We all know we should read more. It’s hard to make time when there are so many exciting things to see and do. (Bubble baths, finding a substitute for Friends to watch in the tub, picking which excuse to use for already blowing your New Years Resolutions) But whether it’s audiobooks, kindle or a good, old-fashioned page-turner science proves reading more not only improves vocabulary and communication but can also improve overall intelligence and emotional IQ!
Specific to sales, books are undoubtedly the cheapest way to access in-depth training from the best minds in the business. (Other than listening to the INSIDE Inside Sales Podcast – which costs exactly…nothing!) To jumpstart your 2020 reading list we’ve assembled the best sales books by the guests of INSIDE Inside Sales and the books they recommend!
Incorporate Reading into Your Sales Routine
Before we dive into the lists let’s start with some tips to help make reading a regular and fun part of your sales routine (because let’s be honest – we all need to read more and could use all the help we can get!):
- Read the summaries! If a summary appeals to you the book likely will too. If it doesn’t appeal, start with a different book and come back later. No pressure!
- Bring your book with you! You never know when you’ll have 10 minutes to sneak in some pages. If you keep books at hand (whether physical, digital or audio) you’ll never have an excuse not to get it in!
- Set a goal! Whether it’s time or pages give yourself a daily goal. We’re a goal-driven profession – why not apply that determination to ourselves!
- Don’t book shame yourself! If you start a book and it isn’t your cup of tea – give it away! Switch to one that does appeal. If you want to read more you need to make reading fun. Once it’s a habit you can worry about what you “should” read. Until then stick to what you enjoy.
Without further ado! Your VanillaSoft INSIDE Inside Sales 2020 reading list from our 2019 guests!
Books by Our Fabulous Guests:
- Ryan Reisert – Outbound Sales – No Fluff – The one where prospecting gets bucketed.
- Chris Beal – Sales Development: Cracking the Code of Outbound Sales – The one perfect for prospective and new SDRs
- Matt Heinz –
- Full Funnel Marketing – The one that makes marketing make sense to salespeople
- Are You Selling Pants, Or Selling a Dream? – The one with 95 common questions answered!
- David Priemer – Sell the Way You Buy: A Modern Approach To Sales That Actually Works (Even on You!) – The one that helps you start selling through empathy and stop selling through brute force
- Melissa Krivachek
- Millionaires & Money: Sex, Sales and Seduction – The one to read if you’re a fan of blunt discussions of human nature
- TRUMPonomics: Power, Performance, Profit – The one to read if enjoy mixing politics with your business.
- Bold: Helping YOU Unleash the Hero Within – The one that will help you channel your inner DC/Marvel superhero – at least at work.
- Trish Bertuzzi – The Sales Development Playbook – The one every Sales Development Org is using whether they realize it or not.
- Mark Hunter –
- A Mind for Sales – The one which will get your mind right.
- High-Profit Prospecting – The one which teaches you to take control of your pipeline.
- Larry Levine – Selling from the Heart – The one that wins by putting the heart above the head.
- Anthony Innarino –
- The Only Sales Guide You’ll Ever Need – The one with 19 key skills and traits of top salespeople.
- Eat Their Lunch: Winning Customers Away from your competition – The one that will make you hungry as you steal business from the competition.
- The Lost Art of Closing – The one that makes closing the easiest part of the sale.
- Alison Edgar – Secrets of Successful Sales – The one with four pillars of sales success designed for founders.
- Steve Knapp – FunnelVision: Selling Made Easy – The one where an east-end fruit seller shares how he rose to write the sales manual for Shell.
- Andy Paul – Amp Up Your Sales – The one with tricks to help your customers make fast, favorable decisions.
- Mark Welch – The Street Savvy Sales Leader – The one that turns bad managers into great ones.
- Keenan – GAP Selling – The one that gives you the swift kick in the a$$ you didn’t know you needed.
- Mike Weinberg –
- Sales Management. Simplified. – The one which helps managers see how certain well-intentioned behaviors undermine their team.
- New Sales Simplified – The one which emphasizes that sometimes sales isn’t complicated.
- Barbara Giamanco – The New Handshake: Sales Meets Social Media – The literal book on social selling.
Books they Recommend:
- Chris Voss – Never Split the Difference – The one where the FBI negotiator will change how you negotiate forever.
- Mary C Gentile – Giving Voice to Values: How to Speak Your Mind When You Know What’s Right – The one which brings your values to the workplace through insights from the Aspen Institute
- Carlos Hidalgo – The UnAmerican Dream: Finding Personal and Professional Happiness Establishing Work-Life Boundaries – The one about the dark side of the “hustle-at-all-costs” mentality in business.
- Gary Keller – The ONE Thing – The one that will help you cut through the clutter and identify what matters.
- Zig Ziglar – Zig Ziglar’s Secrets of Closing the Sale: For Anyone Who Must Get Others to Say Yes! – The one with (seemingly) every possible closing technique.
- Gary Chapman – The 5 Love Languages – The one that will make you the ultimate relationship guru and salesperson.
- Tony Hughes – Combo Prospecting – The one with a 1-2 punch of social and classic prospecting tactics.
- Michael Hyatt
- Free to Focus – The one with the popular 3-step system to achieve more and do less
- Your Best Year Ever – The one which will change how to set and achieve goals
- Platform: Get Noticed in a Noisy World – The one focusing on platform and message to conquer the world.
- Alan Weiss
- Million Dollar Maverick – The one where an advice book tells you not to take advice
- Threescore and More – The one extolling the value of those with threescore and more years of experience.
- Million Dollar Consulting – The one that is the literal book on building a consulting business
- Cal Newport
- Digital Minimalism – The one which will teach you how to put down your d*mn phone.
- Deep Work – The one focused on teaching you to focus.
- Paul Hellman – You’ve Got 8 Seconds – The one which capitalizes on societies 8 second attention span.
Phew. That’s a long list. I’ll be the first to admit I’m going to need all of 2020 to read the 2019 recommended books, and then I’ll be a year behind (again!) by the time 2021 starts! But, as Andy Paul said in Episode #26 “Increased Earnings Start with Increased Learnings”.
So, what do you think? Any surprises on the books recommended by our guests? Do you have a favorite author? What book was on the list that you’ve been meaning to get to but just haven’t? If you could pick just one book from that list, which one would it be? More importantly, what book did they miss? Let’s continue the discussion in the comments or on social. In the meantime, I think I’m going to visit YouTube and learn how to make a killer bookshelf to store all of these. On second thought I’m buying one on Etsy because I’m not allowed to handle power tools anymore.
