Going out and selling ducks was a great experience in what selling can look like when you’re not thinking about selling. We realized that selling rubber ducks wasn’t going to get much money. You can’t sell toys as well as you can sell something that really matters. We realized instead of selling ducks, we should raise support for breast cancer awareness. Something more personal would create a higher support base among people on campus.
It was interesting to see how people’s reactions to us changed when we began talking about breast cancer awareness and not being worried about the number of ducks we sold. They seemed like they became more interested in our cause knowing their money was going towards something that would help others. People seemed to care more about helping others than they did about winning a prize in a carnival-type game. That really changed my outlook on what we were selling. We weren’t selling. We were raising support for people who need it.
This experience really helped me realize that selling doesn’t have to be about the number of sales or amount of money made. Bad selling might look like that, but good selling is about helping others. That could be selling someone a product that is going to genuinely help them in their day to day life, or it could be selling something to help others who need it. The selling part is irrelevant. Becoming a curator of information and help for others goes a lot longer in the sales process.
BoweryJE22
It’s fascinating how quickly all of the groups came to learn this completely independently. It speaks to how effective the mindset of helping people is compared to just trying to sell them something. It’s great to see all of this sales training finally paying off!
Great post Aidan! It was very interesting hearing how you guys were able to sell one hundred and fifty dollars worth of ducks in only forty minutes. My team took a different approach by cold-calling people and getting orders this way. It is very interesting to hear what every group did differently.