Want to be Rich? Sell People What They Want to Buy, Not What You Want to Sell Them

It's so painfully simple. Sell clients what they want to buy and you will be rich. 

You can tell by looking at this guy that he doesn't care about you or even what you want 

Ah! But easier said than done. Most salesmen do not get rich because they keep trying to sell people what the salesman has to sell, not what the people want to buy. How can the salesman sell people what they want to buy? How can the salesman know what people want to buy?


Simple. Ask them.


I meet salesmen all the time and constantly have to repeat myself when it comes to this point. No matter how many times I repeat it, it still bears repeating as sales people don't seem to get it: Sell people what they want to buy and you - and what you have to sell - will always be in demand.


It doesn't matter if it is a product or service, or even you, learn what the customer wants and sell that to them. 


I must be poor at explaining this concept to people. Why? Because, yesterday, with my own staff, I had to explain it again, and I've worked with that person for several months! I had to explain it again! Folks, this was at least the 5th or 6th time I've had to go through it.

"Have I got a great deal for you!"

Here it is again: Sell customers what they want to buy, and not what you want to sell them, and you will be rich. Does this sound like some sort of word game or Za Zen Buddhism? It isn't. 


Like I said, my explanation must be bad. Let me try again, this time let me put you into the head of the customer. Imagine that you are the customer in this next scene.


Here goes two examples. One is the example of a bad salesman. The other is a good salesman. Which, as a customer, do you prefer?:


Example A: 


You are the customer. You go into a clothes store because you want to buy a new coat. The salesperson approaches you. The sales person holds up a pair of bright red and white striped slacks and says to you, "Hello! Please buy these pants!" 


Do you buy the pants? Probably not. You probably run out of the store and think this sales clerk is nuts. You certainly don't like being approached this way. And you probably won't go to that store again.


Unfortunately, this is how most salespeople are approaching their sales job today. The honest sales manager and sales person will admit it.


Example B: 


You are the customer. You go into a clothes store because you want to buy a new coat. The salesperson approaches you. The sales person says, "Hello! May I help you find something today?" Do you answer? Do you say, "I'm looking for a coat"?


Yes, you do. Why? Because the salesperson has offered to help you find what you are looking for. The sales person knows where most of the merchandise is located so, if you are really serious, you will respond positively as it saves your time and is convenient.


This salesperson has asked what you want and you answer because you really do want something and you have walked into their shop to look for it.


It is so simple. Find out what the customer wants and see if you can fill their need. 


Aha! But it's different if I am a salesman and I go to the customers home or place of business. This is true. In the example above, the customer has walked into the clothes store for a reason. How does the salesman create communication and trust with a customer - when visiting that customer at home or work - so that they can explore what the customer wants to buy? Simple again. Ask. Create communication. Do not say, "Buy these pants!" Ask how the salesman can help the customer achieve what they want. 

"You don't need a new refrigerator! Buy this car!"

I work with a lot of mass media; broadcasting stations, both TV and radio, and magazines. They all have a problem. Under their traditional way of doing things, they are selling what they want to sell. They are like the sales person in Example A. All of these salespeople make appointments with clients and then go to see them and ask them to buy time slots in programs that have already been decided on. I can't name one broadcasting salesman - and I know several at many different TV and radio stations - who is out asking the clients what they want to buy and making the effort to fill customer needs. (Recently, though, I know a magazine who has been doing that and has begun to do very well doing so).


The broadcasting station salesmen are like used car salesmen in the United States; they are still selling their services they way they were sold 40 years ago: One way sales. Instead of creating open communication and having the ability to answer customer needs - and offer a flexible, wide array of services and choices, the broadcasting stations are still selling time slots on TV and radio. The great salesman will be creative and offer solutions to customers. 

Listen carefully and with an open mind, offer creative solutions

Are you still selling yourself or your services and products the way you were doing it ten or twenty years ago? If you are, then it should be obvious why your sales are bad. Is there any successful company in the world selling things they way they did twenty years ago? Not is the west and not in Japan there aren't.


Become a needs and solutions provider for your customers. Do some research on them. Go to their web page and see what they are doing for in-house promotions. See how you can support. Get information and knowledge. Talk to the customers and ask them what they want.


Find out what they want to buy and help them to get it. Brainstorm and offer creative solutions... Once you do and trust is made, perhaps then and only then, you'll be able to sell them what you want to sell them.


