I found that the institution of life insurance was one of the sustaining pillars of our
American economy, and it was worthy of the attention of any prospect. After getting
thor­oughly saturated with all the knowledge pertaining to life insurance, I began to
study the prospect. Where does he fit in? Where is his place in this great network
of economic, social, and financial relations? I found that the whole system of life
insurance was set up for one purpose only, and that was to serve the needs of
the prospect. A life insurance policy was a declaration of financial independence,
embodying  guarantees that would solve the prospect’s family problems, help him
to solve his estate problems, help him to solve his retirement problems, and help
him to realize his hopes, am­bitions, and needs. The prospect was not aware
of all the wonderful things that life insurance could do for him. I must tell him.

In creating this Sales Plan for life insurance, I felt I had  a lot in common with
the prospect. I knew he had a family, a home, a job, and, in all probability, a lot
of unfulfilled de­sires. I appreciated one great fact about the prospect: he was a
rational human being with problems and needs and would listen to an appeal on
how to meet them, based on common sense and reason.

Therefore, with a good understanding of life insurance, and with the prospect
as the center of interest, I fitted a life insurance policy about his shoulders. I made
it talk. I made  it reveal its benefits and what they meant to him and his family.
This is the Sales Plan I created. In this Sales Plan I refer to the prospect as “Mr. Doe”
and the insurance com­pany as “Every Man’s Life Insurance Company’

Selling is a good deal like farming. In farming, the farmer
must plant the seed. He knows that he must sow before he
can reap. The farmer and the salesman are alike. The farmer
plants seeds. The salesman plants ideas. Your ideas, like
seeds, will never grow a crop unless they are planted. The
salesman reaps as he sows. The more ideas he sows, the more
sales he will reap.
Therefore, I realized that in order to reap a harvest of life
insurance sales I must sow a crop of life insurance ideas. I
also realized that these ideas must convey to the prospect
the real value of life insurance and the advantages that it meant
to him and his family. They must satisfy the prospect’s sense of
caution, security, and safety. Therefore, it was nec­essary to
create a Sales Plan around the needs of the pros­pect, conveying
the idea that life insurance would satisfy those needs.

In building and creating this Sales Plan, I studied life in­surance
from every angle. Not a phase was overlooked. I sought every
available source for knowledge and informa­tion. I read every
book that I could find on the subject. I compared all major companies.
I analyzed all important types of policies, including term insurance,
ordinary insur­ance, 20-payment life insurance, all kinds of endowment
life insurance, all forms of annuities, and all forms of retire­ment income
plans. I reckoned with mortality tables, com­pound interest tables, life
expectancy tables, cash reserves, disability clauses, and tables and
clauses for optional settle­ments. I studied the protection that life insurance
affords to partnerships, executives of corporations, and the interests of
individual proprietors. I searched tax laws relating to estates, wills, and trusts.
I familiarized myself with inherit­ance tax laws, both state and Federal.
The social, economic, and financial aspects of life insurance were carefully
weighed, analyzed, and considered.

SOME YEARS AGO, a man hired the Opera House in a small
Pennsylvania town for one night, but engaged no ush-
ers or other staff. About a month before the date for which
he had rented the hall, he put a large sign on the most
prominent billboard in town, stating in huge letters: “HE
IS COMING!”

A week before the fateful night this was replaced by: “HE
WILL BE AT THE OPERA HOUSE THURSDAY NIGHT,
OCTOBER 15th, AT 8:30!”
That night, the man himself sat in the box office and sold
tickets at $1 a head to a capacity audience. When the lights
went up inside, however, all that the crowd could see was a
huge sign reading: “HE IS GONE!”

All the principles of selling are wrapped up in this story.
Attention was gained. Interest was developed. Desire was
stimulated. The prospect was convinced to act, and to “close
the deal” by buying a ticket. I do not recommend this pro-
cedure, but the principles applied contain the basic elements
necessary to create a sale. In this chapter, let us unfold and
develop these principles and endeavor to learn how to apply
them to create a sale or to improve our present Sales Plan.
When I was sixteen years old, which was over 42 years
ago, I began to sell. I am still at it. In fact, I get more real
pleasure and enjoyment out of it today then ever before.

