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Joseph Sugarman is a trailblazer in the direct marketing industry. His company, JS&A, was the predecessor of The Sharper Image. His best-known product today is BluBlocker sunglasses.

In Triggers, Joe explains 30 sales tools you can use to make your sales presentation, sales letter, or advertisement more influential and pursuasive.

The concept of Triggers is that by understanding human nature, we will know how people respond to certain situations or techniques. Then we can use those techniques or create those situations in our sales material to ensure we have a successful result.

Joe's approach is to alternate a story of a personal experience that illustrates a trigger with an explanation of the trigger. His examples are usually highly entertaining, which makes this book enjoyable to read.

For example, Joe illustrates the trigger, "a sense of urgency," with his story of how, as a small boy, he tried to impress his "dream girl," Robin. He practiced building fires and putting them out. Then he planned to win Robin's heart by "saving" her from a fire he would build. After tying and blindfolding Robin, he built a fire. He removed the blindfold. "Don't worry Robin, I'll save you!" To his horror, he discovered someone removed some green branches he had stored to smother the fire. He was finally successful in removing the ropes, and Robin ran away, never to associate with Joe again. The garage burned down. Joe experienced an enormous sense of urgency in removing Robin's bonds.

The salesperson also needs to create a sense of urgency for the customer. He or she must develop reasons or incentives for the customer to take action today. These reasons and incentive need to be incorporated by design into the sales presentation. "But make sure you use fire as a last resort."

Here is extremely valuable information synthesized from years of sales and marketing experience. If you are seeking tools to ensure your presentation gets the desired response from your customer or audience, you will want to buy and read Triggers.

Buy it on Amazon: Triggers.

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