There is no doubt that there is a scientific component to selling. In the last twenty years a whole scientific field has arisen specifically to answer questions about how people go about deciding to buy things. This field is, of course, Behavioral Economics.

- In 2002 Daniel Kahneman got the Nobel Prize for economics for his work with Amos Tversky on the subjectivity and non-rationality of human purchasing behaviors.
 
- Robert Cialdini has demonstrated (among other things) that the order in which the salesperson presents options drastically affects the likelihood of making a sale.
 
- Dan Ariely has shown that humans share certain decision biases that can both be exploited by salespeople and are useful in estimating closing probabilities.
 
And the authors and results cited above represent just the tips of the science-of-sales iceberg. It's surprising that so few "professional" salespeople are aware of these and other results. It's crazy because it's so easy to increase the odds of getting the deal if you know just a little about decision biases.

And, amazingly, much of what passes for sales training is conducted by people who are clueless about the scientific foundations of the field. Walking to the library could cure their ignorance. Instead they're walking through fire.

But wait. Don't get all excited. Learn the science but don't trade in your suit for a lab coat before you read the rest of the story.

If you want to maximize your deals science is necessary but far from sufficient. People buy from people. The science won't matter if you can't get people to talk with you. To benefit from a scientific understanding of sales one has to be able to establish a certain level of rapport with one's prospect. And while some elements of rapport building can be learned, there is no doubt that some people are better at it than others.

We've all know salespeople who are just enjoyable to be around. We've all known people who have a knack for making other people feel comfortable in conversation. The reductionists in the crowd may say that even these skills are founded on learned behaviors that exploit human biases and thinking penchants. But few people can learn what my mother liked to call "the gift of gab" in any reasonably short amount of time. You either have it or you don't. Without it, it's unlikely that you'll make it to the top of the sales game. Face it. The best conversationalists are artists.

Science is about understanding how people think and then using this knowledge to say and do the right things at the right times.  Art is how you do what you do and how you say what you say.

There are many sales "artists" who could take their selling to a whole new level by learning the science. And there are just as many "scientists" who would do well to enter a profession other than sales.