THE MODERN WAY

[Music] okay [Music] hi brother hello yourself glad to see you i'm just reading about you it says here the drummer was a bluff hearty individual with a ready smile that's me brother that's me down to a tee i already smile it don't cost anything but when you smile it's got to come straight from the old heart none of this false tinsel stuff i checked with you on that but when you've got that smile on your fizz you don't have to worry about anything else just tell them a good story be one of the boys get the right goods at the right price get around through the territory on time man that's all it takes to get orders regardless of what it says in that magazine well maybe in your day but the selling conditions i have to face are different to say the least today prospects want to know more about what you have to sell selling along with everything else has changed since you were on the road selling has changed with merchandising with research with manufacturing with transportation in the rest of the world i don't say that your methods didn't work for you then because i know they did the methods we use today are simply the thorough methods of the times the methods we all have to use if we're going to turn time into money and expect to bring in orders that make money for the firm you're talking my language brother but let's get down to cases let's open up a sale here i'm the commercial traveler you're the customer this suitcase i leave at the hotel this catalog i take right with me all right then i come hello old horse i ain't seen you since june how's trixx how's the wife how's a little old town you certainly open up like a cyclone what's the matter you think that line ain't so good it's good exercise where do you go from there well if you want to analyze it after i get you warmed up i show you the nippiest line of good you ever clap your peepers on i treat you right brother the way you want to be treated i look over your stuff and then why then you sign on the dotted line sit down i suppose that worked for you especially that whirlwind approach just swept them off their feet didn't you but seriously times have changed we don't do it that way now the modern salesman has learned to appeal to the customer's self-interest to present his products in such a way as to arouse a desire for more information let's see you do it brother well what's on your mind mr owens you have a certain number of farmer customers in this community let's say they're about a hundred if each one of those farmers gets a better profit on his crops you get a direct benefit from his increased purchasing power wouldn't you now i'd like to give you some ideas that will help your farmers make more money and at the same time help you increase your own sales and profits now what i've got to say is tied up with the farmers problem of getting better crops from the seeds he plants seeds you know are just as you and i subject to diseases these plant diseases dig into the farmer's pocketbook they cut down on his yield and affect the quality the crops he harvests which means less money to spend in town less money to spend here in your store sounds reasonable see that dealer had no reason to be interested in me he's interested only in how my products can help him make more money of course i was selling him a fast moving line of products that most dealers are easily interested in one of the most profitable for both the dealer and the consumer these products make a good example of how we sell because they're one line with outstanding selling features to demonstrate all right you go into this dealer and you hand him all this malarkey about profits and crop quality and whatnot then what do you do then i tell him about the product tell what it does and how well it does it that's what i'm doing now rehearsing my facts rehearsing any necessary brother wait a minute did i hear you right did you say you're rehearsing facts my friend certainly that and planning my sales campaign you have to do it dealers won't bother with you if you don't what you're talking about maybe not but man that's work less than you think especially when you're selling something that's interesting and easy to explain on some products all you need to know is the fundamental purpose of the products and the general method of using them for example profound technical knowledge isn't necessary to explain that every year farmers are losing millions of dollars because of stinking smother of wheat barley stripe disease sorghum smut seedling blight anthrax nose on cotton angular leaf spot damping off of young cotton seedlings you don't have to be a graduate scientist to explain how farmers dollars leak away through rhizoctonia on potatoes and potato scab black rot and stem rot of sweet potatoes diplodia on corn damping off in common vegetables rotting of vegetable seedlings hard rot and other diseases of flowers each year those common diseases take money right out of the farmer's pocket money he planted but didn't reap whole fields are often severely damaged and in others the quality is spoiled enough to reduce profits at the elevator farmers and disinfect their seed get the kind of crops the farmer needs to make money they get increased germination more vigorous plant growth improve quality in other words increase profits the whole community the farmers and the retailers in town get the benefit of course it isn't necessary to tell that whole story to any one dealer just the parts that apply to his own farming community but i know my products i decide beforehand the products that offer the dealer the largest sales potential and i say to him something like this when you remember that at least 50 of all the potatoes we plant here in the united states carry disease in some form or other you can see the risk the average farmer runs as a matter of fact the loss in yield alone on account of potato diseases is about equal to the crop from one acre out of every five or six acres planted boy how long have you been studying long enough to talk a conviction to my customers long enough to know my product why there's a big story alone in the research investigations that go on before any of these products are introduced to the public hundreds of them are studied every year in the manufacturer's laboratory each new product has to undergo the most exacting trials before it can be offered for sale samples are sent to federal and state experiment stations for scientific and practical farm tests it takes years before any dubai product can be proved worthy of the public's confidence that information means something to a dealer it gives him confidence sometimes of course you get an objection like this well what you say may be true but what you fellows don't consider is that it takes time and work to apply these disinfectants that used to be the case but nowadays they've got seed treating down to about as simple an operation as there is on the farm farmers all over the country are building