Hilary Hinton Ziglar was an American author, motivational speaker, and salesman. Best known as Zig Ziglar, he gained recognition because of his commitment to his work and motivational speeches. Zig Ziglar’s net worth at the time of his death was quite impressive.
Zig Ziglar’s net worth is $15 million according to recent estimates. As an author, salesman, Vice President, and Training Director of the “Automotive Performance Company,” Ziglar gained fame and wealth. He was a Christian motivational speaker who also wrote several books on various subjects.
Ziglar was a well-known author. His written works include “See You at the Top,” “The Autobiography of Zig Ziglar,” “Born to Win: Find Your Success Code,” and many others.
Table of Contents
Birth And Childhood
In Coffee County, Alabama, John Silas Ziglar and Lila Wescott Ziglar gave birth to Zig Ziglar prematurely. He was the eleventh and youngest son in a family of twelve.
Ziglar’s father accepted a managerial position on a Mississippi farm when Ziglar was five years old, and the family moved to Yazoo City, Mississippi. Here, he spent most of his childhood. The following year, his father died of a stroke, and his younger sister died two days later.
Read: How Ryan Higa conquered YouTube, his net worth, and more
He attended the University of South Carolina’s Navy College Training Program in Columbia, South Carolina, from 1943 to 1945. In 1947, Ziglar dropped out of college and moved to Lancaster, South Carolina, to work as a salesperson for the WearEver Cookware company. Ziglar rose through the ranks and became a field manager and then a divisional supervisor in 1950.
Career
Ziglar developed an interest in self-help and motivational speaking while working at the company and began giving his own speeches. In 1963, Ziglar, along with Richard “Dick” Gardner and Hal Krause, co-founded American Sales Masters.
The company’s purpose was to offer seminars in order to boost salespeople’s reputation in America. Ziglar, Vincent Peale, Ken McFarland, Cavett Robert, Bill Govet, and Red Motley were among the first to talk in cities across the South and Midwest. They booked an auditorium, put together a schedule of speakers, and sought local businesses to sell tickets.
Their audience included insurance agents, vehicle dealers, financial counsellors, entrepreneurs, small business owners, and other interested people. Thereafter, Ziglar gave numerous talks to the National Association of Sales Education (NASE), which Dick Gardner founded in 1965. He was also a well-known sales trainer for Mary Kay Cosmetics.
Ziglar moved to Dallas, Texas, in 1968 to serve as a vice president and training director for the Automotive Performance Company. However, the company went bankrupt two years later.
Ziglar formed the Ziglar Institute, which later grew into Ziglar, Incorporation. He went on to present at several seminars for motivational speaker Peter Lowe. Afterwards, he eventually agreed to endorse Lowe’s programs only.
Besides lecturing, Ziglar wrote approximately 30 books. His debut novel, See You at the Top, was rejected 39 times before he published it. The book is still in the market for purchase.
In Addison, Texas, Ziglar hired and trained other speakers, including Will Harris. He developed short-term memory problems after a fall down a flight of stairs in 2007. Despite this, Ziglar continued to appear at motivational seminars until his retirement in 2010.
Zig Ziglar’s Books
Zig Ziglar left an impression on his writings. He wrote on several topics, including lifestyle, relationships, marketing, Job Hunting, quotations, and others. His most popular books include See you at the Top, Zig Ziglar’s secrets of closing the sale, and Over the Top. Other books that have made the top list are Selling 101: What Every Successful Sales Professional Needs to Know and Ziglar on Selling.
Read more on: Philip DeFranco Swims In Money: See His Net Worth
He is also the author of Raising Positive Kids in a negative world, a book that several parents found inspiring. He expressed his faith in books like Confessions of a Grieving Christian, God’s Way is still the best way and something to smile about. Most of his books remain best sellers till today.
Personal Life
In Jackson, Mississippi, Ziglar met his future wife, Jean, in 1944. He was 17, and she was 16 when they married in late 1946. They had four children: Suzan, Tom, Cindy, and Julie.
Ziglar, a fervent Baptist, infused his motivational speaking with his faith. He was also a Republican who endorsed former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee for the GOP presidential nomination in 2008.
At 86, Ziglar died of pneumonia in the suburb of Plano, Texas hospital on November 28, 2012.
