The Great “Top Sales Techniques” Hunt: What tricks are used to sell to us?

Steve1981

Womaniser wrote: »

Treat them with the contempt they deserve and don't let them take control.

I've worked in sales for a number of years and I find that rude - everyone does a job, its sounds to me that there might have been a few instances where you have been 'sold' to as opposed to 'buying' and now your bitter

HeaddyMX

Very interesting thread; I can identify with some of the tactics.

I was in Starbucks (of all places) on Saturday, and they offered only a medium or large frappucino. (Despite a 'small' option being clearly displayed on the menu.)

I've had bad experiences with salespeople, mainly because I was made to make a decision on impulse. I signed up to a now defunct "IT training" academy at a time when I was disillusioned and afraid after university, not to mention broke.
Probably the second worst experience was with a "CV writing" company; after rubbishing what turned out to be a perfectly okay CV (which had eventually helped me land two to three jobs), they offered to split the payment for rewriting and distributing it. After making the first payment, I hadn't heard from them to take the second. That is, until being called out of the blue by a collection agency.

I do think there are decent salespeople, however. My recruitment consultant (who are not unlike salespeople) of over a year has been very helpful and has kept in contact, and though they obviously want to make commission and such, they showed interest in my career.
Unfortunately they are outnumbered by people like one consultant, who called me up just to get my details and promptly hung up.

lil_miss_insanity

Womaniser wrote: »

One thing to ALWAYS remember is that the salesperson ALWAYS only has his/her interests at heart, ie the sale/commission. They may appear friendly towards you, but they really couldn't care less if you died after doing the deal. A good salesperson will always be honest and have your interests at heart, but when their income is based on a sale, honesty and decency is often put to one side.

Treat them with the contempt they deserve and don't let them take control.

Please please please don't hate me!!! I'm not evil - I certainly don't want anybody to die - and it really upsets me that people would think that of me!

I work in a bank, and the 'anti-sales' attitudes mean that people sit with tens of thousands in a current account paying 0.08% net interest for YEARS sometimes, because they "don't want to be sold to."

I make a specific point of selling to need, and will actually tell someone if a product they're asking about isn't the best thing for them, or if a cheaper product is better, or if they don't need it at all! Customers appreciate honesty, and will come back to me - hence I meet my targets without being a bonus-hungry harpie. I don't even know what products earn me what because if I let myself think it, it'll make me give worse customer service.

May I just say, I have never seen the 'assumptive' approach first hand in my bank for PPI, but I have heard of lots of customers who have experienced that. That drives me crazy - how dare they do that with that much money and breaking regulations, without gaining full informed consent?

Categorically, hand on heart, I have NEVER mis-sold a protection product, and now we're not allowed to sell them any more, and I resent the assumption that we're all the same, money-grabbing soulless witches. I just hope I'm wrong, and that we won't be blamed for not getting people to protect themselves when they default on their loans...

Okay...rant over!

The Technique in a Nutshell: The 'comes as a package' approach.
What you were selling: We are encouraged to cross-sell credit cards and savings accounts with new current accounts.
More Details: Quite often I've seen people just say "and that comes with a credit card with x limit, and a savings account", not actually offering a choice. Just assuming. Now the savings account I do offer and reccommend, although I do give the choice - because a lot of people need encouragement to save, and won't open a savings account of their own accord without being asked - and we get nothing unless they actually use the savings account anyway so doesn't benefit me. But the credit card, some counsellors will add even if they're told they don't particularly want one, and just be told "well it comes with the package, if you don't want it, cut it up when you get it."
How successful was it: Very! Most people didn't question it, apparently!
How should MoneySavers counter it: Quite simple - IF YOU DON'T WANT IT DON'T GET IT!!! And check what you've signed for.

wallyberry

Last Friday afternoon, I was (for once) watching a DVD with my three year old daughter, when three people hammered (and yes, I mean hammered) upon my front door.

The lady started by asking if I'd had "last week's mailing about our Sky package", to which I replied that if I had, as I wasn't interested it had gone straight into the recycling! At this point I would normally have shut the door, but for some reason I decided that I would see what they had to say and challenge them on every point - give them a run for their money.

One of the men took over, assuming that we had a BT surf package - wrong. Having asked what we did have and then which option, I think warning bells should have started to ring for him when I could instantly answer which package from Talk Talk we had, but he ploughed on. "I'm sure your daughter would love to have more television channels than just Freeview". Fortunately said daughter, being only 3 though looking about 5, didn't have a clue what the strange man at the door was on about. Very under the belt that one, using the child to manipulate....

