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68 reviews for:
The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation
Matthew Dixon, Brent Adamson
3.63 AVERAGE
68 reviews for:
The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation
Matthew Dixon, Brent Adamson
3.63 AVERAGE
informative
slow-paced
informative
slow-paced
Assigned for work in preparation for a Challenger class. This was a relatively easy read in terms of writing level, but boring as hell. The authors put in a lot of PowerPoint slides, which made me laugh. Their premise is that they did a lot of research to find out that there are 5 basic types of sales reps and the most effective one is called the Challenger. In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, when people & businesses were very close-fisted, Challenger reps were still selling. The book goes on to show how a company can prepare and support its sales reps into a Challenger style of selling, and it shares data as well as anecdotes from the customer side.
It made my skin crawl on multiple occasions, and I have serious doubts about my future at the company if this is the direction of my role. The basic premise is really just that you're not a doormat, you insist on a partnership rather than a service role, you talk back and argue and control every conversation as well as the customer's perception. That's fine. But several of the methods are blatantly manipulative and unethical, the typical scammy & scumy sales people strategies. Rational Drowning is one - overwhelm the client with data & graphs until they are confused and desperate for you to show them the way out. Another way is to create a problem. They say that if you only solve a problem the customer already knows about, you've failed. They literally say "now there's a burning platform - one you've created, and the customer is looking to you for salvation." Ew.
It made my skin crawl on multiple occasions, and I have serious doubts about my future at the company if this is the direction of my role. The basic premise is really just that you're not a doormat, you insist on a partnership rather than a service role, you talk back and argue and control every conversation as well as the customer's perception. That's fine. But several of the methods are blatantly manipulative and unethical, the typical scammy & scumy sales people strategies. Rational Drowning is one - overwhelm the client with data & graphs until they are confused and desperate for you to show them the way out. Another way is to create a problem. They say that if you only solve a problem the customer already knows about, you've failed. They literally say "now there's a burning platform - one you've created, and the customer is looking to you for salvation." Ew.
A few insights from this were interesting and this might be a helpful resource for people who are actually working in sales, but I personally thought the book was quite repetitive and fairly dry.
inspiring
medium-paced
Frankly, there is very little that is ground breaking or new in this book. The authors went to great lengths to disparage relationship and solution selling in an effort to promote the challenger sales method. This was unnecessary and, in the end, contradictory to their message as they ended up referring back to presenting solution as one of the keys to successful selling outcomes.
The authors would have been much better served if they had referred to relationship builders as servants or concierges in the way they defined them. Again, it was clear that one of the keys to mastery was building and leveraging relationships in the challenger process.
Part of the issue with writing a book that sells is creating enough differentiation and controversy that it might be read. When this book was promoted in the pre-marketing process, I had already taken issue with the premise. Now, having read it at the request of a client, it confirmed my initial premise that there are some really good ideas packaged at the expense of some very successful behaviors.
The biggest and most valued take away is that great sales professionals need to focus more on the sales experience and on having great business acumen in presenting innovative, insightful ideas and solutions to their customers. It is not about what you but how you sell. Nothing could be more accurate.
Chapters 3-6 are very valuable. Dig in and learn from them. Skip the rest.
The authors would have been much better served if they had referred to relationship builders as servants or concierges in the way they defined them. Again, it was clear that one of the keys to mastery was building and leveraging relationships in the challenger process.
Part of the issue with writing a book that sells is creating enough differentiation and controversy that it might be read. When this book was promoted in the pre-marketing process, I had already taken issue with the premise. Now, having read it at the request of a client, it confirmed my initial premise that there are some really good ideas packaged at the expense of some very successful behaviors.
The biggest and most valued take away is that great sales professionals need to focus more on the sales experience and on having great business acumen in presenting innovative, insightful ideas and solutions to their customers. It is not about what you but how you sell. Nothing could be more accurate.
Chapters 3-6 are very valuable. Dig in and learn from them. Skip the rest.
Read this at work. Never thought much about how to go about sales before, but I think the challenger process as outlined in this book makes a lot of intuitive sense. There are some elements I think would be challenging to pull off, and I'd love to see an argument made for one of the other sales styles mentioned in this book. Overall, though, this was a nice, perspective-shifting read on something pretty important.
Good insight into the process and pitfalls of relationship selling. Great examples from experiences in sales.
It’s probably a better book than the 2 stars I’m giving. I just didn’t care for it. But I’m probably not the intended audience. I Read this as it is the “common book” to be read by attendants at a conference where I’ll be speaking, but this was clearly aimed purely at the background of the attendees, not the lecturers. If this is a topic you care about, I’m sure you’d enjoy the book more than I did.
I recommend this read to all my friends in sales. Really makes you think about your own sales process and how you can be better (and close more business aka make more money).