Dinosaur Droppings, Advice from an Old-School Salesman

By Ira Levofsky

Making a living has never been tougher.

Everywhere you look; it’s another protest or a two block long line of unemployed people standing around waiting for money from your taxes, the state unemployment fund

Life sucks, times are tough and as a sales person, you stand in wonder just how the hell you are supposed to make a living with everyone around you so broke?

Trying to decide which line to stand in?

Before you throw in the towel and join the lost masses, take a closer look at what’s really going on around you.

All those protesters are talking on the latest smart phones carrying debit cards and wearing hundred dollar sneakers.

The unemployment line is full of happy smiling faces stuffed with chocolate chunk scones and washed down with venti café lattes and water imported from a subterranean well in Yugoslavia.

The truth is there is plenty of money out there to be earned by you and spent on your products but you need to peel back the layers of life, media and general day to day bullshit to find the path of your success.

The only question is how do you get their money into your pocket?

You need to find the way to grab those bucks before they become another bottle of imported water. Each sale you try and fail is more than a lost opportunity, its lost money, your money.

Within the pages of Dinosaur Droppings are answers, experiences, suggestions, methods, and lessons from past mistakes, more mistakes and years of mistakes.

The Dinosaur will help you open your eyes and claim your prize by helping you in anticipating objections, problems and roadblocks in real time.

Reading the book and allowing the lessons to guide you will result in reducing the number of lost sales and putting the prospects money in your pocket, where it belongs.

Those who tell you all is lost, life is hopeless and there is no hope will soon fund your new ride and upgrade your seats at the game.

As they stand in wonder of how you manage to do so well when all they could afford was your products that they just purchased, you have won the game.

Keep on winning and grow your sales, buy the book Dinosaur Droppings

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ira Levofsky
• Release date: Dec 7, 2011
• ISBN: 9781466151314

Ira Levofsky

Who is Ira D. Levofsky? He is one that believes that even though his message often third person, delivered with a heavy measure of whit, often politically incorrect and occasionally carrying a sense of artistic vulgarity carries an important message. The message that there are leaders in all walks of life who are not out enduring the heat of day, dodging the torrents of rain nor shivering from the cold while the sun sets on their assigned task. They cannot and often have never had the experience, the adrenaline driven thirst for success with each and every labor that envelopes your being, yet they lead. Though the modern day term may be Arm Chair Quarterback, the definition holds true throughout time and testament. By right of birth, serendipitous luck or earning the grade then forgetting the roots of the journey which brought them there, many sit upon their high perch directing those who will toil in their names. Their purpose, stature and often their very existence is based on your effort, your courage and your individual success at everything you do. This, my new friend, is a fact of life. The formidable challenge which I put before you in my written works as I have placed before myself daily in life is to succeed and lead in life itself, by example, deed and word. Sleep well in the fact that you have done the right thing, set the right example and completed the task at hand to the best of your ability satisfying your own expectations every day. If others shine due to your success or avoid one of life’s many pitfalls due to the lessons learned from your experience, then you are truly blessed. This is how I live and the true description of one Ira D. Levofsky which I put in place as my profile for purposes of this quick introduction. “It is easier to whisper advice from behind cover than to test its merit at the point of attack” (Unknown)

Book preview

Dinosaur Droppings

Advice from an old-school salesman

By

Ira D. Levofsky

Dinosaur Droppings

3rd Edition

Copyright 2011 - 2015

Published at Smashwords.com

Ira D. Levofsky All Rights Reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyright hereon may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, Web distribution or information storage retrieval systems without the written permission of Ira D. Levofsky.

For permission to use material from this product, submit your request to [e-mail]

All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

Proudly printed in the United States of America

Preface

The names, characters, actors, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental.

This is a work of parody, as defined by the Fair Use Doctrine. Any similarities, without satirical intent, to copyrighted characters, or individuals living or dead, are purely coincidental.

Thank you, to the many over the years by whose insistence this book has become reality.

Special thanks to my wife Alison and to my friends Kenny and Skip who tolerated the endless barrage of jokes and stories during the long creative process.

