Web Resources:

Unlike library databases, Web resources are available wherever you have web access; they do not require that you access them via the Off-Campus Access button, in the upper right of all library webpages. When using web resources, be sure to evaluate the credibility of these resources. For a subject index to web resources, see Business Resources on the Web on the Foster Business Library homepage.
• Direct Selling Association:   This organization is "the national trade association of the leading firms that manufacture and distribute goods and services sold directly to consumers. More than 200 companies are members of the association, including many well-known brand names." See their Direct Selling by the Numbers for data on salespersons, sales dollars, sales force demographics, etc.

• Fisher Institute for Professional Selling:   The mission of this University of Akron College of Business Administration institute is "to enhance the image of the sales profession; to promote professional selling and sales management as rewarding lifelong careers; to provide high quality instruction to university students through our sales major, minor, and certificate programs; to provide outstanding training to sales executives; and to conduct research that advances the field of sales." See their Direct Selling by the Numbers for data on salespersons, sales dollars, sales force demographics, etc.

• Sales and Marketing Management Magazine:   This companion site to the magazine Sales and Marketing Management (available in the Foster Business Library periodicals collection) offers online editions of new and recent articles from the magazine.

• SellingPower.com:   This companion site to the magazine Selling Power (available in the Foster Business Library periodicals collection) offers previews of the latest issue plus some free articles, in a variety of categories, including Sales Web Links.

• The United Professional Sales Association:   This organization is a nonprofit trade association, based in Washington, D.C., that represents and advances the selling profession by promoting a universal selling framework and providing professional certification. See their articles on Professional Selling, their Highlighted Authors, and their Glossary of Sales and Selling Terms.

• Wikipedia:   This free online user-created and maintained encyclopedia, Wikipedia, can be a good starting point for an orientation to a topic, often with a definition of the term, a history of its practice, its effects, and links to related information. See Sales, Selling Technique, and more articles in the area of Personal Selling.

The Foster Business Library Reference Collection consists of business handbooks, encyclopedias, dictionaries, and other quick reference tools. It is located behind the Reference Desk in Foster, arranged by call number. Reference materials cannot be checked out; they may only be used in the library.
• Business: the ultimate resource.
  This 2,200-page single volume is "designed to offer a wide range of insights, information, and practical guidance on every aspect of management" via 2.5 million words of text from 200 contributors, with 700 illustrations and 150 maps, in seven major sections including best practice, a management library, business thinkers and management giants, a business dictionary, a world business almanac, and a guide to business sources.
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HD38.15 .B878 2002.

  See Selling and Salesmanship resources on pages 2109 to 2111.

• The IEBM encyclopedia of marketing.
  This volume includes twelve-page essays on about five dozen topics, under such headings as marketing management, the marketing mix, marketing in practice, and special topics.
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: HF5412 .I32 1999.

  See Personal Selling and Sales Management on pages 518 to 530.

• The big book of business quotations.
  As the book describes itself, "more than 5,000 indispensable observations on commerce, work, finance and management."
  Foster Business Library Reference, CALL NUMBER: PN6084 .B87 .B54 2003.

  See famous quotations on Selling on pages 325 to 328.

The Foster Business Library maintains a collection of over 70,000 books on all business topics. To search for materials on all three campuses of the University of Washington, go to the UW Libraries Catalog, in the upper left corner of the Foster Business Library homepage. Search by keyword, title, author, series, etc.

To limit the results of your search just to materials in the Foster Business Library collection, use the Modify or Limit options at the top of the search results and change the library location to Foster Business Library. Availablity is indicated on the right of each online catalog record. First, note in which collection, within Foster, your materials are in, since the library has ten different Collections, each in a different location and often with differing arrangements. "Available" indicates that the book should be on the shelves under that call number and available for you to check out. "Due" and a date indicates that the book is already checked out to someone and is due back on the date indicated; you can have the "Request/Place Hold" feature to recall the book for your use.

If the material you want is not in the collections of the University of Washington, you can use the "Search Summit" feature to repeat your search in the combined holdings of over thirty cooperating libraries in Washington and Oregon. Use the "Request This Item" feature in Summit to have books in those library sent here to Foster for you to check out.

The Foster general stacks collection is located south of the main part of the Foster Business Library, through the two pass-throughs into the basement of Balmer. The arrangement is by call number, from A (at the east end, near the Copy Center) to Z (at the far west end).

A search for the subject Selling, limited to the Foster Business Library, produced a list of over two hundred records, including titles such as:

• Dimensional selling   (2005)
• Escaping the black hole: minimizing the damage from the marketing-sales disconnect   (2005)
• Golden circle secrets: how to achieve consistent sales success through customer values & expectations   (2005)
• Creating the #1 sales force: what it takes to transform your sales culture   (2005)
• Ask questions, get sales: close the deal and create long-term relationships   (2005)
• How to master the arts of selling   (2005)
• The fundamentals of business to business sales and marketing   (2004)
• Secrets of top performing sales people: selling with customer focus   (2004)
• Selling (without selling): 4 1/2 steps to success   (2004)
• Customercentric selling   (2004)
• The new science of selling and persuasion: how smart companies and great salespeople sell   (2004)

See also books in the Foster Business Library on related subjects such as:

• Direct Selling
• House Selling
• Sales Management
• Sales Presentations
• Sales Promotion
• Telephone Selling

For an extensive list of books on selling, see the list of Sales Club Books used in Marketing 335, Principles of Selling, based on a collection of books donated to the library by the Business School Sales Club, with subsequent donations.

