Sell something? Easy Peasy!

Hi!

Welcome to the end of the week, which is when I seem to write. (The only time I seem to write)

I came across an interesting ad for astrology services today. Apparently fixing all your problems in life was just a phone call away! They claimed to - and I quote - "100% Permanent Solution to YOUR PROBLEMS IN 11 DAYS - PROMISE TO OCCURRENCE".

I will give you a minute.

Go on, think about it.

The only thing I could understand from this sentence was - a) there will be a permanent solution to your problems in 11 days or b) They will promise that the said problems will occur again. Take your pick!

I guess what one must really wonder is how does someone be so confident while telling you something so strange. 

And this is how most sales people are - they will claim the ridiculous and claim it so confidently, one usually has to keep one's wits about - the alternative is being riddled with things you don't need, or atleast with a considerably lighter wallet.

Take a restaurant for example. You ask the waiter is there colour in the soup, and he will proudly announce that there is, he will even go to the extent of reassuring you that all the soup you have been eating for years was wrong and that this soup, the one with colour in it, is the only kind of soup you must be drinking. It was a way for him to tell that it's what you need in life!

Or let's consider the weird advertisements we see on television. I saw one recently for Amazon's sale. Their claim is, why stick to the shoe you  liked and bought? Amazon has a billion brands and it's on sale and it's infinitely better to have a billion choices than - you know - actually buying something. 

Or the payed reviews that some people like writing. "There is truly nothing - nothing - better than buying this broomstick. It can clean (oh yes!), it can shine in the dark so it's easy to find (where was this object all my life!), it can do your kid's math home work and it can help you fly!"

Or the utter confidence of the people selling you something as simple as shampoo or soap in a mall.

So a lady walks up to me, after she sees me reading the labels of all the nice bottles there. "Yes ma'am, I have an offer for X shampoo because it's awesome and there's so much goodness and not a hair shall remain on your scalp after you use this, and it's on SALE!" I tell her, no - I don't want this shampoo. She goes on to help me, by asking me what I want (hear me out). I tell her, "Well a shampoo without harsh soaps would be nice-" and she shoots off and gets me a humungous bottle of something I know  I am not looking for. So I tell her, no I want something with less chemicals. She shoots off again and brings me a bottle that screams HERBAL and she starts telling me how awesome that is. I tell her there's no ingredients list and I don't really know what's in it, and she's all like whaaaa - this lady wants ingredients!? Is she cooking? Finally I move away, and I can hear her grumbling to her friends. 

There's also the kind who will look at you in disdain and will convince you to buy something just to spite them. These people will usually pose in conspicuous places and stare at you the way a cat stares when it's thinking 'This creature dares walk in front of me? crawl you imbecile! I am your overlord!' And you look at them and feel self conscious. You look at all the junk in the shop and internally think - why am I here? but on the outside you want to show them that you aren't wasting their time. You ask them about one useless bottle, and they roll their eyes (all the time your radars are screaming for release) and yawn out it's purpose. You put the bottle back (hopefully after checking the price and internally balking at it), and you catch them smirking. And then the next bottle you happen to glance at, you pick, throw it at the counter, and stomp away - with new purchases and regrets in tow. 

There are also the Yes men. They will tell you yes for everything you ask them. This is either because they aren't mentally quite there with you, or because they want to seem like good employees without actually being good employees. So we have conversations like - "Excuse me, do you have unpolished rice?" "yes!" "Could you show me?" "yes!" and shows you a handful of polished rice. By now you are confused - "I asked for unpolished rice.. This is polished rice" "Yes". "Show me the raw rice, that is NOT polished" "yes" and shows you some other sort of polished rice that's boiled too for your consumption. You are mentally slamming your brains to a wall now. "Did this rice come from Mars?" "yes" in the most unfazed way. This is when you slowly break down and start to cry internally, and pick up your empty basket and move away to another aisle. Where you have trouble finding green tea, and the lady there hands you a green coloured box and claims that it is green tea. 

Until next time,

DragonRider

PS: this was the advertisement for the problem solving wonder (sorry for the bad picture quality :p)