John H. Patterson created a sophisticated management system to monitor and train his sales force. He provided them with scripts to memorize and territories to work. He held conventions and sales contests, and he pressured salesmen to eliminate competitors from their districts. Patterson sought to create a method of sales management that encompassed all aspects of selling, from calculating quotas and commission rates to motivating discouraged salesmen. This excerpt examines one facet of the Patterson method: the N.C.R. Primer.
J.H. Patterson employed groundbreaking sales tactics for his time.
To ensure that salesmen conveyed all the benefits of the cash register, Patterson provided them with scripts to memorize. Writing out sales arguments was rare but not as novel as some of Patterson’s biographers have claimed. Booksellers and other canvassers had used scripts before the first N.C.R. Primer in 1887. As early as 1859, Henry B. Hyde of the Equitable Life Assurance Society published “Hints to Agents,” which contained persuasive arguments for company representatives to rehearse. Canvassers for the American Bible Society carried small books with helpful scripts. In 1879, Bates Harrington published “How ‘Tis Done,” which reprinted—and thereby, according to the author, “exposed”—the techniques of book agents, map peddlers, and street vendors. Although it is unclear whether Patterson was familiar with any of these scripts, it is likely that his agents, many of whom had worked as salesmen in other fields, were aware of them.
The first N.C.R. sales script was the creation of Patterson’s brother-in-law, Joseph H. Crane. “How I Sell National Cash Registers,” known as the Primer, contained instructions not only on what salesmen should say but also on what they should do while talking. In the Primer, asterisks indicated that the salesman should point to the item he was referring to:
I presume the ordinary every-day transactions with your customers can be arranged into five classes, like this:
- You sell goods for cash.
- You sell goods on credit.
- You receive cash on account.
- You pay out cash.
- You make change.
Am I right?
Now, sir, this Cash Register* makes entries.
The indication* of the transaction shows through this glass.*
The amount* of the transaction last recorded always shows, and the records are made by pressing the keys.
The Primer divided a sales transaction into four steps: the approach, the proposition, the demonstration, and the close. In the approach, the salesman made no mention of the cash register. Instead, he explained that he wanted to help the businessman find ways to increase profits—that in fact he wanted to act as a consultant. In the proposition, the salesman first described the cash register and explained how it would prevent employee theft and provide accurate reports of daily receipts. The goal of this stage was to schedule a demonstration of the machine at a nearby hotel, where the salesman had set up a display or, if convenient, at the local N.C.R. branch office. During the demonstration, the salesman carefully led the customer to the point of purchase. When the moment seemed right, he attempted to close the sale. This was the most difficult part of the sale. The Primer provided a number of techniques, including the following:
After you have clearly presented your proposition and feel confident that the merchant realizes the value of the Cash Register, don’t ask for his order, take it for granted that he is going to buy. Tell him “Mr. Blank, what color shall I have it made?” or “When do you want it delivered?” … Get your order blank, fill it out, and hand him the pen, saying, “Just sign your name right there where I have made a cross.”
If he objects, find out why, answer his objections, and again prepare him to sign…. Let the merchant feel that he is buying because of his own good judgment… find the real reason why, and the chances are that that is the very reason why he should buy…. Center all your power on one good strong point, appeal to his judgment, get him to admit that what you say is true, then hand him the pen in a matter-of-fact way and go right on with what you are saying. This makes the signing the natural and logical thing to do.
The Primer instructed salesmen to apply pressure aggressively but subtly. It was important to prevent the prospective customer from feeling manipulated. “Avoid creating the impression with the merchant that you are trying to force him to buy…. Nobody likes to feel that he is being sold.” At the same time, it was crucial for the salesman to project confidence and sincerity. Most important among the rules of salesmanship at N.C.R. was the ability to exhibit “sympathy [for] … the P.P.’s [or “Prospective Purchaser’s”] business and interests and sincerity in presenting [the] machines to the P.P.” These were skills to be cultivated. After an agent named John T. Watson gave a demonstration at the 1895 sales convention, one audience member praised Watson’s “earnestness” and another remarked, “The best thing I noticed in the demonstration was Mr. Watson’s manner showed that he thought he was telling the truth.”
Of course, even careful use of the Primer could not guarantee a smooth sale. The sales process remained a cat-and-mouse game. When A. T. Webb, an agent from Portland, Oregon, set out to sell a machine, he began, as the Primer advised, by studying the prospective customer and gaining his “confidence.” When confronted with an objection, he acknowledged the legitimacy of the complaint and then attempted a rebuttal.
My method of getting orders, I presume, is not very different from other managers. If the party is what is termed a stranger, the first thing is to study and know my man, his residence, his business, etc., and gain his confidence; after that, I am all right and will sell him the register best suited to his needs and business; or, if he has made up his mind that he wants one like his neighbor’s, I will sell him that one, all right, if in my judgment it is not exactly the one best suited to his business. After I have his order written, then, if I deem it advisable, I will take the matter up with him of the different kinds of registers, and see to it that he gets one best adapted to his work.
NCR Cash Register
The high price, of course, was one hurdle to overcome. On this point, I usually remark, “to you, to be sure, the price seems high, and I don’t blame you a bit for thinking so, because you lack the experience and knowledge of what our registers will do.” …Frequently, during the conversation, I will tell the P.P. that I do not want to sell him a register, and will not, if I think he will not use, or care to use, the register according to our instructions. The reason for this, I tell him, that one register misplaced might spoil the sale of a dozen.
Over the years, the Primer was revised frequently. Not long after it was introduced, it was supplemented by a Book of Arguments containing a catalogue of answers to frequently asked questions. In January 1894, N.C.R. produced a more formal Salesman’s Handbook that incorporated both. The Handbook reached its maximum size in the 1904 edition, with nearly two hundred pages. Thereafter, it was condensed for easier handling by salesmen. The 1910 edition was a slim volume of fifty-six pages. Changes to the Primer were treated like changes to the cash register—both were part of the ongoing effort to improve and to keep up with the changing demands of customers. E. St. Elmo Lewis, an N.C.R. employee who later became advertising manager at Burroughs, called the Primer “one of the fruits of the scientific attitude toward the problem of attaining highest efficiency in selling goods.”