Foster Business Library Articles:

The Foster Business Library subscribes to a number of relevant journals including:

• Agency sales, v.23 no.3, 5-  (Mar. 1993-)
• Sales and marketing management, v.115 no.9-   (Nov. 17, 1975-)
• Sales meetings, v.1 no.6-   (July/Aug. 2003-)
• Selling power, v.19 no.2-   (Mar. 1999-)

In addition to the 800 journals in the Foster Business Library Periodicals Collection, the Foster Business Library offers access to over 100 million full text articles in over 10,000 periodicals through its full text article databases such as EBSCO Business Source Premier, Factiva, LexisNexis Academic, and ProQuest Databases. These article databases may be found on the Foster Business Library homepage, listed under Databases.

All four of these databases are available from any computer on the campus network as well as from home (via the UW Connectivity Kit or the Libraries' Off-Campus Access link, using your UW Net ID and password). The easiest of these databases to use is ProQuest Databases. For more information about accessing Foster Business Library databases from off campus, see Database Access. For more information about business databases, see the research guide entitled Databases, A to Z.

• ProQuest Databases:

  This database--actually, a family of over two dozen databases--offers full text articles for over 10,000 publications, including scholarly journals, magazines, trade and industry periodicals, newspapers, and reports on a very wide range of topics. To find articles on specific topics, search by word or phrase by keying your search phrase into the search box--or search for your topic in the Topic Guide. Article full text is often available in several formats, including text, text plus graphics, and PDF. This database also offers a very useful subject structure, to narrow search results, as well as article citation information.

  Your search terms will be highlighted in red in each article. For tips on searching this database, see About ProQuest Databases.

  A subject search in this database for SUB(Personal Selling) produced over 8,500 articles, including over 580 articles in scholarly journals, over 440 magazine articles, over 7,400 articles in trade and industry periodicals, and over fifty articles in newspapers. Among the publications included in the results of these searches are the American Salesman, Agency Sales, American Agent & Broker, Selling Power, Sales & Marketing Management, and many more.

  This subject term can be combined with other terms to narrow a search, including:

  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Salespeople)   (Over 1,600 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Guidelines)   (Over 1,500 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Sales Presentations)   (Over 660 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Techniques)   (Over 600 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Sales Prospecting)   (Over 520 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Recommendations)   (Over 460 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Success)   (Over 400 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Case Studies)   (Over 360 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Training)   (Over 350 articles)
  • SUB(Personal Selling) and SUB(Studies)   (Over 270 articles)

  Examples of articles from such searches include:

  • "The doctor won't see you now"   (Business Week. New York: Feb 05, 2007. , Iss. 4020;  pg. 30)
  • "Success in Selling for B2B Franchises"   (Franchising World. Washington: Nov 2006. Vol. 38, Iss. 11;  pg. 60, 4 pgs)
  • "How to Maximize Retail Watch Sales"   (JCK. Secaucus: Oct 2006. Vol. 177, Iss. 10;  pg. 126)
  • "Top 10 Sales Urban Myths"   (The American Salesman. Burlington: Oct 2006. Vol. 51, Iss. 10;  pg. 3, 6 pgs)
  • "Teaching the future how to sell"   (Accounting Today. New York: Sep 18-Oct 1, 2006. Vol. 20, Iss. 17;  pg. 30, 1 pgs)
  • "Prospecting Skills Are Key To Your Sales Organization's Success"   (Agency Sales. Irvine: Oct 2005. Vol. 35, Iss. 10;  pg. 62, 2 pgs)
  • "Sales Success"   (The American Salesman. Burlington: Sep 2005. Vol. 50, Iss. 9;  pg. 12, 3 pgs)
  • "Birth of a Salesman: The Transformation of Selling in America"   (Journal of Popular Culture. Bowling Green: Aug 2005. Vol. 38, Iss. 5;  pg. 974, 3 pgs)
  • "A Winning Sales Team"   (The American Salesman. Burlington: May 2005. Vol. 50, Iss. 5;  pg. 14, 3 pgs)
  • "Personal Selling as a Knowledge-Based Activity"   (Irish Journal of Management. Dublin: 2005. Vol. 26, Iss. 1;  pg. 61, 10 pgs)
  • "The Adaptive Consequences of Pride in Personal Selling"   (Academy of Marketing Science. Journal. Greenvale: Fall 2004. Vol. 32, Iss. 4;  pg. 386, 17 pgs)
  • "Customer Centered Selling: Eight Steps to Success From the World's Best Sales Force"   (Academy of Marketing Science. Journal. Greenvale: Fall 2000. Vol. 28, Iss. 4;  pg. 546, 2 pgs)

The Foster Business Library Reference Desk is staffed nearly all of the hours that the library is open. The staff at the desk will be happy to help you find business research tools and resources, exploit business databases to the fullest or advise on research strategies. For e-mail questions, direct your query to balib@u.washington.edu. For assistance by telephone, dial (206) 543-8012 during library hours.

See also the Foster Business Library's Business & Economics FAQ, and, in particular, the section for Marketing and Advertising.

For research guides on a wide variety of industries, products, companies, issues and topics, see the Team Librarian Consultation archives.

• Team Consultation Course/Program Index
• Team Consultation Industry Index
• Team Consultation Quarter Index
• Team Consultation Title Index
• Team Consultation and Research Guide Index
  • Advertising Resources
  • Business Presentations
  • Consumer Behavior Resources
  • Entrepreneurial Marketing Resources
  • Marketing Resources
  • Negotiation Resources
  • Sales Club Books   (By Title)
  • Sales Club Books   (By Call Number)