“Start doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”- Joe Girard

The Greatest Salesperson In The World

Joe Girard is listed as “the worlds greatest salesperson” in the Guinness book of records and guess what he sold?

Cars & Trucks (Vans in UK speak)… he was the original Derek (those that know, know)!

From 1963 - 1978 he sold 13001 vehicles.

His stats were amazing:

- On his best day he sold 18 vehicles
- His best month was 174 units.
- His best year he sold 1425 vehicles.
- He averaged 6 cars sold every day he worked.

He didn’t work in the fleet department either (not that there is anything wrong in that) he sold ordinary cars to ordinary people one by one. No fleet deals.

He was so busy that he sold more cars by himself than 95% of all the dealers in North America…

So, what was the secret to Joe’s success?... He was incredibly hard working and had been from an early age and all of his customers liked him! No mean feats their, as plenty of salespeople at the time and to this day have similar qualities, however never touched him when it came to numbers.

The one stand out thing that he did, was to keep in regular contact with his previous customers! He would send each of his previous customers a personalised card, every month! Any occasion and he would send a card, Christmas, new year, birthdays, valentines! Each card would vary in size and colour and everyone was hand written and a stamp attached. This was a must so as not to be confused as junk mail.

Joe wanted his customers to know that he valued their business and he quickly found out that they also enjoyed receiving his personalised cards.

Joe did this month in, month out, year in and year out as he knew his customers would eventually need or want a new vehicle and when they did, who do you think they would think of? His numbers alone answer that question.

By the time he finished selling vehicles he was sending over 13000 cards every month, thats a lot of miles of ink and just imagine licking the stamps! He was so busy that he had to hire his own assistants and his customers had to book an appointment just to come and buy from him!…Joe knew each day was going to be a busy selling day and never really had to rely on walk in traffic!

In 2001, he was inducted into the Automotive Hall of Fame

Today these tactics can and still do work. Sending personalised cards, perhaps wont get you much of a direct response, but it will definitely make you stand out from the crowd. What really works is the type of consistent (but not persistent) contact that Joe did. There is also really good news and that is in these modern times we have so many more mediums available to us and the great thing is that a lot of these mediums can be automated.


I can almost see Joe’s eyes lighting up at the thought of what he could achieve with modern day follow up.

If you don’t currently regularly follow up with your previous customers, you are seriously missing a massive trick!