Me- "I'm sure she would, but since on a normal day we watch only about 20 minutes of television it would be a bit of a waste. Where do you stand on the research that suggests that watching too much television reduces a child's concentration span in school?"
Salesman - "What?"

After explaining the research, he suggested they had a children's knowledge channel which she would find very useful. He even showed me his clipboard to show me how many of my neighbours had signed up!

I pointed out that I never have and never will buy anything over the doorstep - "that's alright,we can come inside!"

I told him he'd got the wrong end of the stick, and that if he wanted to leave me some information that I could could look at in my own time, he was welcome to.

Then came his major clanger "I could leave you lots of information but YOU WOULDN'T UNDERSTAND IT!" and as soon as he said it he realised it was a mistake. I have a degree; I have a postgraduate qualification; I used to teach; I stay at home to look after my children because I believe I am the best person to do that job.... And now he knows all that! I told him that if he wanted to sell things, it was best not to insult your potential customer!

Needless to say I did not sign up to Sky....

Jenni :rotfl:

Al_Vampyre

Womaniser wrote: »

As you ask.....

House in the country value £800K, paid for.
Flat in Regents Park, London value £550K, paid for.
Condo in Singapore value £450K, paid for.
Ferrari 360 value £70K, paid for.
Audi A4 value £23K, paid for.
Savings of £80K for a rainy day............

*Puts willy away*

For someone with such a deep contempt of salespeople you seem to have bought a lot from them!

skintbutsmiling01

wallyberry wrote: »

Last Friday afternoon, I was (for once) watching a DVD with my three year old daughter, when three people hammered (and yes, I mean hammered) upon my front door.

The lady started by asking if I'd had "last week's mailing about our Sky package", to which I replied that if I had, as I wasn't interested it had gone straight into the recycling! At this point I would normally have shut the door, but for some reason I decided that I would see what they had to say and challenge them on every point - give them a run for their money.

One of the men took over, assuming that we had a BT surf package - wrong. Having asked what we did have and then which option, I think warning bells should have started to ring for him when I could instantly answer which package from Talk Talk we had, but he ploughed on. "I'm sure your daughter would love to have more television channels than just Freeview". Fortunately said daughter, being only 3 though looking about 5, didn't have a clue what the strange man at the door was on about. Very under the belt that one, using the child to manipulate....

Me- "I'm sure she would, but since on a normal day we watch only about 20 minutes of television it would be a bit of a waste. Where do you stand on the research that suggests that watching too much television reduces a child's concentration span in school?"
Salesman - "What?"

After explaining the research, he suggested they had a children's knowledge channel which she would find very useful. He even showed me his clipboard to show me how many of my neighbours had signed up!

I pointed out that I never have and never will buy anything over the doorstep - "that's alright,we can come inside!"

I told him he'd got the wrong end of the stick, and that if he wanted to leave me some information that I could could look at in my own time, he was welcome to.

Then came his major clanger "I could leave you lots of information but YOU WOULDN'T UNDERSTAND IT!" and as soon as he said it he realised it was a mistake. I have a degree; I have a postgraduate qualification; I used to teach; I stay at home to look after my children because I believe I am the best person to do that job.... And now he knows all that! I told him that if he wanted to sell things, it was best not to insult your potential customer!

Needless to say I did not sign up to Sky....

Jenni :rotfl:

You could probably ring up sky & complain and get the whole caboodle at a discount rate after that!

jennybegoode

Mark_drinks_Gem wrote: »

Bolt on / link selling ... The old burger joint comment woudl be would you like fries / go large?

Just goes to show this technique applies at every level. I used to be a waitress in a national chain and we were rigorously trained to 'upsell' at least three times with every table: offering extras with meals (e.g. portion of beans on a breakfast); warm bread rolls in a basket (price of which was not on the menu); drink refills etc

cristalfiona

I got some first hand experience of being sold to yesterday. I went into the post office to get some euros, as im going to paris this weekend. While i was waiting, I picked up the leaflet about the currency card thing they are doing at the moment. After i had told her how much i wanted in foreign currency (£80), she tried to sell me the card- I only needed to buy another £70 of currency to be able to get it. No thanks. Then it was travel insurance, and a credit card, which could be used abroad. Again, no thanks. (Even though apparently Martin recommends it!). And somehow she managed to try and sell me home insurance (until she found out I dont own my own home), contents insurance and car insurance. The sneaky thing was, she held onto my euros until after she had tried to sell me all of these. I said I checked everything like that online, and basically ran. How do these people do this every day?