these treaties for grain and cotton at a cost of only a couple of dollars we supply free blueprints for building the treater and any farmer with a coal chisel in the saw and a monkey wrench can do the rest seed cleaners jenners elevators and dealers everywhere are putting in treaters to help the farmers hundreds of thousands of bushels of seed grain are cleaned and treated each year by portable outfits traveling from farm to farm seed potatoes are an example of a different setup but it's even more simple all the grower has to do is mix amazon bell in water and dip his seed in it using a barrel if he grows a lot of potatoes or a couple of pails if the job is small so you see the speedy methods of applying modern disinfectants have simplified the job and made the work easy bear semester is promoting the idea of treating and showing farmers how with all that mr owens you naturally get a quick turnover when you stock a good line of seed disinfectants well i don't know by golly neither do i how does he know he's going to get turnover what's to keep those cans from roosting up there on his shelf is he supposed to take your word for it not a single word of what i've said does that deal i have to take for granted that's my next point prove your claims all this information about value mr owens is derived from government figures this sheet gives you the potential market breakdown for the whole country by states it shows you what you can expect you say these are taken from government figures yes united states government census figures they show the potential market in every state the opportunity is yours to get as much of this potential as you want to go after and that's not all by any means you have to back up everything with proof and in this case the manufacturer helps me with real evidence about the need for the product and its effectiveness at these bulletins proof from practically every state college this has anything to do with agriculture imagine what these do to help the dealer seize opportunity you don't have to take our word mr owens nor the word of the manufacturer for here's the impartial word of authorities on agriculture and you know they're only interested in the welfare of their former constituents on page after page of these scientists and they're in a position to know because they've made the tests these college men tell the farmer about the results they secure in experimenting with dubai products proof also comes from the united states department of agriculture in washington and it extends out through the states to the counties and the farm bureaus most farm states have publicly endorsed seed disinfection iowa illinois texas minnesota missouri indiana north dakota north carolina south carolina georgia nebraska oregon and others all over the country urged their farmers to use sarah sand for grains and cotton sema summersand junior for corn summers and belle for potatoes and summersand for the seeds of flowers and vegetables that's what i mean by proving your claims yeah but holy smoke i didn't have any proof like that i know you didn't you had to make your claims and travel fast now my next point is something else that will surprise you because when you were on the road things were really different in this respect now my point is sell your advertising something you probably didn't have very much of this company has been advertising steadily for almost 20 years the whole purpose of the advertising is to convince farmers that they can make more money by protecting their seed ads like these appear in farm papers and magazines throughout the nation all progressive farmers and a lot of town people here in york county read these magazines and these ads every month we cover 17 million prospects with this national circulation you can get ads all prepared ready to run in your local paper simply by asking for free mats and electros makes the farmers think of you when they think about seed disinfecting and there's radio telling the same educational story reaching millions more hold on brother all that gab about advertising won't get you anyplace you're off the track advertising don't mean nothing to the dealer that's why you're not up to date when you can show a customer that you're advertising for him and that it's the kind of advertising that drives business into his store then you've got something look here's how we do it today back of the advertising there's a broad educational campaign reaching america's future farmers working with 4-h and ffa clubs promoting interest in seed treating projects and seed treating rings reaching vocational agriculture teachers reaching county agents reaching custom seed treaters and farmers distributing seed treating information to all these groups educating the public in the modern way to fight plant diseases and reaching out to the millions who go to the movies short feature pictures extend the education feeding the multitude tall corn peruvian gold scourge seeds of prosperity these pictures are distributed free to rural theaters dealers tie in with the theater manager's promotion in nearly 15 years these pictures have been shown to millions of people and to show how closely all this is tied up to the dealer's profits here's a free window display telling more of the story reminding people once again as they pass the dealer's store what seed disinfection means to the farmer's pocketbook inside the store free crop pamphlets and display cards clinched the story a complete advertising and merchandising follow through to the dealer's cash register brother that's a story but listen and this is on the level do your dealers really move this stuff do you dare to go back or is it 23 skidoo after you load them up no i'm safe enough you know why it's because i've shown my dealers how to sell the goods i've sold them when i sell to my dealers i expect them to get turnover i know they will get turnover by selling the same thing i'm selling which is not merely a certain number of pounds of saracen or one of the other seed treatments but a service to the farmers so that's my last point don't sell the package sell what it does and you might be surprised how quick the dealers get the idea how soon do you want to start getting 190 pounds more seed cotton to the acre glad to hear about your little girl tom say here's two dollars more out of every acre of that corn of yours costs you a penny an acre here you are mr scott simison bell 35 more bushels of potatoes to the acre here's three extra bushels of oats to the acre john for a nickel an acre point number one was appeal to the customer self-interest appeal to the customers self-interest number two know your products no your [Music] products number three prove your claims prove your claims number four sell your advertising sell you're advertising number five don't sell the package sell what it does don't sell the package sell what it does and brother it's a good idea to grab a profitable line when you see it foreign