But first you have to find out what they need and help them get it.




This article was inspired by Kimitoshi, Youichi and Tom

Japanese Terrestrial TV Stations Commit Suicide

Yesterday, an era in broadcasting ended for Japan. Terrestrial TV has now gone static and digital broadcasting has begun.


As I have written before, this strikes the death knell for the major Japanese broadcasting stations in Japan. Their ratings and viewership were already at all-time lows. With this conversion, they lose 20 ~ 30% of their audience.


Digital TV subscriptions and tuners are not cheap. In 2011, people with disposable income do not watch TV anymore. As I pointed out in Why the Digital Conversion Will Kill TV Tokyo and TBS:


It seems obvious to me that there's no doubt about it...  Basically:

1) People with money do not watch TV
2) The only people who do watch a lot of TV have either no money or too much time on their hands; they are not active
3) Advertising to people with no money and who are not active is a waste of money.
4) When digital goes online fully, then the only people who don't have the digital equipment are poor people
5) Poor people are the only ones who watch TV Tokyo and TBS now (see #2 above)

The countdown has begun. The digital TV conversion will kill TV Tokyo and TBS.


I also hammered the point home in


The end of analogue TV broadcasting happened yesterday. Kyodo reports:


TOKYO, July 24 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Japanese broadcasters completely digitalized their terrestrial TV broadcasting noon Sunday, ending the analog transmission that began more than a half century ago, except in areas hit hard by March's earthquake and tsunami.

But the telecom ministry estimates some people nationwide have yet to prepare for the analog-to-digital shift and has increased staff for the last-minute campaign to provide people with technical help before analog TVs turn grainy by midnight Sunday.

The broadcasting industry estimates 100,000 households failed to buy essential equipment such as digital tuners and antennas as of Saturday.

In my opinion, those estimates are way off. Even NHK surveys and surveys by Yomiuri newspaper show a 70% ~ 80% rate which definitely repudiates those rosy numbers. 

The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications exempted viewers in Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima prefectures from the nationwide start of the land-based digital TV broadcasting, putting off the project there until March next year.
Japan's analog television service began in 1953.

Japanese broadcasters digitalized their transmission of programs in stages after the relevant law passed parliament in 2001. The digital broadcasting, along with the traditional analog transmission, began inTokyo and two other major cities of Osaka and Nagoya in 2003 and spread nationwide in 2006.

The video talks about the end of analogue TV and how they are getting massive amounts of complaints and inquiries from people about it.... I imagine many people will not be too happy when they find out that they cannot watch TV anymore unless they cough up a few thousand dollars to watch it.

So, it's the beginning of the end. TV is sliding into irrelevance and oblivion. Good riddance.

NHK Blows Away Other Media for Nuclear Updates. Watch Live on UStream!!

If you want to really see what's going on in Japan, you only need to watch NHK news.


Japan's NHK blows away the competition for reporting on the nuclear situation... Amazingly, the staid old school broadcaster is using U-Stream to get the news out to the public.


The other stations are trying to catch up, but it is way too little too late. Checkmate for NHK.



Webcam chat at Ustream
NHK on Ustream? Who needs a TV?


View NHK on Ustream here: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-gtv

The Advertising Scam in Japan

This is a letter I wrote to a business associate....

Don't Waste Money Going Through Old Ad Agencies

Before your company goes and spends a bunch of money on old media through the old channels, please read this.

We specialize in repairing client websites in upgrading to web 2.0 (most are still web 1.0 - so they are 6 years behind). This involves getting bloggers aboard, SEO and daily updates to build community. You can see by the bio that my partners are experts in this field.

Once we do fix the web problems, then we integrate an intelligent Mortar and Click plan that drives old media users to the new media. It is extremely cheap and cost effective under our method.

You can use this info or think of using it in one of two ways: Firstly, we don't mind if you middle-man in the deals, so, say, a TV ad campaign that we charge ¥2.2 million for, you can charge your client's, say, ¥3.2 million for and pocket the ¥1 million (up to you on margins, but I recommend keeping them low, that way word spreads fast). Or, two; using us to represent your projects.

Now, we only focus on travel and airlines (we will expand into fashion later this year).... So that may or may not be your business focus. That's OK. We only work with people we like and trust, so if you are interested, then that's great.

