TY - JOUR AB - Many entrepreneurs are enthralled with their company's technologies, products and potential markets. Invariably these emerging ventures present bedazzling business plans with industry-wise vernacular, detailed market research, and sophisticated financial spreadsheets. They often flaunt their “optimized business models.” Investors, however, typically want to know when and how the sales will start meeting the Plan. “Whereʼs the purchase order?” is the refrain. In this article, our “Practitionerʼs Corner” associate editor Joe Levangie collaborates with a long-time colleague, Deaver Brown, to address how businesses should “make sales happen.” Levangie warns that Brownʼs elitist education (Choate, Harvard College, Harvard Business School) should not be interpreted as a lack of “street smarts”; Brownʼs more entrepreneurially friendly credentials include winning Golden Gloves boxing medals and selling Fuller Brush products door-to-door! To ascertain how the entrepreneur can wrest an order from a prospective customer, read on. VL - 9 IS - 1 SN - 2574-8904 DO - 10.1108/NEJE-09-01-2006-B006 UR - https://doi.org/10.1108/NEJE-09-01-2006-B006 AU - Brown Deaver AU - Levangie Joseph E. PY - 2006 Y1 - 2006/01/01 TI - The often-neglected term in the entrepreneurial equation–the purchase order T2 - New England Journal of Entrepreneurship PB - Emerald Publishing Limited SP - 63 EP - 80 Y2 - 2024/04/24 ER -