Customer Reviews

Selling The Wheel: Choosing The Best Way To Sell For You Your Company Your Customers

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book would make a five star read either as a book about sales or as humor. You can read it for both, and get twice the benefit.

The premise for this fable is based on a character named Max inventing the wheel in ancient Egypt, and then quickly adapting to the evolving market place with different product focus, marketing, and sales efforts.

With the help of his wife and the Oracle, Max finds different sales people to create demand for the wheel. Initially, no one can see a purpose for the wheel. Soon there is lots of competition, and Max has to adjust.

Based on research by Howard Stevens, a coauthor, there are four types of customers: gateswingers who want to be first with the new, progressive customers who want advanced products, relationship customers who want relatively acceptable products from a company they can trust, and world customers who want a standard product that is reliable at a good price.

Each type of customer needs a different type of salesperson: closers work best with gateswingers; wizards (technically competent people) do well with progressive customers; relationship salespeople do well with relationship customers; and the reliable captain and his crew (solving the customer's problem) are best for the world customer.

The key point is to choose customers for whom you can deliver the most value.

There is also lots of information about sales planning, the marketing and sales process, and how to measure your effectivenss. All of this information is solid and valuable, especially to those who are just learning about sales and marketing.

The beauty of using the wheel as the basis for the fable is to make the point about developing a product into a mass industry is easier to understand. Everyone knows about wheels. But the point is that every product was once a breakthrough and will at some point become a low-price, undifferentiated commodity. This allows you to understand how that life cycle affects what will make you most successful.

This book will help you overcome your stalled thinking that there is only one way to sell products. If you are in sales, you can apply this to getting a sales job that fits your preferred sales style. If you are a customer, it will help you know which kind of a sales person will best meet your needs. If you are running a business, it will help you plan your business and monitor your effectiveness. That's quite a lot of stalled thinking to overcome from one book.

The authors point out in a note that few sales forces are measured for effectiveness, and little hiring is done to match sales style to customer need. Be sure to focus on improving over that set of practices if you want to become more successful.

Enjoy faster and more profitable growth as your 2,000 percent solution from this wonderful tale!

Donald Mitchell

Coauthor of The Irresistible Growth Enterprise (available in September 2000) and The 2,000 Percent Solution

(donmitch@fastforward400.com)

What more can you ask for in a book?

1) It is an easy read.

2) It makes complete sense

3) The message is memorable

I read this book a few years ago, and it still resonates with me.

The makeup of a sales force evolves over time. For a new product, you need a person who can sell anything to anyone. A real rainmaker. As your business grows, you need someone who can engineer custom solutions. Grow more, and you'll need someone who can manage long-term relationships. Finally, in the most mature market, you'll need someone who can manage and motivate a sales force in a commodity-based system.

If you are an entrepreneur growing a business, this book is written for you. It will help you decide what stage your business is in, and what type of sales person/force you need to succeed in each stage.

Business self-help books are rarely lively. And books about sales are usually the most boring of all. And yet, "Selling the wheel" is fascinating. I enjoyed it even though I am not a sales professional, nor a businessman of any kind. What makes the book a quick read is that the practical sales information is couched in the form of a fictional narrative. This story, about the efforts of the ancient inventor of the wheel to sell his invention, is funny and engaging. But all the while, you are learning valuable information about the various types of salesman required to sell products at different stages in a product's technolgoical development: a "closer" for new products; a "wizard" for developed products that require a high-degree of technical expertise to select, install and service; a "builder" for standardized products that are purchased primarily by large, bureaucratic organizations; and a "captain" for products that are so common they have become commodiztized. If only all business self-help books were this interesting and well-conceived!

Written in the style of a business novel, set in ancient times, when the Egyptian pyramids were being built, "Selling the Wheel" is a fantastic book, about the sales process. It covers the different types of sales people and personalities appropriate during various stages of the evolution of a product, which in this case is the wheel. The book is also about positioning a company, determining what markets to target, and fending off competition. You will be introduced to the Closer, the Wizard, the Relationship Builder, as well as the Captain and Crew, all of whom have a place in the growth and evolution process of a business and it's sales strategy.

