The Art and Culture of Salesmanship
Its just the way the sales psychology works. I had never thought about it ever. But the trip to Gopinatham(details of that I will be giving you soon) made me think in this direction. There was an old man(He said he was 75). He spoke fluent English. I was initially shocked by his fluency. Not that it was a BPO style English but none the less good enough. He told me that he had learnt English from a variety of places and people. He understood the psychology of all that. I wondered psychology talking as a guide!!!
He was good. He tried his best to flatter everyone in my group in a variety of ways. But then I am a Marwari.
I began to wonder what the relation between salesmanship and psychology. Not late that I realized that its just the way you talk and make the customer feel good. Its generally not just by the words but the body language and the tone. I have somehow never seen any Kannadiga have a tone which makes me feel warm when it comes to buying from a shop. Ditto for Bengalis. The worst shopkeepers that I have met are Muslims(No offense meant but this is what I have experienced).Other cultures, I am not sure. The supermarkets do go on the safe side by not having anyone at all in sight. But once you get into a shop owned by a Marwari he will, before selling you anything will make you feel comfortable in his shop. You will always feel welcome. What’s more interesting is the way he interacts with his employees in the presence of a customer. Whatever be the case with the employee, he will never sound ugly in front of a customer. He might not sell you the cheapest but he will sell in a manner that seems to be more acceptable to you. All that I am telling you is not from some bigshot’s book but my own experience as a customer that is.
It might be something that you have also experienced, you must have been to some shop and you have seen all the wares in there but like none. If its some shop in
To add to that this is something I had heard from my grand father. He told me that there used to be caravans going from
But that was centuries ago. Now things have changed dramatically. But your shopping experience has not. The geniuses at supermarkets came up with a brilliant plan. Let there be no people, so people would simply buy. This was a safe bet. Rather than having an employee spoiling the sales, its better to have none. But I must tell u that a shop with a really warm person in charge sells more than supermarket of similar size. And finally I think I would soon start a super market with the right mix. Is Big Bazaar doing that???
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