The book crafts a witty story around solid sales fundamentals gleaned from a quarter-century of research and analysis. Its hero is a fledgling old-time entrepreneur named Max who invents the wheel but can’t get anybody to buy one. With marketing assistance from his wife (“In the olden days,” Cox explains, “women almost always did the marketing”), and guidance from a cave-dwelling wise man, Max ultimately succeeds with help from four distinctly different types of salespeople, dubbed Closer, Wizard, Builder, and Captain. While this may sound silly when taken out of context, the story is entertaining and, more important, filled with sound tips that could help sales professionals and their managers deal with varying evolutionary phases of any product or service.