Also to Mike Swedenberg, who not only kept me grounded in the English language but also designed my book cover and insisted that it be shot from an original oil painting which he painstakingly created. What a Dinosaur.

About the Author

Ira Levofsky, Author and Executive Publisher of LevofskyPress blah blah blah blah blah yadda yadda yadda.

Ira was born in a log cabin on Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. His parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families--second families, perhaps I should say. His father was of a family of the name of Roosevelt, great Grandfather of Theodore (the Good Roosevelt.) His mother was removed from Kentucky to Indiana in her eighth year where she invented Doppler Radar.

Ira has an impressive list of accomplishments including Night Watchman on the Titanic, Fire Marshall on the Hindenburg, developer of the Netflix price increase based on the time honored business principle of What could possibly go wrong?, the silent Yak whistle and guacamole flavored chewing gum.

Kentucky was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There he grew up. Of course, when he came of age he did not know much.

Still somehow, he could read, write and cipher quantum physics, but that was all. Ira walked 15 miles to school each day through 6 feet of snow - up hill both ways while barefoot because he gave a poor kid his shoes. He stopped occasionally, on the way, to help a neighbor chop down a 100 ft sequoia tree or butcher a wild buffalo he had caught along the way to help feed needy mountain folks. Ira wrote his college thesis on the back of a shovel with a lump of coal and graduated from Harvard at the age of twelve with a record breaking 5.0 GPA and classmate of a Kenyan native, B.H. Obama who later found fame as a community organizer with the encouragement of Ira.

Ira went on to help the Wright Brothers develop a flying machine. Ira made a March 1903 entry in his notebook indicating his prototype propeller was 66% efficient. Modern wind tunnel tests on reproduction Ira 1903 propellers show they were more than 75% efficient under the conditions of the first flights, and actually had a peak efficiency of 82%. This is a remarkable achievement, considering that modern wooden propellers have a maximum efficiency of 55%.

Unbeknownst to Orville and Wilbur, Ira took the plane out the night before Orville's world-renowned first flight for a test drive. Not only was it the first flight, it was the first night flight using an improvised radar system he borrowed from his mother. The short hop was from Kitty Hawk North Carolina to Raleigh Durham in 45 minutes. Unfortunately, Orville was an extremely jealous man and hid the truth from the press. The next morning Orville tried to duplicate the Kitty Hawk - Raleigh flight but all he could muster was a paltry 120 feet. Apparently, Ira had neglected to refill the fuel tank and that’s as far as Orville could fly before the engine sputtered out.

Other accomplishments were, tail gunner on a Flying Fortress, Indy car racer best known as Wrong Way Ira, Orthopedic toe surgeon specializing in the one who went wee wee wee all the way home, cast the deciding vote in the 1948 Miss America Pageant earning him the everlasting gratitude of Bess Myerson (wink – wink) Ira later had to get a court order of protection when Ms. Myerson camped out on Ira’s front lawn and refused to leave.

Additionally, Ira suggested that Charles Schultz name his comic strip Peanuts instead of Cashews, and he was the creator of the Bahamas business model that requires next of kin to repay outstanding salary draw of deceased sales reps.

Ira is currently living in the back seat of a baby-blue 1971 Chrysler Newport with rich Corinthian leather that had been abandoned in a supermarket parking lot, located in a very affluent area of Miami Florida.

- Editor in Chief Mike Swedenberg

Introduction

Over the years sales reps who have worked for me and customers alike, have encouraged me to write down what I do and how it’s done. Thus, others could benefit from my experiences in selling and teaching; but I procrastinated.

Not long ago, the doctor held a stethoscope to my chest and I asked him,

Doc, how do I stand?

The doctor said, That’s what puzzles me.

This was my signal to write this book; a refresher course in the old ways of the professional salesman, the Dinosaur.

Mistake number one: Practice makes perfect. Well, I got your perfect right here, pal. Practice does not make perfect. Practice makes permanent.

Permanent mistakes are harder than hell to get rid of once they’re a practiced part of your every day methods and behavior. If you start knowing only one way to do something, loaded with misinformation or bad habits then you are practicing to suck, perfectly.

As they say in the computer world, shit it and shit out.

The object of sales and of this book is not to use canned one size fits all solutions to your every selling situation or presentation.

