Dan Seidman agreed to come out of seclusion for this rare interview by Tad Ballantyne.


TB: SalesAutopsy.com What a great name! This appears to be a quite expensive site to design and run. How did you acquire all your wealth?

Dan: It was really quite simple. I’d buy an apple for 5c and sell it for 10c. Taking that money, I’d buy 2 more apples, sell each for 10c and so on. I did this everyday for 6 months. Then my wife’s father died and left us a chain of hotels.

TB: Oh, well, uh, good for you. Dan, you must have done something noteworthy in your business career that had nothing to do with an inheritance. Just in case someone cares, would you share it with us?

Dan: Don’t you think another warm-up question would help you gain rapport a bit faster?

TB: Okay, who was the model for your cool dead guy chalk outline logo?

Dan: I was, I have always wanted to model. Jealousy has eaten away at me for decades after my little brother’s experience doing runway work for Montgomery Wards. It’s my company, so like the Wendy’s hamburger and Gillette razor Presidents, I appointed myself the ‘spokesperson’ for our advertising campaigns. The only un-nerving part for me was undressing for the shots. The photographer insisted that the lines of the dead guy be depicted as cleanly as possible. So I had to duct tape… well, uh, never mind.

TB: Fascinating expose’. What did you do before creating the Sales Autopsy web site?

Dan: Actually, I’ve been involved in high-impact sales and marketing for privately-run companies since 1980. I was what you’d call an early adopter of the Internet. In 1992, I helped initial sales efforts for the first online job site – Online Career Center – a company run by the great visionary Bill Warren. His company merged with Monster.com in 2001 and I now collect and write about sales horror stories for Monster’s sales community – 250,000 readers strong.

TB: So aside from writing, anything significant accomplished since 1992?

Dan: Do I detect an undercurrent of sarcasm? Because there are many entrepreneurs and sales executives who would be happy to have me on a leash, permanently chomping at their customers. I’m a consultant, however, as I prefer more temporary relationships.

TB: Is that why you didn’t get married until you were 42 years old?

Dan: For example, I constructed a telemarketing lead generation system for a large distributor of machine products. After hiring and training the team (and putting a system and database in place), we nailed down 532 qualified leads the first month.

TB: That’s a lot of leads to close. Did they make money for the company?

Dan: Remember, those were the qualified leads, at least another 500 were discarded because they weren’t worth the sales team’s time. A good manager pays very close attention to the scripting of his phone team. Over the long haul, this saves huge amounts of time and energy on everyone’s part. Anyway, in the first six months, over one million dollars in increased sales was attributed to the lead system. That’s a pretty strong argument for scripting your sales pros who use the phone.

TB: So, if sales and marketing people can do this well by implementing a lead generation system, why don’t we hear more success stories like this?

Dan: That’s a great question. Did you say your name was Todd?

TB: Tad Ballantyne

Dan: Right. I believe that there are two simple reasons why most companies don’t sell up to their potential. First, on the company side - people do their sales and marketing backwards. Second, on the prospects’ side – the buyers are better at buying than the sellers are at selling.

TB: Would you elaborate on your first observation? What do you mean by ‘doing sales and marketing backwards’?

Dan: Okay. Salespeople at some point in time do something that works. They say the right thing and land a sale. Doesn’t it make sense that if someone consistently says and does something that works, we should copy or model that? Furthermore, whatever they did and said should be reflected in the marketing literature. But that’s not the way we work, is it? Unfortunately, we generate all this beautiful, glossy, expensive paper to mail out and hand out. And all of it was designed by a marketing department, in an office, in a galaxy far, far away from that potential client. So what’s really wrong with that literature? This is something I learned years ago from marketing genius Dr. Jeffrey Lant. Most literature is very self-centered. “We can do this. We’ve been around for 90 years Here’s a picture of our factory in China.” WHO CARES? What you should do is, in your literature, talk to your potential client about his or her problems – and how you solve them. This is the foundation for the Teaching Consequences to Your Prospects strategy I reveal in my keynote speeches and training sessions. So don’t focus on yourself. First figure out how to sell well, take the most powerful language you’ve got, then use it to design your literature.

TB: Good perspective and it seems so logical as well. How about your second concern? You made a rather bold comment - that buyers are better at buying than sellers are at selling.

