins and “learning experiences” early and often.
4. Use peer pressure to motivate the pack.
5. Don’t try to teach pigs to sing!
6. Use common terms, such as “learning experiences” and “debriefing,” rather than
convoluted corporate-speak.
7. Feed the “hot hand.” When one of your dogs in on a roll, keep fueling the fire until it
cycles out.
8. Set short-duration goals that can be accomplished quickly and cleanly. Most dogs have
very little concept of the future. They can scarcely think beyond dinnertime.
9. Get your dogs to practice standing in the “heat” of pressure, confrontation and challenge
often so they will become used to it. Be sure to surface and acknowledge the emotion
that arises. The SalesDog objection/rejection system systematically conditions the
SalesDog to successfully deal with emotion.
10. Manage and address emotional needs more than tangible ones.
11. Give them a way to feel that they are contributing something to a higher purpose. Dogs
love to serve.
12. Establish and maintain ritual behavior, events and routines that promote team, family and
camaraderie.
13. Always look for champions and allies within the team and use them to lead the team.
14. Look for and acknowledge heroes all the time.
15. Find a way to change the environment, mood, routine or physical location when the team
gets stuck mentally or emotionally. Dogs that lie on the couch too much get lethargic.
16. Manage and focus on energy and emotions continually.
17. Throw their problems back to them to solve. Toss the meat back to the wolves.
18. Practice the Roulette Wheel of Leadership. Whoever has the “hot” hand or the “hot” idea
at the time is the spiritual leader of the group at that moment.
19. You can show your hard side when it comes to maintaining the rules of the game or the
Coke of Honor, but always balance it with the soft side (supportive).
20. Know when to facilitate others, when to be a champion and when to take momentary
control.
21. When you sense something brewing, or a mindset sitting under the surface, bring it up
and tell it like it is … as you see or sense it. (even though you could be wrong!)
22. Be a student of people, psychology, management and change and DOGS!

Chapter Ten – Dogged Belief – Four Mindsets of Champion Sales Dogs:

1. Face the challenge

2. Trap negative dialogue

3. Celebrate all wins

4. Project the Power of Your Personal Intention

Chapter Eleven – Training for the Hunt – Five Critical Skills for SalesDog Success:

1. Master the art of referrals

Types of referrals (quality decreases as you go down the list):
1) Friend gets prospect to call you – charm of the Poodle
 2) Friend tells prospect you will call him – easy for the Retriever
3) Friend tells you who to call and allows you to mention that he or she
referred you – Basset Hounds and Chihuahuas are comfortable with
this one.
4) Friend gives you a name, any name! – Good enough for the Pit Bull.

o Your friend’s introduction of you should have a one-line endorsement.

o Six basic principles of psychology that direct human decision-making: reciprocity,

consistency, social proof, liking, respect for perceived authority, and scarcity.

o Never ask for referrals right after the sale, let the customer get settled into the
product.

2. Master the ability to Deliver Powerful Presentations

o There is much more leverage in talking to 100 people than to one person.
o Learn how to ask the right questions
o Acknowledge others
o Identify and confront silent issues. Say something like “I get a sense that there is
some doubt about what I am saying. Who would care to say how they feel about
the information that I just delivered?”.
o Listen to what participants have to say
o Ask lots of questions

3. Tap the Desire to Serve Others

o Take the time to find out what someone really needs and then find the solution to
that need

4. Manage the Personal Marketing Versus Selling Formula

o Learn how to market yourself effectively so that you don’t have to sell at all!
o Sales / Marketing = Sales Effort
o Sales x Marketing = $Results
o Marketing Avenues:
 Create cooperative relationships with other individuals or companies that
are already in contact with your prospects.
 Send out sales letters.
 Create compelling headlines and unique selling propositions to place in
journals, magazines and print media and on websites.
 Advertise.
 Volunteer at industry functions.
 Fax blitzes to groups and prospects.
 Work trade shows.
 Conduct free educational seminars.
 Cosponsor community activities.
 Generate testimonials and referrals.

5. Master the Handling of Objections or Rejections

- The objection that a prospect gives you is not the problem. It is your emotional response
to the objections that is the problem. Once you are able to remain emotionless in the
face of the hardest critique, your brilliant mind will be able to handle those situations with
 ease. Rejection stimulates primal fears and causes deep emotional disturbance. In
heightened negative emotional states, intelligence is low.

- The skill of being cool and calm under fire involves erasing your own emotional
responses through repetition.

- In the case of upset clients or prospects, you must learn how to identify the emotion
behind their words. Once you do that, their objection begins to subside.

- Behind every objection lies a benefit. Think of positive things about what the prospect
has objected to.

- Ask: “If I were to wave a magic wand in this case, what is it you would want or what is it
that would work best?”

- Don’t take it personally

Chapter Twelve – Managing SalesDog Emotions:

- Never fear pressure, greatness was rarely ever forged without it.
- If you are experiencing an emotional low, try: calling on a good customer, get physical, sit
on the beach and connect with nature, listen to your favorite music, sing in the car.
- Find newspaper articles about people successfully using your product.

Chapter Thirteen – What Keeps Them Coming Back? – Untold Secrets of Handling
Objections and Rejections:

- Objection is simply an avenue for further discussion, clarification or understanding. But

without retraining your reactions, you will never be able to keep emotion from
overwhelming logic and reason.

- Rejection should be interpreted as:

i) A specific nonrelated incident
ii) Having no bearing on any other aspects of their life
iii) Being caused by external factors such as timing, the prospect’s mood or
issues that the prospect was dealing with

- Never try to trap a prospect into agreement, especially after an objection.