Selling the Wheel" is both educational and entertaining, as are Jeff's other business novels. It is creatively written, humorous at times, and never dull. It satirizes many of the situations and logic we see in today's business environment including the world of the net economy. Even in ancient times, star salespeople such as Ben (below) were way ahead of the times:

"But, Ben," said Max, "if we sell them wheels at twenty-four shekels, we're gonna lose money on every wheel we sell!"

"I know, but we'll make it up on volume!" Said Ben, uttering a remark that would echo forward through the centuries.

Whether you work in sales or not, this book is easy to identify with. It touches on elements presented in Jeff's other books (Zapp, Heroz, and The Goal), including motivation, conflict, management, and day to day decision making within a company. If you have an interest in sales, or even in business, pick up this book, set aside a few hours, and dive in!

Hiring your first sales rep is often difficult for entrepreneurs, yet hiring the wrong first sales rep can doom the company before it really gets any momentum. This book gives an excellent analysis of 4 types of sales reps, how to recognize them and when they are appropriate to the organization. I highly recommend this book to my entreprenuer clients.

This book is an easy read and packed with lot of wisdom. The author explains the selling process through a story of selling wheels when it was invented in the ancient time. Using the wheel-selling story, the author discusses how different types of sales people fits at different stages of product selling life cycle, what makes a product a world-class product etc. This book is worth reading.

Selling the Wheel

I am not a sales professional, but I thought Selling the Wheel was a good introduction. It provides EXTREMELY valuable information on sales and marketing.

Sales people are broken into four categories:
1. closers
2. wizards
3. builders (i. e., relationship builder)
4. captain & crew

This roughly corresponds to (my examples)
1. luxury car salesman
2. drug rep
3. insurance salesman
4. electronics superstore sales manager and sales crew

My friends who sell thought the categories were interesting. Information about customers, markets, etc., are also organized in this way.

I gave it 4 stars because the story was too long. Also, I really did not see where they were going until about half-way through the book. More of an overview in the introduction would be an improvement. Instead, the authors try to surprise you with the information as the story unfolds. Then you are surprised with a very good overview at the end of the book. There is no table of contents.

Overall, I appreciated it. I can't recommend a better introduction. If you are in a hurry, just read the overview.

I am not now, nor have I ever been a salesperson. I've joined every MLM on the planet and couldn't get past square one because I didn't know how to sell. Reading this book helped me to understand that there are different ways of selling to different markets and at different life-cycles in an organization. Having it in a story format really helped bring across the message much more clearly than just a dry 'this is how you do it' book.

Best marketing and sales book I have ever read until now! It's a nice story about selling innovation and market evolution.

I've read many a book on technology sales and this one is easily the best. It's also a book very few have heard about, which is a shame. The story format works as pure entertainment - you turn each page to discover how it will all work out for Max and Mini. Jeff Cox is a master of the business fable. His first was "The Goal" written with Eli Goldratt. Here he distills deep insight borne from many years of research by Howard and the Chally Group.

If you are a sales person, you will discover your sales style in one of the three characters - Cassius, Ben and Toby. You will realize that your style is appropriate for particular sales situations. The faster you place yourself in companies whose phase matches your style, the more successful you will be. Knowing your style empowers you to deepen it rather than emulate others.

VPs of Sales and company founders: you will be challenged to think about your organization's stage of evolution and matching your sales approach, team and culture to it. Beware of your own style clouding your view! If you are Cassius and your company is in need of Ben you must be able to step out of your comfort zone and mental model.

This book was one of the sources of inspiration for The Human Fabric. It's no accident that Cassius, Ben and Toby map directly to the Evangelist, Relater and Maven core types.