Music Trade Review
Issue: 1922 Vol. 74 N. 9 - Page 3
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
REVIEW
THE
JflJJ1C TIRADE
VOL. LXXIV. No. 9
PublUhed Eyery Saturday by Edward Lyman BUI, Inc., at 373 4th Aye., New York.
March 4, 1922
Old Selling Methods Still the Best
T
HERE is piano business being done in this country right now—business that in some sections mounts
up to substantial and satisfactory figures—but this condition exists only in certain sections and only
among dealers who have put into their selling campaigns more energy than some of them believed pos
sible a year ago. Members of the industry who have covered the country thoroughly during the past
few weeks, not alone to sell goods at wholesale, but to study conditions, came back with the report that they
found business where it was least expected and in practically every instance it was because the dealer, or
group of dealers, had gone back to the pre-war methods of selling—methods that call for extensive can-
vassing and intensive following up of prospects.
A dealer, some time ago, came forward with the protest that he was getting somewhat tired of the
advice offered by manufacturers to their travelers and others to go after business with renewed energy and
with assurance that it was to be had. "After I have gone over my prospects with a fine-tooth comb, sur-
veyed the field carefully, advertised generously and followed out every suggestion offered, and the results are
still negligible, what's the answer?" he lamented.
The answer is that other retailers have done those selfsame things and probably have gone into the
work more enthusiastically, for they have secured sufficient results to warrant the effort. A prominent adver-
tising man said recently that the more sales that a retailer or salesman exposed himself to the more sales
he would catch, and experience has served to establish the truth of that suggestion.
In The Review last week there was told the story of a canvasser in the West who, for a brief period
at least, averaged well over one hundred calls per day and managed to turn in the names of about fifteen per
cent of those he called on as prospects for piano and talking machine sales, and of the remaining eighty-five
per cent there were many he found ready to buy banjo strings, violin bows, harmonicas, or odds and ends of
musical goods, and by establishing contact those people were induced to bring their business into the store
represented by the canvasser.
It is safe to say that enough sales were made to the prospects thus secured, even if the average was
only one sale a day, to pay a profit on the canvasser's time and effort, and there still remained the good-will
and the advertising developed through the personal appeal. A sales manager of national reputation declared
recently that when his salesmen began to sell over forty or, at most, fifty per cent of the people called upon
each day those salesmen were brought upon the carpet for a lecture, as the results meant that they were select-
ing only the cream of the prospect list and were neglecting the less likely people on their lists. Such tactics,
declared the sales manager, while building up the current business average, meant that the future sales field
was being diminished and neglected. The salesman's job, he maintained, was not only to sell those who were
ready to buy to-day, but to come in contact with and cultivate those who might buy in the future.
Prospects do not crowd into piano stores these days and, as a matter of fact, the practice of crowd-
ing in went out of style some months ago. They have to be hunted, whether by means of canvassers or by
some other method not so direct, and although the salesman may not find it possible to average one hundred,
or even thirty, calls a day he knows that the more people he sees the more business he is liable to do.
The salesman who won a prize in a recent salesmanship contest declared that he did more business
selling high-priced instruments in 1921 than he did in 1920. He wasn't elated about the fact either, for he
insists on picturing what would have happened in 1920 if he had put the same effort into -his work that he
was forced to put into it the following year.
As the months pass it appears that the answer to the business problem in the piano trade, at least,
does not hinge so much upon the development of new sales methods as upon the energetic use of the old and
established methods that have proven themselves sound and valuable during other dull periods.
REVIEW
THE
JflJJ1C TIRADE
VOL. LXXIV. No. 9
PublUhed Eyery Saturday by Edward Lyman BUI, Inc., at 373 4th Aye., New York.
March 4, 1922
Old Selling Methods Still the Best
T
HERE is piano business being done in this country right now—business that in some sections mounts
up to substantial and satisfactory figures—but this condition exists only in certain sections and only
among dealers who have put into their selling campaigns more energy than some of them believed pos
sible a year ago. Members of the industry who have covered the country thoroughly during the past
few weeks, not alone to sell goods at wholesale, but to study conditions, came back with the report that they
found business where it was least expected and in practically every instance it was because the dealer, or
group of dealers, had gone back to the pre-war methods of selling—methods that call for extensive can-
vassing and intensive following up of prospects.
A dealer, some time ago, came forward with the protest that he was getting somewhat tired of the
advice offered by manufacturers to their travelers and others to go after business with renewed energy and
with assurance that it was to be had. "After I have gone over my prospects with a fine-tooth comb, sur-
veyed the field carefully, advertised generously and followed out every suggestion offered, and the results are
still negligible, what's the answer?" he lamented.
The answer is that other retailers have done those selfsame things and probably have gone into the
work more enthusiastically, for they have secured sufficient results to warrant the effort. A prominent adver-
tising man said recently that the more sales that a retailer or salesman exposed himself to the more sales
he would catch, and experience has served to establish the truth of that suggestion.
In The Review last week there was told the story of a canvasser in the West who, for a brief period
at least, averaged well over one hundred calls per day and managed to turn in the names of about fifteen per
cent of those he called on as prospects for piano and talking machine sales, and of the remaining eighty-five
per cent there were many he found ready to buy banjo strings, violin bows, harmonicas, or odds and ends of
musical goods, and by establishing contact those people were induced to bring their business into the store
represented by the canvasser.
It is safe to say that enough sales were made to the prospects thus secured, even if the average was
only one sale a day, to pay a profit on the canvasser's time and effort, and there still remained the good-will
and the advertising developed through the personal appeal. A sales manager of national reputation declared
recently that when his salesmen began to sell over forty or, at most, fifty per cent of the people called upon
each day those salesmen were brought upon the carpet for a lecture, as the results meant that they were select-
ing only the cream of the prospect list and were neglecting the less likely people on their lists. Such tactics,
declared the sales manager, while building up the current business average, meant that the future sales field
was being diminished and neglected. The salesman's job, he maintained, was not only to sell those who were
ready to buy to-day, but to come in contact with and cultivate those who might buy in the future.
Prospects do not crowd into piano stores these days and, as a matter of fact, the practice of crowd-
ing in went out of style some months ago. They have to be hunted, whether by means of canvassers or by
some other method not so direct, and although the salesman may not find it possible to average one hundred,
or even thirty, calls a day he knows that the more people he sees the more business he is liable to do.
The salesman who won a prize in a recent salesmanship contest declared that he did more business
selling high-priced instruments in 1921 than he did in 1920. He wasn't elated about the fact either, for he
insists on picturing what would have happened in 1920 if he had put the same effort into -his work that he
was forced to put into it the following year.
As the months pass it appears that the answer to the business problem in the piano trade, at least,
does not hinge so much upon the development of new sales methods as upon the energetic use of the old and
established methods that have proven themselves sound and valuable during other dull periods.
Future scanning projects are planned by the International Arcade Museum Library (IAML).