Here we are searching for the originality inside you, which in turn will make you the winner you already know that you are.

I have been playing golf most of my life and admittedly, I suck at it.

As badly as I need help, recently during a golf ball buying trip I was given a free lesson by a pro who insisted on changing my grip.

Even though he was a pro and I suck at golf, it was harder than hell for me to get out-of-the-way of my ego and take his advice. I did however take the free lesson and now I suck at golf with a new grip.

Perhaps down the road when I stop asking myself who does he think he is telling me how to up my game, I will actually focus on my game and improve it. The grip might actually work; but only if I give it a chance.

Give this book a chance. What’s in it just might work for you as it did for many of my sales reps and me.

Most salesmen learn through a canned presentation aimed at teaching you the great salesperson and of course, the other ones who suck at selling to all sell in the same way with the same results.

Let’s agree right here early in our relationship that canned prefabricated presentations, which put their words in your mouth, are worthless pieces of shit usually written by a committee who collectively couldn’t sell a bottle of water to a man whose balls are on fire.

Canned presentations are like canned soup; any moron can open it and make dinner. Give me the guy that you hand a chicken and come back an hour later to eat. That’s the guy I put my money on every time.

Now stop choking your chicken and let’s get focused.

With practice on getting your skills sharpened, mind expanded and bank account full this book will be the best twenty five bucks you have ever spent (ten bucks for the electronic book) and that is perfect.

If you learn only one thing from this book, it’s Don’t be the richest guy in the cemetery.

This is the hardest lesson I ever learned when I stressed myself into heart attacks at 47 years old.

You woke up this morning and many people didn’t, so for that you are already the big winner. Working smart and living to enjoy the fruits of your labor is the ultimate goal.

There is plenty of hard work ahead but once you have mastered your craft and left the rest of the salesmen in the dust, you will see sales are easier as it’s never crowded along that extra mile.

We are commission sales people, which by definition mean we get paid on results. There are ways to control these results without letting the job control us.

Sales is a war where we are judged on our results every day. Knowledge is our greatest weapon to carry into battle.

Change happens, whether or not you want it, need it or expect it; one day everything is different.

Millions of years ago, whales had feet. They spent some of their time swimming and sometimes foraging for food on land. Big and slow were these whales and fell easy prey to predators, all types of hungry land creatures considered them the dollar menu.

One day the head whale made the decision to relocate his entire whale colony into the ocean and leave the land behind forever. One young whale said, I’m afraid. Besides what will become of my feet?

The leader said, We need these feet like a hole in the head. and the term blow-hole was born.

Change happens and nothing in life is without consequence.

In life as in sales, you get nothing of value free.

If you want to kiss me you have to buy me a drink first. No free samples, trials, or tastes without commitment and absolutely no short cuts.

If only sales was as easy as dating, Excuse me, does this damp cloth smell like chloroform to you?

Our art, closing the sale, is one practiced wide-awake and face-to-face.

We must master the skill of getting in their face and then utilizing this time to our advantage.

Just because someone has been doing something for a very long time and is considered an expert doesn’t mean he didn’t make mistakes along the way.

I am the sales expert and the following pages contain some of my many, many mistakes. Learn from them and try not to repeat them and this book will repay you one thousand fold.

Just what the hell makes me the expert?

Time and survival, just like the cave drawings have been there forever. They mean something, but what?

It takes that special person to interpret those scratches on the walls. In the same fashion, I am here to unravel for you some of the age-old mysteries of selling.

Convincing people to change their ways isn’t easy.

I started out knocking on doors at 9 years old, in high-rise NY City buildings peddling anything I could get my hands on from orange flavored bathroom spray to costume jewelry, both of which I consigned from a local shop owner.

I have sold, managed, trained, directed and most of all fucked up enough times to know better and am willing able and ready to pass my mistakes and observations on to you.

I have been selling nearly 52 years now, since I was 9 years old.

That’s a lot of presentations, closes and disappointments, but also, tons of ideas, which may help you, make a sale and uncountable mistakes you don’t have to make if you live and laugh through mine.

Selling, like life, is a roller coaster and I invite you along on my ride.

