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Heavy Hitter Selling: How Successful Salespeople Use Language
and Intuition to Persuade Customers to Buy
by Steve W. Martin

Like other marketing and sales books published recently, this one stresses the importance of human behavior. But unlike the others, it puts an emphasis on language. The first section deals with the human nature of communication.

It describes different layers of communication, including phonetics, content, purpose, and the way the mind uses and interprets language. "Heavy hitters," or successful salespeople, can structure their dialogue and create personal rapport with customers by borrowing ideas from neurolinguistics, the study of how the brain and the body work in conjunction with language.

The second section examines strategies for deciding which customers to target and which actions to take. The third section focuses on the power of persuasion, and touches on a deeper level of the meaning of language: the power of metaphor and language’s ability to appeal to emotions rather than logic.

Though the author defines salesmanship principally as an art, he believes that art has a scientific element. Salespeople could well benefit by exploring scientific models of language. Practical exercises and a glossary make the book useful for everyone.