Zig Ziglar is known for several things- being one of the best salesmen of his generation, being a widely published author as well as being one of the best motivational speakers in the country.
We recently covered Joe Girard, known for having the title of “Best Car Salesman in the World” for 44 years. Where Joe merely practiced the art of being a salesman, Ziglar was shaping the way we see it today!
Early Life
Ziglar was born as Hillary Hinton Ziglar on November 6 1926 in Coffee County in Alabama, to John and Lila Ziglar (née Wescott). Ziglar was the tenth of twelve children.
Although, his birth was premature, Ziglar quickly made a speedy recovery and soon became quite lively. At the age of five, his father took a job as a manager of a large farm in Mississippi, as such, the Ziglars moved to Yazoo City in Mississippi.
Whilst at elementary school, his class had a pet, who Ziglar nicknamed “Zig”. After a while, the nickname stuck- both for the pet and for Ziglar himself. This name would be used by him throughout this personal and professional lives.
Months after moving to Mississippi, John Ziglar, Zig’s father, passed away from a stoke with his older sister passing away only a few days later. This left the Ziglar family incredibly poor, with Ziglar’s mother become the breadwinner of the family… in 1932.
This taught Ziglar to always look for ways to make money, to budget effectively and to always have a positive attitude and outlook on life.
With the onset of WWII, Ziglar, as with many other young men, joined up. For Ziglar, he chose to join the Navy, however, he spent most of it serving in the Navy College Training Program in Columbia, University of South Carolina.
WearEver Cookware
After WWII, whilst still enrolled at the University of South Carolina, Ziglar took a part time job as a salesman for WearEver Aluminium Company and its subsidiary WearEver Cookware.
Here, Ziglar began to refine his skills. Originally, he was a mediocre salesman, but then he began to learn about non-sleazy, yet effective sales tactics.
After doing much research, reading and learning, Ziglar became one of the best salesman WearEver had ever had. Once Ziglar had dropped out from the University of South Carolina, Ziglar decided he would continue working as a salesman.
The result was that Zig Ziglar moved to Lancaster, South Carolina in 1947, with his wife, Jean Ziglar (née Norman), who he’d married in 1946. He worked for WearEver as a salesman for his entire professional career.
Whilst still working for WearEver, Ziglar’s division manager at WearEver Cookware, P. C. Merrell decided to teach him more. P. C. Merrell taught Zig Ziglar that he needed to have a positive attitude and outlook on life.
By 1948, Zig Ziglar had become such a good salesman that he was promoted by the company to serve as a field manager. By 1950, Ziglar was so good at his job as a field manager, that the company promoted him to divisional supervisor.
Motivational Speaking and Books
Whilst working at WearEver, after being taught by P. C. Merrell, Zig Ziglar began to get interested in motivational speaking and self-help. Ziglar began to read self-help books as well as attending motivational speeches.
Within only a few years, Zig Ziglar went from attending motivational speeches and reading self-help books to giving motivational speeches and writing his own self-help books.
By 1963, Ziglar had becoem a chartered member of the Establishment of American Salesmasters. Through being a member, Ziglar spoke all over the South and Midwest with other speakers like:
- Norman Vincent Peale
- Ken McFarland
- Cavett Robert
- Bill Gove
- Maxwell Maltz
- Red Motley
1965 saw the best year for Ziglar, with a lucrative motivational speaking contract with National Association of Sales Education (NASE), founded by close friend, Dick Gardner.
That same year, Ziglar also became the principle sales trainer for Mary Kay Cosmetics. 1968 was also a lucratuve year, when Ziglar became the vice president of the Automotive Performance Co. which saw him move to Dallas.
Legacy
In 1970, Ziglar founded what he originally called the Zigmanship Institute, however, this later went on to become Ziglar, Inc. a leading sales training company. This company is still going strong today, dominating the industry.
For the next 20 years, Zig Ziglar, along with help from his son, Tom, and his daughter, Julie, grew Ziglar, Inc. into being one of the biggest sales training companies in the world, with some of the largest corporations as their clients.
However, what Ziglar is truly remembered for is his books. His first book, See You at the Top, was rejected 39 times by publishers. It was eventually published in 1975 and has become a best seller on multiple occasions.
Ziglar continued to write books on self-help and on salesmanship, until 2010. In 2010, he began enlisting the help of his son, Tom, to help him write his last few books before his death.
