I have door-to-door sales people call on my regularly. What gives them the right to disturb me when I am trying to
work I don’t know – I really do need to get that sign up on my front door.
Anyway. Since they are there I like to listen to what they have to say. Amazingly, they actually use questions which prevent them ever making a sale. If you are a sales person or sell anything at all, you will starve if you can’t sell so knowing what not to ask is as important as knowing what to ask.
The guy trying to sell me fish from his van knocked. I was busy trying to feed my baby and I do already buy from my regular fish man to be honest. But the new fish man upon hearing that I already buy from fish man asked a strange question which was guaranteed to end the conversation with a no – only because he was the one who said no!
I said I already buy from a fish man so he then said ‘So won’t want to buy from me then?’
There was nothing I could add to that because he had just closed the door in his own face.
The moral is self evident.
Paul Browning
I was taught never to ask questions that could be answered with yes or no. There is nowhere for the conversation to go when someone says no!
Putting the word no in a sales pitch is a very bad idea. That fish guy better like fish, because he will be stuck with a lot of it at the end of the day!
There are many people out there in sales who struggle to come up with anything that will keep my interest, but this guy really fell on his own sword.
That guy needs to read your blog!
The first thing I learned about sales is to never answer for a customer. The fish guy is a great example of what not to do. He gave you the perfect out by answering his question for you with no room for any rebuttal. I agree with Spencer, the fish guy really needs to read your blog!
Wow, I’ve heard of stupid rhetorical questions, but that guy is stiff as a board!!!
At any rate people who want to sell really do need to hone their marketing skills. Marketing is a war zone so you need the sharpest tool in the shed. =)
People really need to consider their marketing skills. If you know you’re not selling then something must be wrong. There are some books out there regarding marketing, and one popular one is about guerrilla marketing.
It is a definite Turn off for me whenever a vendor says something bad about the competition or tries to force me to buy the product. I feel bad sometimes about them not making a sale, but really sometimes its their own fault.