Although I am a salesperson, I could never do something like this. I work in a sofa place, and am quite lucky- we are very specialist, and so only have people in who WANT our products. And we dont try to sell from the shop floor- everything is made from scratch. If you wanted a 5 seater corner sofa in duck egg blue suede with pink spots, we could probably do it for you (although id advise against it):D . I could never work in a phone shop, for example, where everything is about forcing goods onto the customer.

soulman_3

The Technique in a Nutshell:

0% finance and free for a year What you were selling:

anything that offers it - at the time windows / conservatories but also furniture (think DFS) More Details:

you see it on TV all the time, 0% finance and nothing to pay for two years - these are in fact two offers used to hoik in customers and they do not really exist.

first 0% finance. this does not exist - no one will lend you money for free - always remember that. The way it works is that lets say they sell you a conservatory for £10,000 - they sign you up for £10,000 on the paperwork for 0% finance - you pay back to £10,000 over say 3 years and there you go - you got free credit right? WRONG

the company who sold you the service did not get £10,000 - they probably only got £9000 or even less. It's a con, you paid £10,000 for a £9,000 item - the extra £1000 was for the credit.

how this is allowed in this day and age is beyond me but it happens all the time.

The second thing is the 'pay nothing for a year' bit - this is yet another finance trick called 'deferred finance' - you will find this out if you go in and say you want to pay nothing for a year but then say you will pay cash in a year and don't sign up to a finance agreement. you can't have this without the finance.

And you pay for it, again about a percentage of the price will be for the cost of the credit for that period you sign up for £2000 suite for your living room - pay nothing for a year AND intrest free for 3 years then the company will probably only get £1600 or less for that item - another con. - you might also even get 'cashback' - another offer added onto the deal / finance.

what a sweet world we live in when this is still allowed to continue by companies the general public class a 'respectable' just because they advertise a lot and have been around a while.
How successful was it:

It's very successful, just see any DFS ad on the telly - it's always mentioned.
How should MoneySavers counter it:

Don't ever let the sales rep know you want finance even if you do - talk like a cash buyer - never let them get into finance mode like 'how much a month can you afford' etc - just talk about cash - if they try to sniff you for finance just say 'I dont need credit'.

Then bargain hard on the price and shake on it - then drop the bombshell that you will take advantage after all of the finance offers of 0% and free for a year - they will protest loudly - son't give in to them - you protest loudly (best sunday afternoon) threaten them with trading standards and if needs be do so.

if they have room you will get your prioce and finance offer too - then you have the best deal - even then you will be paying for the 0% and the extra time but you will be getting the goods at near cost price.

Hope this helps

From a very good salesman

soulman_3

The Technique in a Nutshell:

0% finance and free for a year

What you were selling:

anything that offers it - at the time windows / conservatories but also furniture (think DFS)

More Details:

you see it on TV all the time, 0% finance and nothing to pay for two years - these are in fact two offers used to hoik in customers and they do not really exist.

first 0% finance. this does not exist - no one will lend you money for free - always remember that. The way it works is that lets say they sell you a conservatory for £10,000 - they sign you up for £10,000 on the paperwork for 0% finance - you pay back to £10,000 over say 3 years and there you go - you got free credit right? WRONG

the company who sold you the service did not get £10,000 - they probably only got £9000 or even less. It's a con, you paid £10,000 for a £9,000 item - the extra £1000 was for the credit.

how this is allowed in this day and age is beyond me but it happens all the time.

The second thing is the 'pay nothing for a year' bit - this is yet another finance trick called 'deferred finance' - you will find this out if you go in and say you want to pay nothing for a year but then say you will pay cash in a year and don't sign up to a finance agreement. you can't have this without the finance.

And you pay for it, again about a percentage of the price will be for the cost of the credit for that period you sign up for £2000 suite for your living room - pay nothing for a year AND intrest free for 3 years then the company will probably only get £1600 or less for that item - another con. - you might also even get 'cashback' - another offer added onto the deal / finance.

what a sweet world we live in when this is still allowed to continue by companies the general public class a 'respectable' just because they advertise a lot and have been around a while.

How successful was it:

It's very successful, just see any DFS ad on the telly - it's always mentioned.

How should MoneySavers counter it:

Don't ever let the sales rep know you want finance even if you do - talk like a cash buyer - never let them get into finance mode like 'how much a month can you afford' etc - just talk about cash - if they try to sniff you for finance just say 'I dont need credit'.

Then bargain hard on the price and shake on it - then drop the bombshell that you will take advantage after all of the finance offers of 0% and free for a year - they will protest loudly - son't give in to them - you protest loudly (best sunday afternoon) threaten them with trading standards and if needs be do so.

if they have room you will get your prioce and finance offer too - then you have the best deal - even then you will be paying for the 0% and the extra time but you will be getting the goods at near cost price.

Hope this helps

From a very good salesman