MAKE THE FIRST SALE TO YOURSELF
Three or four years ago a young man who had not had a great deal of business experience took up the selling of an electrical carpet sweeper for household use. This he was to offer in a house-to-house canvas over a limited territory especially assigned to him. Before starting out he read all the circulars prepared by the selling department and watched demonstrations made at the office. Armed with his equipment and a prepared selling talk the young man started in his new field. Most of the women proved to be interested to get a “close-up” of the bagpipe, as one of them called it, and even listened to the selling talk, but when it was all over—there was no sale.
For a week the same experience went on until finally the salesman’s young wife thought she would try how it worked around the house. She hitched it up and tried it on the hall rug. The result was fine, and she then tested it on the furniture, the curtains and finally on a suit of clothes. “It’s a wonder,” she said, “and I must have one. We can’t afford to be without it.” She got it, of course, but the important point, as far as we are concerned, is that the man was given in those few minutes the best selling talk he could possibly use and the only one he ever needed from that time on. The experience was the turning point in his career.
What could a cut-and-dry selling talk amount to as compared with the genuine enthusiasm of the man who had just installed a sweeper for his wife’s own convenience? He had now sold himself on the merit of his goods, and there could be no doubt or failing in his voice when approaching the customer. Now he could talk in terms of facts rather than opinions.
“But,” some shoe salesman may say, “we don’t have to demonstrate the shoe to the customer, she knows what it is and all about it.” Provided the salesman is simply to take the order it is true that he does not need to demonstrate or convince. The genuine salesman, however, does more. He will sell the customer the shoe she ought to have. He will probably sell her a more expensive one, or he may sell her two or three pairs, and at the same time have her realize that she is being served best in buying them. This is real salesmanship, and it is only possible of a man who is thoroughly sold on the superior merit of his own goods and his house—who has made the first sale to himself.