Sales Pro of the Year
Bridging the Gap While helping clients turn their dreams into reality, Sales Pro of the Year Jayson Cook hopes to give back by teaching and helping foster better communication between salespeople and installers. WORDS BY ROSA SOPHIA
For most of his career, Jayson Cook has been with Columbus Car Audio and Accessories in Columbus, Ohio. After attending Mobile Dynamics in 1996 with the intention of becoming an installer, Cook started working in sales in 1998 instead. He left once—for about a year— and worked as an installer, but returned to the sales floor. “When I started in sales, I just ran with it,” he said. “A good friend of mine was a box builder, so everyone around the neighborhood went to him to build boxes, and I helped him a lot with that. A lot of people knew of me, so when I started selling, they were coming in the front door.” Although he hadn’t intended to become a salesperson, Cook said, “I love this industry. I love cars and audio in general, so what I love about sales is that I’m able to put dream systems together for people and use their money to do it. You get to see their reaction. A lot of the technicians don’t get to see that—the end user getting excited about it. I think my passion overflows into the sales process. People pick up on that and start to get pumped up about what they can do. I have embraced sales over the years.”
The Evolution of Sales in the 12-Volt Industry Continuous changes in technology require continuous evolution for the salesperson, according to Cook, who
14 Mobile Electronics November 2019
noted that it used to be the norm to say, “Let’s change that radio out.” It was the first step, he said. “I’ve got a Model S Tesla back here. There’s no way we could change that. Who would want to change that? I just did an amazing system in a 2020 Ram, and it’s the same thing. It’s got that 12-inch tablet style radio, and
I would be stupid to tell the guy, ‘Let’s change that radio out and put this little 7-inch touchscreen in,’ or even a floating Halo 9-inch.” OEM integration is a huge focus, he added. “For me, I’m pitching doing a 5-channel amplifier and a sub to start out, not even touching the speakers