Selling furnishes me with a modern school and a complete
laboratory that is made up of living people, and affords me
the opportunity to study every phase of human behavior and
to understand the relations that exist in the varying aspects
of selling. When you analyze selling, and especially creative
selling, you find that you are dealing with the greatest and
most interesting thing in the world. You are dealing with
ideas and thoughts. By the application of ideas and thoughts,
man has the ability to create. He creates by the power of an
invisible idea. It is an invisible idea before it is a visible
thing. It must be a thought before it can be a product or
service. Therefore, if man has the capacity and ability to
create a product or service by the means of an invisible idea,
it must stand to reason that he has the power to create a
sale, and to establish a market for that product or service.

This is the line of reasoning that I have always followed,
and it has never failed. I know from my experience that a
man can create a demand and a market for anything, even
for a product that never existed before.

To gain attention and get interest is not enough. With a
feeling of confidence and earnestness you must arouse the
desire, incite that inward, invisible intensity of being and
make others want to do what you propose. You have the
power to intensify your thoughts. Concentrate this power on
a sale, and you will attract all the forces necessary to accom-
plish it. You will attract that which you want to accomplish
by putting a lot of thought into it. When you proceed along
this line, you are in a position to draw on all the necessary
elements and entities and make full use of them. The sale
will build itself if you center your thoughts on it. Thoughts
turn into realities. Your great creative power is within you
now, right where you are, ready to go to work for you. You
can apply the Law of Attraction as a means to help you put
this power of creative selling into action. It will turn your
sales ability into cash.

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The power of creative selling lies not in the product, not
in the service, and not in the prospect—it lies in you. It lies
in your ability to apply the Law of Attraction to draw the
prospect to you. As a salesman, you want results; you want
to make a sale, and you want to be of service to the prospect.

The most scientific and practical way to do this is to give
the prospect all the knowledge and information possible
about your product. Make an effort to give him a complete
and comprehensive picture of what the product is, what it
can do for him, and the pleasure and satisfaction he will
derive from owning it. In doing this, you give the prospect
an idea of what you can really do for him. He feels the im-
pact of your impelling presentation. You stimulate and in-
cite his consciousness with a genuine reason for buying. You
feelingly persuade him to act. The prospect says to himself:
“This is an appeal to my reason and to my interest, and ac-
cording to my judgment it is a sound presentation. It makes
sense. This salesman is telling me the truth. He believes
what he says. Therefore, I am going to act on his advice
and counsel.” Prove and demonstrate that the product that
you are selling has merit, that it is faithfully meeting the
needs and satisfying the wants of others, and that it will
therefore serve and benefit your prospect.

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The Law of Attraction is very plainly expressed in the
Bible. It reads: “To him that hath shall be given, and from
him that hath not shall be taken away, even that which he
hath.” As applied to attracting the prospect, this simply
means that if you have the thoughts and ideas to attract him,
and give them out, then you attract other things to you, and
therefore more things shall be given unto you. On the other
hand, if you do not make use of the thoughts and ideas you
now have, then even that which you already have shall be
taken away. It merely expresses the inexorable and immu-
table law that you have to give in order to get.

In selling you have only one thing to give, and that is
your ability, intelligently reviewed and appraised, and con-
veyed to others through a system or a plan of action. Your
ability can be expressed through a Sales Plan. You can
create this plan in a haphazard, hit-or-miss way, or you can
create it in a scientifically planned way. To attract a pros-
pect and to create a sale, the latter is imperative. The per-
fection of selling starts with you. How high do you register
in the scale of perfection? What are you doing to improve
your efficiency? Have you learned to harness all your forces
and concentrate them on the job of selling? Have you ac-
quired the knowledge and skill to do the greatest amount of
work with the least possible amount of effort in the shortest
period of time? Can you get maximum results with minimum
effort? Are your thoughts liquid? Can you adjust yourself
quickly? Have you the power of adaptability? Can you apply
common sense? Do you assume the role of self-importance
when shouldered with the responsibility of serving others?