Valuable lessons in selling come fast and are deeply hidden in everyday conversations and happenings.

Recently, I was visiting a very old eastern seaport on a rainy Saturday afternoon.

I found myself taking in the local flavor on a corner seat of the dockside pub.

This pub was a hundred years old if it was a day and there was character and history from the floor to the ceiling including a salty buxom barmaid to draw the local ale.

Just like in a novel, out of the rain and fog a classic nautical figure came walking through the door.

It was an old-timer, a real salt of a sailor with a gray beard, chewing on his pipe as he walked and each step accented with a limp and a thud.

In his soaking wet blue Pea coat and dirty torn white captain’s hat he shuffled his way through the crowd and to my great fortune, he pulled up the stool next to mine.

He had a wooden peg leg, a metal hook where his right hand used to be and a patch over his right eye.

In my mind, everything I had ever heard, read or imagined about life at sea was sitting there, right next to me.

It was a given that he had years of experience and no doubt unlimited tales to tell based on his obvious rugged existence and damaged physical condition.

Here I was looking directly in the eye of an expert, for sure.

What a great diversion talking with him would be, changing my otherwise humdrum, dreary and rainy day.

Calling over the barmaid with the big tits, I offered to buy him a drink and a conversation soon began. Captain how did you lose the leg

Arrr, he said. I was working a freighter at the tip of the mighty Cape Horn don’t ya know. The sea she was churning and getting ready to deal a real blow.

"We were inspecting the lashings of the cargo on deck, the ship she took a mean list to port and the crate I was standing on washed overboard.

Me leg was hung up in the lines and tore clean off at the knee. Food fer the fishes, har har harrr.

Arrr, but the ships wood smith was a mate of mine and made me this fine peg leg. Have had it for near 30 years now by gum. "

Wow, that’s amazing, how did you lose the hand? I asked.

"Arrr, we was out in the Baltic Sea. Dead of winter it was. Black as the devil and colder than the witch’s tit it was that night.

The plan was to use a harpoon to shoot into the ice and then me mates would haul the line and pull us through the frozen pass back to open sea.

I was on the fore deck lining up my shot with the harpoon, the lock slipped and without warnin' the dam thing fired with the line still in my other hand.

The hand got torn clean off, harpoon shot out three hundred yards with my digits tangled up in the line.

Arrr, never found the hand but the ships tinsmith was a fine feller and made me this hook, have it going’ on 15 years."

Whew tough break, how about the eye? I asked.

"Arrr, It was a balmy night don’t you know we was off the coast of New Brunswick makin' fer the Baltic’s and I hauled myself up into the crow’s nest with the sextant to check our bearings.

I looked up at the sky and a sea gull flew over me head and shit right in me eye, and I lost it."

I stopped him, "OK wait a minute.

I don’t know much about the sea but one thing I do know that you don’t lose your eye because a sea gull shits in it."

Arrr, he says, you do if it’s the first day with the hook!

Moral of the story - something new can be learned even by the most experienced professional. Arrr.

My mother (Thanks Ruthie, I love you) was the first to set me on the path to sales. I was 9 years old.

It was the day that I came home from school, PS 172 in Queens, New York, all excited because I was chosen for a part in the school play.

I told her I had the part of a husband, she insisted that I go back and ask for a speaking part.

It was there, at that young age, on that stage, I discovered that my mouth was my power.

It was many, many years later before I learned that the brain needed to be attached to the mouth.

(I still forget this fact on occasion)

Arguably, the most valuable selling lesson I ever learned came much later in life while on vacation in Miami Beach, Florida.

Here I learned that salespeople only tell you what you need to know, just so they get the sale and will leave out almost anything else in fear of losing the deal they just closed.

Also, once sold, they don’t summarize they just take the money and run. This lesson was a tough one and a burden I will carry with me forever and here’s how it happened.

On a dare, I entered the Men’s bikini bathing suit competition at my hotel on Miami Beach.

Shopping for a bathing suit in the shop, which was just off the beach, the salesman seemed to be an expert and they had hundreds of bathing suits from which to choose.

I knew this was just the perfect place to buy the bathing suit for the competition.

The salesman had all the hallmarks of