Please Don’t Buy My Book

With Sell Well unveiled and ready for reading by you and your colleagues, I’m turning to an update of my 2010 book, Retailer’s Edge, which no longer qualifies as state-of-the-art. Hold off on buying Retailer’s Edge if you haven’t already. Expect to see the second edition available later this year. At this point, Sell Well is your better purchase.
     To those who have already read the current Retailer’s Edge, my abundant thanks, along with a question: How might I improve the book? I await your feedback at RIMtailing@gmail.com.
     I expect to receive conflicting counsel. Since Retailer’s Edge was published, I’ve had comments like those from an antiques dealer in Lakeport, California who thanked me for using a typeface big enough that busy eyes could easily read the profitability tips. But I have also received comments like those from a marketing consultant in Anchorage, Alaska who said the large san serif typeface irritated her.
     When I began writing Retailer’s Edge, people told me to omit full citations of the research on which I base the tactics I’ve validated in stores and professional offices. Footnotes clutter up the text and make it look too academic, they said. Then once the book was published, others, including academics, said the absence of research citations lessened my credibility. Another instance of conflicting counsel.
     I welcome suggestions in the same spirit I encourage you to welcome advice from your shoppers and staff. Even when you don’t take the advice, your responses are an opportunity to think through why you’re doing what you’re doing. I also urge you to acknowledge the assistance you receive from your stakeholders. I’ll be doing the same with whatever I discover from you.
     One suggestion I’ve consistently gotten about Retailer’s Edge is to organize the chapters more clearly around the tasks of setting prices, managing discounts, building the sale, and maintaining loyalty. So that’s how I’ll write the second edition. I also want Retailer’s Edge to be a tight companion to Sell Well, which is organized around the eight major motivators of retail purchasing.
     I do listen and take action on what I hear. That sometimes involves compromise. The body text of Sell Well is in 11 point Garamond serif typeface. And almost all the research citations carry a small superscript number in the body text, with the full reference in a section at the back of the book. No footnotes.

For your profitability: Sell Well: What Really Moves Your Shoppers

Click below for more: 
To Build Loyalty, Ask Advice, Not Expectations 
Keep a Skeptical Eye on Suggested Tactics