Does your expert knowledge and keen sales ability lose its
charm and savor at the expense of impudence and arro-
gance? Do you use your head for other things as well as a
place to hang your hat? Always remember that if the product
or service could talk and reveal its qualities, services, merits,
usefulness, and its benefits and advantages to the prospect,
the power of creative selling would be unessential and your
services as a salesman would no longer be needed. However,
since the product or service cannot do this, it is your job to
do it effectively. This requires positive thinking, creative
planning, and dynamic action.

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In analyzing the prospect, we find his acts to buy are con-
trolled by three sources. So important are these three sources
that I again enumerate them. By all means, initiate them
into your activities and appropriate them to your use.

First: The prospect has a desire, and a desire is an unfilled
want, seeking satisfaction.

Second: The prospect has a urge, and the urge stimulates
and incites him to buy;

Third: The prospect has a reason, and the reason is based
on definite knowledge of an established need.

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A knowledge of ourselves, and what appeals to us, often
gives us a definite clue to what appeals to and attracts others.
We discover an appeal that makes them act. Most prospects
are fundamentily alike. What will appeal to one will appeal
to all. Most of us are constantly and eternally trying to per-
suade and even convince ourselves that we are different
from everyone else. With 42 years experience in selling and
experimenting in the laboratory of human relations, I know
differently. We all have a lot in common with each other.
The sooner we realize this, the sooner will we generate the
power to attract. We must realize and appreciate one great
fact about the prospect: he is a rational human being. He has
desires, problems and needs, and he will listen to a reason-
able and common-sense appeal on how to meet and fulfill
them.

The attributes, characteristics, and qualities of the pros-
pect can usually be determined by an understanding of our
own. Your purpose should be to understand what the pros-
pect thinks and to express your power to him through a well-
formulated Sales Plan. Therefore, with this understanding,
using the prospect and his needs as a center of interest, you
can build and create thoughts into a Sales Plan that will
impel him to act. You can attract and inspire him to have
full confidence in your proposition.

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Image via Wikipedia

The laws of the universe are abstract until we begin to
understand their principles and discover that these scientific
laws are as close to us as our elbows. According to scientific
theories, the universe is held together by the Law of Attrac-
tion. In physics you were taught that the Law of Attraction
is a force acting mutually between particles of matter, tend-
ing to draw them together.

A Law of Attraction also operates in selling. It is the for-
mula, the process, the method, the plan, and the act you
employ to attract the prospect. The more you know about
the prospect and the situations that control his acts, the more
quickly you can attract him. Attracting the prospect calls
for a combination of science and art. Science instructs us
what to do. Art teaches us how to do it. Through observa-
tion, experience, reflection, and reasoning you can analyze
the prospect. You can uncover the reasons that influence
and motivate him to act.

Prospects are governed and motivated to action by ideas.
Compounding ideas into a scientific Sales Plan and present-
ing them in logical sequence stimulates reaction and leads
to quick results. Human nature is fundamental. You can be
fairly certain what reaction you will get from people when
you present them with a certain definite idea. A positive idea
in action always produces a reaction. This reaction will be
favorable if the plan to convey the idea is scientifically pre-
pared.

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Image by Koshyk via Flickr

The highway to the interest of all men lies on the fertile
plain of ideas. Hazel McCann used this highway to attract
Dr. Douglas, and as a result she was highly rewarded. As a
salesman, you have access to this highway from a choice
field of selling ideas. Your ability and power as a salesman
must be expressed through ideas. You must be able to pre-
sent these ideas by creating a Sales Plan to merchandise your
proposition. You must turn over what you have in order to
get something else; in short, you must sell.

You must keep on the move, and consider the ups and
downs in your activities as a stepping stone to greater
achievements. Has it ever occurred to you why the ocean’s
waves constantly roll and break against each other with
clocklike regularity? Without this persistent motion the
ocean would become stagnant. Everything in and around
it would perish. These movements keep the water teeming
with wholesomeness and vitality.

Ups and downs in selling act as a tonic to provoke thought
and stimulate action. The world is a proving ground. The
prospects you call on furnish you with material for your
laboratory of human relations. Your salesmanship is the head
chemist who compounds formulas, and, if these formulas are
scientifically compounded, you can attract the prospect and
sell whatever you desire. In this chapter there are formulas
compounded in the laboratory of human relations, tested in
the field of experience, and proved on the proving grounds
of hard knocks.