Almost twenty-five years ago, it was a cool December morning. The winter had just started in Karachi and the people had gathered after the prayers around the prayer leader. He was delivering his short speech which he had been doing since many years. He recited the following verse 36:82 Yaseen إِنَّمَا أَمْرُهُ إِذَا أَرَادَ شَيْئًا

Manager Sales of a large equipment distribution company was called by Director Supply Chain of a large technology company. He was asked about the country of origin of his proposed equipment?” Sales Manager replied without a second of hesitation “Country X”. Then, the customer asked “why is an equipment assembled in Country X considered inferior

TREADMILLOne of the best sales persons ever, said:I was hired by a person who knew nothing about selling. He only told me that “sales is a number game; all you have to do is talk to enough people and eventually someone would buy”. He called it “mud against the wall technique of selling” - If

THE UNDERDOGS: In 1960s and first half of 70s, Pakistan cricket team had some great names. Each one of them was a superstar. The batsmen could annihilate world’s best bowling attacks at will. Bowling was also reasonably strong; we had the best wicket keeper in the world. Star studded team had many all-rounders also. But

The Sales Manager, during the course of his presentation in the Sales Conference, placed a black dot in the middle of the large white board. He then asked the group of almost sixty participants “What do they see on the white board”? The entire group with almost unanimity replied “a black dot”. Only one or

Interviews for a sales engineer were being held in a highly reputable organisation. Apparently, there was only one vacancy but at least forty candidates were lined up in a queue for selection. Boys were nervous with parched lips! All of a sudden one boy left the queue, scribbled something on a piece of paper, walked

The salesman was brimming with confidence. The engineering consultant of perhaps the best organisation in Pakistan was asking one question after another; the Director Technical and Director Projects and the whole team of engineers was bombarding the salesman with highly technical and commercial queries. The salesman was equal to the task. He knew his product;

I taught strategic management at a business school for a while. On the first page of the book, the line which caught the attention of the teacher and every student was “He did it because he didn’t know that it can’t be done”. Later the book also taught another great lesson “One who says

Here is a true story of a marine engine salesman. He used to work from five to nine (not nine to five). While the whole world would be fast asleep, he would be up and preparing notes for the day. There were no laptops, no emails etc., he would write fax messages for his Principal

Most of the times, potential customers are busy with their daily lives, working for their hard-earned livelihood and then a salesman appears; an insurance girl or a travel agent calls or someone selling a property knocks on your door - it appears salespeople are after your money. It’s not because the customers don’t want