Eoin Purcell

New Experiences
I did something I have never done before on Tuesday, I took a sales meeting with a major wholesaler. Needless to say I was terrified, I was surprised and I was woefully under-prepared for the meeting but it did give me an amazing experience and one that I know I can improve upon.

A couple of things stand out as guides that I guess I should really have known in advance but which I know for certain now.

1) Wholesalers have a very fine sense of the market (they need to) as such they really only care about the books that they know will sell. A meeting with them then is one where you should really know their market and not try and sell them something that they cannot sell to their retailers.
2) Fancy sales material is next to useless. What matters is if the product meets their needs. Is it the right Price? Does it have wide enough appeal? Will it look good on shelves? If you can fit these key points on a single sheet (and you should be able to) then that will do the trick.
3) Don’t waste time. Buyers are busy, they are busy doing a lot more than you think. Get in, get the books over and done with and get out.

I know these are probably terribly obvious to most people who have ever spent a day selling but to me they were new and I thought they might be useful.

The crowning value of the trip though was that it has instilled in me a new found respect for all things data and sales system based. I know why people who sell things want the system to work and to have data in the right place at the right time: It stops you looking like an idiot in front of people who you are asking to give you money!

Fortunately my inexperience did not do us too badly. All but one of our forthcoming titles got some orders and one or two did pretty well by my book. So I cannot have been too bad!

Feeling less foolish by the hour
Eoin