The need to understand what top-performing reps are doing that their average performing colleagues are not drove Matthew Dixon, Brent Adamson, and their colleagues at Corporate Executive Board to investigate the skills, behaviors, knowledge, and attitudes that matter most for high performance. And what they discovered may be the biggest shock to conventional sales wisdom in decades.

In sales, the worst thing you can hear from a customer isn’t “no.” It’s “I need to think about it.” When this happens, deeply entrenched business advice says to double down on your efforts to sell a buyer on all the ways they might win by choosing you and your business. But this approach backfires dramatically. Why? Because it completely gets wrong the primary driver behind purchasing decision-making: once purchase intent is established, customers no longer care about succeeding. What they really care about is not failing.

People don't buy from people they like. No! Your buyer doesn't care about you or your product or service. It's not your job to overcome objections, it's your buyer's. Closing isn't a skill of good salespeople; it's the skill of weak salespeople. Price isn't the main reason salespeople lose the sale. Gap Selling shreds traditional and closely held sales beliefs that have been hurting salespeople for decades. For years, salespeople have embraced a myriad of sales tactics and belief systems that have unknowingly created many of the issues they have been trying to avoid.

Fanatical Prospecting gives salespeople, sales leaders, entrepreneurs, and executives a practical, eye-opening guide that clearly explains the why and how behind the most important activity in sales and business development—prospecting. Step by step, Jeb Blount outlines his innovative approach to prospecting that works for real people, in the real world, with real prospects.

The sales profession is in the midst of a perfect storm. Buyers have more power - more information, more at stake, and more control over the sales process - than any time in history. Technology is bringing disruptive change at an ever-increasing pace, creating fear and uncertainty that leaves buyers clinging to the status quo.