Archive for November, 2009

You are sitting in your living room watching a movie enjoying a cup of coffee and relaxing, maybe you are working on a painting, working out, reading a book, organizing all your tools, or balancing your budget, whatever you do to relax. You’ve taken a day off just for yourself to unwind, the kids are at school, your spouse is at work and you’ve just settled in to start “You” time. You get that knock on the door and there in the doorway are two finely dressed individuals, each bearing a leather briefcase and holding a few small brochures or pamphlets in one hand. You know the rest of the exchange if you even open the door.

The problem with this exchange for most of us is the pushy or intrusive experience we’ve all had; whether it happened with a religious person or just a car salesman. We’ve all had some bad experience with an over zealous sales person trying to force you to buy something you really don’t want to buy, or aren’t ready to buy. The salesman comes in many different disguises: men, women, elderly and young; wealthy or poor, beautiful or not. We all have a certain button that when pushed makes us respond to situations with passionate resistance; whether you verbalize your resistance outwardly or not your body language tells the story of your emotional reaction.

On the other hand, we also have a passionate salesman inside each of us that when set in action makes us respond with great passion to situations trying to convince others that our point of view on a subject is right and should be the point of view that all people hold. I find that with most people those who are pushy salespeople also are the most passionate when confronted by another pushy salesperson.

Who are you and what are your buttons?
Please share your stories and oppinions with me I would love to hear any and all of them especially the taboo topics religion, sex, politics, culture, war.

I don’t really hate religious people, I am just very easily annoyed by pushy salespeople, or people with little or no training or sensitivity in etiquette.

Every culture has phrases they use that in some other culture is going to offend people. In many religious circles people say “amen” frequently, call everyone “bro”, hug everyone, say things like “praise the lord” or “Hallelujah”. This is fine in that particular culture but when the words and phrases are used in another cultural setting it can be a very uncomfortable catalyst causing damage in some of the relationships you have. If you are religious and want to share your convictions with everyone around you the first step in getting other people to “want” to hear your opinions is to make it comfortable for people to want to speak with you, want to hear your opinions, and want to share enough time with you for you to share what it is that you feel so strongly about.

I often hear preachers sharing the analogy, if you just discovered the cure for cancer would you keep it to yourself or would you run around sharing your cure with everyone. The problem is that when you’re talking about religion, politics, sex, marriage, war, etc… the “cure” is not such a cut and dry or black and white solution. For some people garlic is the answer for many ailments, for others a trip to the hospital due to a severe allergic reaction. Words are kind of like food, to one person saying “that outfit is FAT” or “that outfit is the BOMB” is a compliment and for others it’s an insult.

My point is this: If you want people to listen to your convictions or buy your products first ask lots of questions and get to know the cultural sensitivities of the person you are trying to share with. The greatest salespeople in the word ask more questions and listen to the people they are trying to sell to more than trying to “push” their products onto an audience who doesn’t want or need them. We all need to work much harder on our sensitivity.

How does this subject apply to sales tactics on the Internet in your opinion?