Throughout his lifetime, Ziglar wrote and published over 30 books, many of which have become staples of the sales industry. Do you want to know the best part about this all? You can buy Ziglar’s books even to this day!
In 2007, Ziglar fell down a flight of stairs, which led to short term memory problems that plagued him the rest of his life. This didn’t stop him from continuing giving speeches until 2010, when ailing health forced him to retire.
In 2012, following a severe bout of pneumonia, Zig Ziglar died in the suburb of Plano, in Dallas, Texas. His death was mourned by millions of people around the world, by both those who knew him and those who did not.
How can I Replicate Zig Ziglar?
Short answer: You can’t. Zig Ziglar is remembered because he was one of only a few in his generation who could successfully make his clients feel special in a non-sleazy way.
Unfortunately, you can’t replicate what Zig Ziglar did. However, you could take the best parts of both him and Joe Girard, as well as other successful salesmen, and use their knowledge and skill to become successful too!
The best, and easiest way to do that would be to buy the books he wrote over the years, and perhaps some of Joe Girard’s too, and read them vivaciously. Make sure that you learn everything you can from them.
Once you’ve done that, you need to find something to sell, and somewhere to sell it from. If you know a lot about cars, become a car salesman, if you know a lot about kitchens, become a kitchen salesman and so on.
When you have done this, you can begin to sell your product, or more likely the feeling the product will bring. Who knows… one day we might be talking about you and how you’re one of the greatest salesmen in the world!
What Can we Learn From Zig Ziglar?
Zig Ziglar left us with many lesson. Many of them can be used in a business sense, others in terms of personal finance. But they are all great life lessons that you could adapt for almost anything!
Always be Positive
One thing that Zig Ziglar and almost every other successful person have in common is that they have a positive outlook on life. However, you could argue that Ziglar took this to the extreme.
Nevertheless, one of the things that Ziglar preached in particular was to have a positive outlook on just about everything in life. In fact, many of his books and speeches dedicated a large portion to being positive.
Broken your leg? Your crutches get you to the front of the queue at Disneyland. Your company has gone under? Time for you to relax (sort of). Your car has just been scratched? Time for new car color!
By being positive almost all of the time, you are able to see the whole picture- the best parts of a bad situation. Buy doing this, you remove emotion from a tough decision, or you just generally make yourself feel better!
Start Now
Whatever it is, start now. If you want to start your own business, do it now. If you want to become a successful lawyer, go to law school.
Ziglar, as with most other people we have covered in our Surprising Wealth Stories, understands the importance of timing. There truly is no time like the present to get started with.
Most people who want to start their own business spend years “planning” for a business they never set up. How many Bill Gateses or Warren Buffetts have been lost because people don’t just want to start now.
The same can also be said for people wanting their dream job, car or literally anything else! If you want it, you should start today and make the errors along the way- all successful people have made mistakes, so can you.
Have Integrity
As a businessman, salesman or just being a person in general, you should probably have integrity. If you promise someone that you’ll do something, you should make good on that promise.
You should also be honest. If you are a businessman or salesman, you shouldn’t have to rely on shady business and/or sales tactics in order to sell your product, your honest about the product should be the seller.
Plus, no one likes a liar or someone who doesn’t have integrity- when you’re a value or rule one investor, it’s one of the main things that we tend to look at- does the management have integrity?
Set Goals
Once you have started something you want to do, set yourself weekly, monthly, quarterly or annual targets for whatever it is that you do. Generally, the shorter the targets are, the better they are.
However, these targets should be specific. A target such as “Sell more X” isn’t specific enough. However, a target such as “Sell X amount of X by X date” is specific enough.
For Ziglar, his targets were probably something along the lines of “Give X amount of courses between X date and X date” or “Sell X amount of books between X date and X date”.
For me, when I started Finance Friday, it was to gain X amount of new readers per month, with that always increasing every month. One day, I aim for Finance Friday to be one of the biggest sites on the internet!
Patience is Key
One of Zig Ziglar’s most famous quotes go along the lines of :
Success doesn’t come overnight, it comes over time.
Since then, this quote has become a favorite among people espousing entrepreneurship. This lesson can also be adapted to my favorite type of investing- rule one investing.
Other than being positive all the time, Ziglar spent a similarly large amount of his time preaching that patience is the only way to become successful. And whilst it may not always be ideal, it is the only way.
Has the story of Zig Ziglar inspired you? Tell me in the comments!
