Have you ever visited a Cheesecake Factory?  I LOVE the menu - they offer EVERYTHING.  The downside is that because there are so many items to choose from, it's difficult to decide what to order.  That's better than the options you have with my Blog.  [Please stay with me - the info on how to become a better closer is coming and if you can't wait, just scroll to the last 4 paragraphs.]

Buried in here - somewhere - are more than 1,700 articles.  But can you find any of them?  I can't!   If you scroll the left-side navigation of the Blog, you'll see that I created several categories but most of the series are not up-to-date.  Shame on me.  Despite that, there is a better chance of finding the articles you are most interested in by selecting the appropriate series than by scrolling or using the built-in Google search functionality..

The left-hand navigation menu begins with an opportunity to subscribe to the Blog, order Baseline Selling, followed by the article series, the most popular articles of all-time, 10 most recent articles, awards, and finally, free resources.

My top 5 favorite categories are:

Data and Research 
Comparing Salespeople to Children 
Sales Pipeline 
Music and Selling 
Articles Debunked 

From the most popular articles of all time, my top 5 favorites are

Exposed - Personality Tests Disguised as Sales Assessments
SPIN and Miller Heiman Compared to Baseline Selling
Personality Assessments - The Definitive Case Study
How Your Salespeople Measure Up in 21 Sales Core Competencies
Rebuttal to What Elite Salespeople Do Differently

As with the Cheesecake Factory, the choices are practically limitless but the restaurant has a much better menu.  Salespeople are guilty of the Cheesecake Factory approach too.  We'll call it the CFF for Cheesecake Factory Factor.  Several complications occur when salespeople provide their prospects with too many choices:

• They GIVE prospects a reason to think it over which results in delayed closings
• They FAIL to be an expert.  If they asked the right questions and actually listened to the responses, then there would be only one ideal recommendation and/or solution that is both needs and cost appropriate.
• They ALLOW their competitors to demonstrate their own expertise, recommending a single ideal solution and differentiating.

This will seem cheesy but compare the Cheesecake Factory to a 1960's era McDonalds.  There were only 2 choices back then - a hamburger or a cheeseburger. Of course you could order fries and a shake too.

Here's how it might sound: 

Based on what I know about you, I strongly recommend that you order the cheeseburger from the Cheesecake Factory, which will be a healthier choice than McDonalds.