{"id":1144,"date":"2007-08-20T12:05:11","date_gmt":"2007-08-20T17:05:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2007\/08\/sell-me-this-pen\/"},"modified":"2007-08-20T12:07:30","modified_gmt":"2007-08-20T17:07:30","slug":"sell-me-this-pen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2007\/08\/sell-me-this-pen\/","title":{"rendered":"Sell Me This Pen"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a good post from Ed McLean on his Sales Itch blog &#8211; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.salesitch.com\/2007\/08\/sales-dilemma-no1.html\">Sales Dilemma No.1<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>There\u20ac\u2122s a story in sales job hunting folklore where the smugly smiling interviewer plucks out a pen from his jacket pocket and say, \u20ac\u0153Sell me this pen\u20ac\u009d. What would you say? Here are the options I came up with:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>You will have to read the post to view Ed&#8217;s excellent options.<\/p>\n<p>Believe it or not, I actually encountered this interview approach when I was a young sales rep.  I sat in the office of a salty old sales manager who told me to look under the chair I was sitting in.  There was a box with many little trinkets and I was told to pick an item and sell it to him.<\/p>\n<p>I picked a pen and attempted to qualify him.  He, of course, did me the favor of being the worst prospect ever (which means he wasn&#8217;t a prospect).  I worked through the qualifying and determined he had no need for my unique pen and its qualities.  I got to the end of the qualifying discussion and told him I had reached the conclusion that he was not a prospect and I was moving on.  The sales manager was not impressed and my interview ended right there.<\/p>\n<p>At that point, I was glad I didn&#8217;t have to waste any more time with him.  And I suspect that was his view of me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a good post from Ed McLean on his Sales Itch blog &#8211; Sales Dilemma No.1: There\u20ac\u2122s a story in sales job hunting folklore where the smugly smiling interviewer plucks out a pen from his jacket pocket and say, \u20ac\u0153Sell me this pen\u20ac\u009d. What would you say? Here are the options I came up with: You will have to read the post to view Ed&#8217;s excellent options. Believe it or not, I actually encountered this interview approach when I was a young sales rep. I sat in the office of a salty old sales manager who told me to look under the chair I was sitting in. There was&hellip; <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2007\/08\/sell-me-this-pen\/\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"bgseo_title":"","bgseo_description":"","bgseo_robots_index":"","bgseo_robots_follow":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[16,10,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hiring-salespeople","category-interview","category-sales-techniques"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5Oho-is","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2230,"url":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2010\/01\/interview-myths\/","url_meta":{"origin":1144,"position":0},"title":"Interview Myths","author":"Derrick Moe","date":"January 11, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"This article from Yahoo\u2019s Hot Jobs contains 5 hiring myths designed to help candidates perform better in an interview.\u00a0 Myth #1 is excellent for the hiring manager: Myth #1: Be prepared with a list of questions to ask at the close of the interview. There is some truth in this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hiring&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hiring","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/category\/hiring\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2105,"url":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2009\/09\/q-is-for-qualifying-questions\/","url_meta":{"origin":1144,"position":1},"title":"Q Is For Qualifying Questions","author":"Derrick Moe","date":"September 15, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"I come across this often \u2013 a company wants to hire a superstar salesperson and the hiring manager\u2019s first instinct is to find a loquacious talker.\u00a0 Perhaps you have seen this approach too?\u00a0 Clearly no readers of the Hire Sense would administer this approach in their hiring. Right? Ok, maybe\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Hiring Salespeople&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Hiring Salespeople","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/category\/hiring\/hiring-salespeople\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1787,"url":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2008\/11\/8-things-not-to-do-on-a-sales-call\/","url_meta":{"origin":1144,"position":2},"title":"8 Things Not To Do On A Sales Call","author":"Lee Fratzke","date":"November 13, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"I read this post on Bnet and got a chuckle out of a couple of the points and thought I would share this article by Geoffrey James with you.\u00a0 I especially laughed when I read don't flirt with the admin...who does that?!\u00a0 Anyway, here are the 8 things not to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Interview&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Interview","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/category\/hiring\/interview\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2208,"url":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2009\/12\/christmas-in-the-sales-world\/","url_meta":{"origin":1144,"position":3},"title":"Christmas In The Sales World","author":"Derrick Moe","date":"December 21, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"This is from EyeOnSales.com: Twas the end of the quarter, with my Blackberry dead Not a prospect was stirring, my dashboard pure red. The managers were wringing their hands with despair, With thoughts of their bonuses vanishing into thin air. The VP of sales sat awake in her bed, While\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Anecdotes&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Anecdotes","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/category\/hiring\/anecdotes\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1582,"url":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2008\/05\/12-strategies-for-asking-questions\/","url_meta":{"origin":1144,"position":4},"title":"12 Strategies For Asking Questions","author":"Derrick Moe","date":"May 20, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"This article from Selling Power offers suggestions for salespeople when questioning prospects.\u00a0 The author makes some excellent points with one that stands out - number 9.\u00a0 I have edited the content for length. 1. Qualify prospects You can quickly establish if this \"suspect\" is a qualified prospect with a few\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Communication&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Communication","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/category\/communication\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1455,"url":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/2008\/03\/sales-reminder-be-valuable\/","url_meta":{"origin":1144,"position":5},"title":"Sales Reminder-Be Valuable","author":"Derrick Moe","date":"March 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"This reminder is from the daily JustSell.com email: Harvard Business School Professor Emeritus Theodore Levitt once said, \"People don't want a quarter-inch drill, they want a quarter-inch hole.\" The sales point: your prospect doesn't want a product; she wants a solution. You need to listen to uncover your prospect's hidden\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Sales Techniques&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Sales Techniques","link":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/category\/sales-techniques\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/selectmetrix.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<!-- WP Super Cache is installed but broken. 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