Gap Selling: How to Secure a Positive Outcome with Your Customers

Abrooks: Great framework and process of how to manage the sales cycle.

Gap selling simplifies what you need to focus on for each prospect

United States on Sep 05, 2023

Niam: Repeats often the same methodology but still a must read.

Germany on Mar 07, 2023

Abraham Batres: I can't recommend this book enough! It totally shifted my perspective on selling and at the same time gave me solid, actionable advice. Also the author's writing style makes it fun to read.

Mexico on Jun 04, 2022

Edward Wal: I do like the book. In particular the nine truth bombs of selling are a very good starting point. They summarise the reality. I do like the fact that relationships really don't matter and that change is a difficult concept to accept. If you like this book you should look at Solution Selling the STRONGMAN process which adds another dimension. Unlike SPIN or The Challenger sale Gap Selling and STRONGMAN provide genuine guidance and direction. Importantly, there is a focus on the truth and not perception or "hopium" the drug of perception and want to believe which so many sales people and leaders thrive on and then measure with appointments, demonstrations and dare I say it pipeline.

United Kingdom on Nov 10, 2020

Mark Marcelletti: A word of warning to those of you purchasing the audio version... Don't listen to this before bed! Keenan is very energetic, and he'll get you jacked and ready to sell something. Then again, maybe that's a good thing...

As sales continues to evolve and become more focused on technology, salespeople forget the fundamental pillars of effective selling. Gap Selling provides a framework for gaining your prospect's attention, getting them to trust you enough to tell you about their problems and provide you with a vision for their ideal future state.

Here are my biggest takeaways:

1. At the heart of every sale, there’s a gap. It’s a gap between what buyers have now and what they believe they want in the future, between who they are now and who they want to be tomorrow, or even where they are now and where they want to go. This gap represents the value of the sale to the buyer and the salesperson. Without it, there is no sale.

2. Problems get you to the impact and the impact is where urgency, value, and need live and where the sale takes root. You have to know the problem your buyers and prospects are struggling with and the impact it’s having on them....

United States on May 23, 2020

Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 Ltd: Wow. Just Wow. How many sales books have I read in my 30 years of selling? More than I can count. How many would I recommend to the delegates of my training courses at SerialTrainer7.com? Not many. Most are recycled BS written by people who either cannot sell or have never sold. This book however is something else. It is not just different it is relevant and I cannot recommend it enough.
The book focusses on the gap between where a client currently sits and where they want to be. Keenan calls these two places the current and future states, a sales persons value to that client sits in the gap between these two states, hence gap selling. The book is divided up into four key sections with sub sections laid out. There are some exceptional analogies used to help bring points to life and makes the content even more relevant. Each section will challenge you, and in some cases may even cause you to question what you have been taught and what you have found to work. It turns common sales thinking on its head and givers it a damn good shake. An brilliant example is in chapter 5. Relationships Don't Matter (Kinda). This section really resonated with me and just made perfect sense. The...

United Kingdom on Jun 15, 2019

Mike Weinberg | Consultant, Speaker, Author: I wanted to read Gap Selling when it first came out but just couldn't get to it. Week after week I'd watch it impressively maintain its bestseller ranking (way after the launch period) and read newly posted glowing review after glowing review. So with high expectations, I cracked open the Kindle version (do you "crack" open a Kindle?) last week and Could. Not. Stop. Reading.

I having nothing but high praise for Keenan and this powerful, provocative and supremely helpful book! From his motivation as a professional seller (to successfully solve customers' problems) to his bold statement that your sale is won or lost during the discovery phase of the process, to his EPIC rant in Chapter 11 about why most demos suck (he actually uses the word "butcher" to describe what most salespeople do during their awful demos), I found myself shouting "Amen!" in vehement agreement with just about everything suggested in Gap Selling.

Get this book and read it. It will challenge you. It will make you think. It will help you truly see your role in closing the "gap" and taking your customer from their current state to the desired future state -- and provide you with all kinds or...

United States on May 15, 2019

Dan's business books: The best book on selling that I’ve read in ten years. And I read all of them. Get ready for the ride of your life, this book debunks all of the so call “axioms” about selling that you have heard over the course of your career. In this book the author “Keenan” (don’t ask I didn’t) Handles all of that sticky stuff that slows down, nay, just about kills your sales effort.
Here are some of the more cogent examples from the book:
• The customer does not care about you. The customer does not care about your company, or how long it has been in business, or how it started. The customer only cares about one thing, and that is, what can you do for her?
• The sales person is dead: You are a consultant, an advisor, an expert, someone who is a peer, someone, the customer comes to rely on for valuable solutions.
• Customers don’t buy from friends: Or drinking buddies, or golf partners. Customers, buy from someone who can bring them value…yes, even if they don’t actually like that person.
• Customers do like change. Heck, they will embrace change, if you can prove to them that it will make their product, and their company better.
• Show them the...

United States on Feb 13, 2019

@Timothy_Hughes: When it comes to a person’s second book I’m always interested which way will somebody go? Will they take a “bucket to the well” from where they got their first book and do a first book part 2? As many people pressurised me to do and something Keenan could have done. No, he has decided to come up with his own sales methodology. Now sales methodologies have been around for years, looking at Google there are at least 10 in circulation today. So why did Keenan go down a path already well trodden with the danger he will create, yet another “me to” process?

In “Gap Selling” Keenan brings the sales methodology up to the modern day, using modern tool and techniques. Putting it another way, it’s a 21st century methodology and not a 20th century methodology. The book is fast paced and if you follow any of his videos or blogs on social media, it’s written in his “take no prisoners” approach.

It’s a modern day approach, for a modern day buyer.

One world of warning, if you are a lazy salesperson, this book isn’t for you. Keenan is proud of us sales people and he expects us to perform at the highest levels of professionalism, in the office, in...

United Kingdom on Jan 15, 2019