Chapter Fourteen – Guard Dogs and Pigs:

- Honor thy client’s secretary

- Don’t teach a pig to sing, “If you spend time arguing with an idiot, you now have two
idiots” – Robert Kiyosaki.

Chapter Fifteen – The Hunt – The “Dog Doo-Doo-Simple” SalesDog Cycle

Gaining Prospects
1) Sales is an energy business—what you expend comes back. So just
getting out there and speaking to people is valuable from an energy-
generation point of view.

2) You could be wrong. You might think prospect X has no obvious use
for your product but you don’t know what he or she knows. It may be
that he or she has a friend that is just desperate for your exact product
and can’t find it anywhere. You would never know that.
 3) It will assist you to get desensitized to rejection, and you get to practice
your objections on a relatively unimportant prospect.

4) The time you waste trying to work out if someone is interested could be
more effectively used by just asking him or her!

Step One:
You should never talk to anyone who does not know who you are until you talk to
everybody who does!
o talk to past customers, users, and friend and ask everyone and anyone for a lead

Step Two:
Make initial contact in whatever way you are most comfortable.
Either:
o Thank them for their time, assure them you won’t take up much of their time, and
introduce yourself and your product or service.
o Thank them for their time, assure them you won’t take up much of their time, and
ask if they received the introductory communication you sent and whether they
have any questions.
o Thank them for their time, assure them you won’t take up much of their time, and
offer to provide more information, clarification or specifics regarding the product
or service.

o be polite and enthusiastic

o don’t talk too much
o ask them when would be a good time to meet, if they don’t have one in mind,
suggest one or several
o after the interaction, email a thank you note for their time

Step Three:
Do market research. Learn everything you can about your prospects, their business,
their industry, or how they received the information originally.
o Prepare a list of questions you would like to ask the prospect in advance
o Determine the kind of person you are talking to

If the prospect is a:

Pit Bull:
o He may be controlling, abrupt and bottom-line-oriented, so make your comments
quick and to the point.
o He may not need lots of socializing.
o Proposals should be brief.
o Relate things in terms of immediate bottom-line benefits to him.
o Do not beat around the bush.
o Ask for his opinions about next steps.
o Highlight key events to take place.
o Go light on the detail.

Chihuahua:
o He is detail- and research-oriented.
o Provide all of the backup material, including facts and figures.
o Accuracy is critical for Chihuahuas, so triple-check everything (no typos!).
o Require good and solid proof.
 o Make a detailed proposal.
o Provide testimonials from credible sources.
o Speak clearly and back everything up with facts.
o He will want to see a plan.

Poodle:
o He is image conscious, socially adept, loves to talk, knows the market trends.
o Be sure to personally connect.
o Use referrals.
o List benefits to him in terms of image.
o Is there someone else he was to answer to?
o Being first on the block may be important (seen as an innovator).
o Compliment him on things he has done.
o Ask his opinions.

Retriever:
o He is service-conscious and friendly.
o Focus on after-sales support.
o Follow-through is critical.
o Be friendly, connect personally, ask about him personally.
o Talk in terms of long-term futures.
o Work begins after the sale.
o Offer to do whatever you can for him.
o Ask for referrals.
o He will want to see a plan.

Basset Hound
o He is very one-to-one, value-oriented and seeks a personal connection.
o Ask for his needs.
o Stress loyalty, service, credibility and value.
o Spend time with him.
o Be on his side.
o Sympathize with his situation.
o Practice humility.

Step Four:
On the day of the appointment

o Be well-groomed and well-dressed

o Set your emotions and thoughts in the right place. Be excited, enthusiastic, and
happy.
o Be on time and arrive at least 5 minutes before. If meeting was set over a week
ago, call to confirm.
o Do you what you say you will do when you said you would do it.

Step Five:
Focus on what you want to happen as an outcome to the meeting

o Remember a previous positive experience as you walk in

o Smile and offer a handshake
o Find out as much as you can about the prospect: about what they do, why they
do it, why they like it, what their ideals are and what their frustrations and
problems are. Do not pitch yet!
 o Ask the following questions:
 How did you hear about our service or product?
 What particular needs do you have regarding our service or product?
 When his product or service was referred to you, what was it that
specifically sparked your interest?
o Do not interrupt

Step Six:
Set up another time to present a proposal, a draft solution or a process by which
customers can reach the goals that they mentioned to you.

o Make an agreement with them with the sole purpose being to prove to them that
you can keep an agreement.

Step Seven:
Give them whatever they want

Step Eight:
Making arrangements (closing)
o Pay attention to body language and make immediate adjustments
o If they are not interested, ask if they know anyone else who would be interested
and if they can give them a call in advance
o Try asking, “How soon can we begin?”

Chapter Sixteen – Whose Fire Hydrant Is This Anyway? – Secrets of Territory

Management:

- Know your area and it will pay off.

Chapter Seventeen – Stay Out of the Pound – Career Progression for SalesDogs:

- Progress from Retail Sales to Corporate Sales to Network Marketing / Franchise Sales to
Entrepreneur Sales to Business Sales

Chapter Eighteen – Dogs Just “Do It”:

SalesDogs Success Cycle:

1. Seek Opportunities
2. Enablement
3. Ownership

Chapter Nineteen – So What Kind of Sales Dog are you Anyway?:

Reflections:

This book shows some great correlations between salespeople and dogs. It highlights what we
can learn from our canine friends and has some good points about human nature. There are
many sales books on the market that will focus on a specific type of breed. Blair Singer does not
focus on one type, and instead calls attention to each and explains the importance of having the
positive qualities of each type of dog to form a “SuperMutt”. This was an excellent read, very
interesting, and I would highly recommend it.