Dan: It means that the buyers have heard it all, they know all of our closes better than we do! Can I relate a story to emphasize my point?

TB: Go ahead. We still have plenty of tape.

Dan: I had just finished test driving a beautiful new Lexus and now sat across from a very anxious salesperson (and thank God that I was the buyer for a change):

Salesperson: It's a great car isn't it?
Me: Yes.

Salesperson: You like that gold color?
Me: Yes.

Salesperson: We call it ‘pebble beige.’
Me: Oh.

Salesperson: That is our most popular color and model. In fact, that’s only one of the reasons you'll want to place a deposit on that car today. Because it will not be here tomorrow.
Me (slowly): That's the "impending event" close.

Salesperson: What’s that you said?
Me: You know. The impending event close - if I don’t decide to buy from you right now, a change in events will prevent me from buying later.

Salesperson: Uh, yeah, impending event...say what do you do for a living?
Me: What do you think I do?

Salesperson: You’re not going to buy a car from me today, are you?
Me: (head slowly shakes side to side)

Dan: Back to the present. If you want to undress a salesperson, just name his or her closes. There is nothing more frustrating than to tell someone that his negotiating tactic are so obvious that you have the name for it. How does this happen? The buyer has heard them all for so long and so often that he or she knows right where the salesperson is headed. Of course we don’t all know the names of the closes, but we certainly see them coming – seen ‘em, heard ‘em, experienced ‘em before. By the way, I bought my car somewhere else.

TB: That’s a great story, funny.

Dan: It’s amusing, but it should also be VERY PAINFUL for sales professionals and especially for sales executives and entrepreneurs.

TB: So if we can’t use closing techniques that have been in use for so long, what’s left?

Dan: Again, I speak and train on a strategy I developed called Teaching Consequences to Prospects. This concept gives loads of new language, ammunition actually, to salespeople. And their prospects haven’t experienced this approach.

TB: So then the rep is perceived as unique in the eyes of the potential customer.

Dan: Unique, wise, insightful, professional – all the things a buyer wants from someone they’re going to pay to be in a relationship with.

TB: Good thinking. I hope this next question isn’t too personal. It’s been quite some time since I was tossed from an interview.

Dan: I have nothing to hide.

TB: Here goes. How do you feel about comments in the press and on the web about your ghoulish collection of SalesAutopsy.com sales disasters? People say that you prey on the failures of others. You publicize embarrassing incidents and even profit by them. Are you really, as one writer said, the Jerry Springer of the sales world?

Dan: Hey, I like to compare myself to a great reporter, the elite of your colleagues. I am a WAR CORRESPONDENT. That’s what this is all about – selling time in the trenches. This site of sales horror stories is intended to both entertain and serve sales managers as a warning to avoid similar mistakes by their selling staff. I collect these stories when I speak and through the SalesAutopsy.com website. I now have almost 500 stories.

TB: Wow, 500? And “war correspondent” - good analogy. Well this time has been quite interesting. Just one last question. Are you so obsessed with your work that your personal life is virtually non-existent?

Dan: My personal life can best be described as blessed. I get to play basketball in places like Spain and Australia. I compete in World Master’s Sports, representing the U.S. on a basketball team. Master’s competition is comprised of Olympic sports for athletes over 35 years of age. We beat Australia for the basketball Gold Medal in 1994, then defended it by beating Canada in 1998. Along the way we made a wreck of older athletes from such countries as Russia, Brazil, Lithuania and others. I guess you’d say we were their horror stories. Aside from basketball, I have the most precious wife in the world, a near-perfect son and twin girls.

TB: Well you have an amusing site and it’s just brilliant how you use it to teach people that there are other options to traditional sales approaches. I’ve enjoyed meeting you. Do you, by any chance, have a question for me?

Dan: Sure, do you think that since Communism has broken down we should allow the import of Cuban cigars?

TB: Yeah, makes sense to me. Thanks for your time and thanks for keeping your bodyguard away from me.

Dan: You’re welcome, Tad. Let me know if this ever makes it into print.


Dan has been named one of the top 12 sales coaches in America (Ultimate Selling Power). His hilarious keynote speeches and workshops will lighten your selling life while increasing the weight of your wallet. You will reach him at 847-359-7860 or by email at
dan @ salesautopsy.com This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it .