14. Making appointments.—Above all, if the sales man intends to display in a sample room he should immediately secure one at the hotel and arrange his display before starting out to secure appointments. The salesman who takes a leading sample or two from his trunk in the baggage room at the railroad station, intending to secure a sample room only in the event of securing appointments, will half wish that he may not be put to the trouble; consequently he will be loath to press the slightly interested buyer for an appoint ment. The salesman who has gone to the trouble of unpacking his trunk and arranging -his line, on the other hand, will do everything in his power to get someone to look at his goods.
The "trunk line" man should bear in mind that, while it is to the prospect's advantage to look over every line, it is probably impossible for him to do so. He is continually being asked to look over one line or another without any particular reason being advanced as to why he should. The real salesman will carry one or two numbers of remarkable value or unique pattern by means of which hc may impress his pros pects with the unusual quality of his goods. He will paint a picture of the ease with which his goods can be sold that will make the buyer see the advantage of looking at them.
.A.t that point, and not before, he will drive hard for an appointment. Then, if the prospect is a man who keeps his business appointments with absolute punctuality, all well and good. If there is the least doubt on this score the salesman, a little before the time set, will just happen to go by and will wait for the prospect so that they may walk to the hotel to crether.
15. Displaying samples attractively.—Once the prospect is in the sample room, the arrangement of samples will have much to do with securing his favor able attention, arousing his interest and creating de sire. The salesman should learn to be an artist in displaying his line. Other things being equal, the salesman with the best sense of the artistic will sell the most goods. The ordinary sheeting provided by the hotel does not lend itself to an effective arrange ment. A suitable backurround should be carried.
e, For example, more cut glass will be sold from a back ground of black velvet than from one of white sheet ing. The unusually effective samples should, as a rule, be displayed with more ordinary ones surround ing them; the placing of all the leaders together will put them in competition, the one with the other, and result in the selling of fewer of them than if they are separated and contrasted with the less attractive (mods.
Accessories -to the goods themselves will enhance their attractiveness. The milliner.), salesman will ar range his ostrich plumes on a shape rather than dis play them separately. There is a successful shirt salesman who always displays his line with collars and harmonizing cravats attached.
16. The "you" attitude.—Above all, it must be re membered in getting attention, that the prospect is more interested in himself and his business than he is in the salesman or the salesman's business. The lat ter's opening, therefore, should always approach the proposition from the prospect's point of view. Any talk about the salesman or the salesman's house that fails to get the prospect into the story is going to leave him cold and uninterested. We said previously that salesmanship was the taking of the prospect's view point and then swinging him around to ours. The talk to a jobber should take him on an imaginary sell ing trip and picture him selling the commodity offered to his customers. To the retailer a picture of himself reselling the commodity over his counter at a profit, is bound to be interesting. The customer must be pictured as enjoying the article. The prospect for an automobile should see himself, in his mind's eye, speeding along in the sunshine amid the admiration of his friends and acquaintances. By painting a picture and putting the prospect in it, the salesman stands the best chance of securing undivided attention.
17. Example of the "you" was a stage in the development of the telephone business when it was a simple matter to persuade a business man to instal a telephone, hilt a different and more difficult thing to sell him an equipment that was ade quate. There was, at that time, a department store in an Indiana town that had but one wire with two extensions, one on each floor of the store. The tele phone people were convinced that this equipment was inadequate, but they had failed on several occasions to make the proprietor recognize that fact. Finally one of the big commercial men of the company came down from Chicago to see what he could do.