Over the years of being a consumer and being a professional salesman in multiple industries, there is one thing in common. People buy on emotion. People buy, because they like you and the value that you create in the environment where this interaction is taking place. There are of course those few outsiders who don’t have any emotion, or lack of impulsive purchasing; very methodical, process oriented purchasers. I’ll keep my first one simple.
In any situation you are in where you must sell or promote a product, service, or even yourself, to gain the most amount income, you must sell the environment and emotional buy. Sell the environment, build a unique value propositions (I will quote this later). And create the emotional buy for the customer, mirroring their image and doing the basics of greeting and being the professional question asker.
I often see kids, girl scouts, random adults all the time at grocery stores trying to sell candy. As I hold my girlfriends dogs and watch them, I see them struggle with each passing person, not capitalizing on any single individual but being overwhelmed many rejections. As a man, getting rejected is hard, still. As a kid, it will suck.
Giving a hand of advice I go up to the child and ask, “hey, wanna make some real money?” in a sort of creepy way, as the kid looks at me like WTF. I laugh and say, you know, to really make some money, you can’t tell them what you’re wanting to sell them. You need to sell them! Again, kid is like wtf as I struggle with two staffords and a cavalier king who is just looking for his mom.
Simply put I tell him, don’t talk about the candy. Talk about them. Talk about the most random shit they have on, are doing, or just say hello and smile. It’s better then being, “that guy”, the solicitor, the anyone can do job. I tell the kid, my pitch is, “HI How are you? Wow, those are nice… (shoes-pants-shirt-belt-watch-hat-glasses). Where did you get it from?
They stop in their tracks. Most of the time. If they don’t, smile and say Have a good day! Hate them with a smile. Cause when they come outside they will remember you. As you, haltingly smile. At the very least, he will write you a check for a million bucks just for being nice
So once they stop, that’s when you quickly, but efficiently, ask them questions about what you just stopped them for. Relating more to their emotional side of making them feel acknowledged, understood, relaxed. Build your questions to get answers to use against them. Once you realize you have enough ammo, HA!, yes really, use those answers to make them feel obliged to purchase your product or service.
Now pitch! Tell them what you are doing and why it will BENEFIT them through the answers they gave you! Yes, it’s all connected. Then go for the close. “Wouldn’t this candy make your kid’s day and you would be supporting a local charity.” And sometimes you will get, “oh, well i’m ok”, and you say, “ok you would like a candy?” A subliminal second close, and then ask a third time.
Now at this point the kids like, WTF are you saying man. I say, Keep It Simple. Just talk about them, the rest will come.
So as I walk away, some swanky looking guy in a nice white coat and gold watch walks by the kid. “Damn, that’s a nice watch!” the kid reacts, guy stops, while the kid holds the box of candy, surprisingly watching the kid acting like he’s done this for years. He goes right into saying he’s selling candy bars and sells 2 bars! Looks back with this look… Like WTF?!
We love to be sold. Meet a salesman, you can sell them anything!
