Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III Salesmanship A Good substitute should be found for the word " salesmanship " because the word, or that for which it stands, is actually in disrepute on account of being considered, in the minds of altogether too many individuals, as representing a sort of cunning, the possession of which is rather against, than for, the individual. Unless this condition can be corrected so that the meaning is interpreted as being a high order of approach, which results in the meeting of minds, some other word which better comports with advanced ideas on selling should be substituted. Small consideration should be given the idea that only a favored few are born salesmen, because only the unfavored minority cannot become efficient members of a sales organization. Every individual is selling something every day of his life. A good salesman is a born gentleman who is not lazy. All human accomplishment hinges around salesmanship. Even advertising is a form of salesmanship. Salesmanship is driving power—militancy—not the noisy, flamboyant kind, but that born of industry, enterprise, determination and inherent gentlemanly qualities. A Life Insurance salesman is a composite individual, exercising the qualities of the ordinary salesman, plus functions of the leading professions, combined with the knowledge of the economist and sociologist. Life Insurance salesmanship has been shunned because of the percentage of failures registered by those who engaged in the work, and because of the common misconception of the importance and dignity of the business as a profession. Failures in salesmanship—not alone in Life Insurance, but in every field—have been multiplied owing to the lack of constructive sales methods in the decorum employed in daily work, and the unscientific methods o...