Guilelessness and technique
Can we ever really tell if anyone is genuine any more? We’re being told that John Howard is perceived as “tricky”, but equally Rudd is a smoothly engineered PR machine who talks the political talk as much as anyone. With today’s psychology, finessing an image, tweaking a sentence, to elicit the right emotional reaction, is becoming an exacting science, to the point where communication becomes… what? A concept that must always be framed as “communication”, perpetually ironic term? Non-communication? Unidirectional emoting? Will we switch off entirely to messages?
A lady spruiking an inaugural provincial fashion event has been pursuing us for weeks to try and get us to support the event. She’s terribly persistent and I give her credit for it. But we had this conversation:
Me: I’m sorry, we’re not really interested in being part of the event.”
A: That’s such a pity because it’s going to be MASSIVE.
Me: We wish you the very best but we’re not interested.
A: Well we really did want to have you involved but I guess we’ll have some other company from the sphere of X involved.
Me: As I said, not interested. Bye.
Deceitful and emotionally manipulative, but WELL ENGINEERED. Said provincial fashion event is likely to be a croc of shit, and doubly likely because it seems to be necessary to pursue us so rabidly. If they had so many others in the wings, would they bother ringing back? And then of course, the take away. If someone seems to be prevaricating, raise the specter of missed opportunity, tell them they can’t have it, and then watch as close like than a Venus fly trap.
I dislike tricky sales. I’d much rather have someone shove something in my face and tell me how much it is, and tell me its good points and faults, than have someone wheedle around the edges, hide the price tags and not fully state what the product is about. But maybe I’m the only one.
” I’d much rather have someone shove something in my face and tell me how much it is, and tell me its good points and faults, than have someone wheedle around the edges, hide the price tags and not fully state what the product is about. But maybe I’m the only one.”
I doubt that you’re the only one; but you’re making the assumption that what you’d _prefer_ is in fact the same as what _works_. And I have this little cynical voice in my head saying that this probably isn’t a safe assumption…
I like Martin’s comment. I’m indeed being utopian, a foible I indulge occasionally. What does it mean when a sales process “works”? That the customer ultimately buys, or that the customer ultimately is happy? That the customer feels their decision is wise, or that they have been inveigled? Many businesses are profitable but I’d assert few are successful. And of course, it’s the ones where the premise is unsuccessful that more frequently foist sales tactics on the hordes.