Selling Against The Odds

I just wanted to tell you a little and true story about a man who decided to sell collectable stamps on e bay. Before he did he researched his competition and realised almost to his dismay that there were already over 150,000 persons selling the same product. Instead of feeling disheartened he researched the way they sold their products, their presentation, the wording they used in describing their products etc.He discovered that most did not care how they presented their goods.

He decided he would take time in presenting the stamps, colour coding and organising the stamps in size order so they would look neat and be pleasing to the eye, buying good display sheets to present them on, adding value with volume and describing them with words such as excellent, superb, a bumper lot and so on.

Then came the service, whenever someone purchased a set of stamps, he always posted them the next working day, never charged more than he had to for postage and allowed customers to build up their collections to provide the best possible postage discount. More importantly he always informed the clients when the stamps had been posted and spent time ensuring the stamps were in padded paper, sealed in waterproof polythene bags and protected in reinforced envelopes.

If he made a mistake he would rectify it by giving a full refund, let the clients keep the stamps and send replacements.

The result of all of this is that he has, in a very short space of time, sold over 20,000 sets of stamps, has clients all over the world, many of which return time and again to purchase more. The secret to success has been in the presentation, positive descriptions, quality of service and a passion to treat the client fairly and put the customer first in all things.

To him there are no odds to fear and if there are these can be reduced to almost nothing by adopting the above.

No matter what we are selling their will always be odds against you, but preparation, taking time, putting quality first, good service, a tradition of excellence and putting customers first will reduce them considerably and make you and your company a winner.