An important point about all of this is that we have to keep it under our hat the prices that we can buy this media for or our connections might get into hot water at the TV stations or magazines. We do not involve the station of magazine/newspaper sales departments in our negotiations; we go directly to hensei (programming department). Since we are media insiders, we know exactly who to talk to, how it works, and when to get the dirt cheap campaigns. Like I mentioned, say, twenty-five 15 second commercials a week on TBS or TV Tokyo, 6 am - 11 pm, normally about ¥16,500,000.... We can do that (and already have many times) for ¥2.2 million.

Anyhow, that's basically it. If you are interested in hearing more, just let me know.

About keeping our deals hush hush; let me explain. The reasons for doing so might surprise you...

For many years Dentsu & crowd have dominated the ad agency market, as you know. They have totally corrupted the process so that there is no transparency between client and agency at all. The bizarre part is that new ad agencies follow this model.

For example, you go to Dentsu to buy a TV commercial. They tell you it costs ¥50,000,000. Then they also tell you it is a 40% margin. You pay ¥70,000,000. The commercial airs. When it is over, you never see the bill from the TV station. You never really do know what the ads cost. 

One thing about this ad business deal that you probably do not know is that the TV, radio, print, etc. they all hate Dentsu also. Why? Because we know what they are doing when they sell the commercials. From the station perspective, they  WANT to discount. But Dentsu has had such a hold for so long that they have frightened the Japanese companies into submission.... This is the big reason we work only with foreign companies. Foreign companies, generally speaking, don't care about Dentsu. There are people inside the broadcasting and print industry who want to take down this Dentsu system and we work with them...So we must stick with foreign companies for now. 10 years from now? Expand into Japanese companies. (Currently, even if a Japanese company wanted to work with us, some old fashioned thinker in marketing would quash it. Why? The Dentsu system has been around for 100 years. Us? 1 year. The old guys are worried that, if they piss of Dentsu, then Dentsu will not help them anymore - not that Dentsu is doing anything for them now!) 

We hope to provide the solution. Koji Kamibayashi and I are industry insiders. Koji and Tim are internet experts. We see an opportunity. We will only deal with foreign companies who are trying to do business in Japan (I mean foreign companies who are trying to sell to the Japanese).

Also, I arranged many barter deals for clients through another new system we developed whereby we have created a sort of "inkai" among our clients and satellite partners.... This was about ¥20,000,000 ~ ¥30,000,000 worth of promotion that I arranged for retainer fee only (¥1,900,000). There was no money passed between our client's and stations for this stuff.

Japan is astronomically high. Dentsu wants to keep it that way....

Dentsu has had such a tight hold on this business for so long that they have frightened the Japanese companies into submission.... Even if Denstu is selling no commercials at all for a TV station, old habits die hard, and the people-in-charge at the stations are afraid that, if they go outside the customary way things have always been done, then Dentsu might get mad at them. 

The key to the future and breaking down the old-guard are the foreign companies in Japan. Foreign companies, generally speaking, don't care about Dentsu. There are people inside the broadcasting and print industry who want to take down this "Dentsu system." 

These are the companies that I like to work with. 

10 years from now? Expand into Japanese companies. (Currently, even if a Japanese company wanted to work with us, some old fashioned thinker in marketing would quash it. Why? The Dentsu system has been around for 100 years. Us? 1 year. The old guys are worried that, if they piss of Dentsu, then Dentsu will not help them anymore - not that Dentsu is doing anything for them now!) 

We hope to provide the solution. Koji Kamibayashi and I are industry insiders. Koji and Tim are internet experts. We see an opportunity. We will only deal with foreign companies who are trying to do business in Japan (I mean foreign companies who are trying to sell to the Japanese - not companies that deal in the Metropolis magazine crowd - no offense intended).

I arranged dozens of barter deals for clients through another new system we developed whereby we have created a sort of "inkai" (business association) among our clients and satellite partners.... This was about ¥20,000,000 ~ ¥30,000,000 worth of promotion that I arranged for retainer fee only (¥1,900,000). There was no money passed between our client's and stations for this stuff (there's lots more, but this is a sample).

Anyhow, like I said, if you need more details, I can come see you. Maybe we'd be good, mutually beneficial partners.


See you,


Mike


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Ad agencies, Dentsu, inkai, broadcasting, bloggers, SEO, travel, airlines, TBS, TV Tokyo