Earlier in the week, I was skimming through Chapter 3 of the textbook, which covered social responsibility and ethics. I came across a heading that immediately evoked a bad memory of being pressured into a purchase.
High-pressure selling: “… selling that persuades people to buy goods they had no thought of buying.
This had actually happened several months ago (before I had a class on marketing!). I was strolling around the mall, looking for a novel to purchase when I was suddenly approached by a pushcart salesman wearing an apron who was selling some face-wash. Our 30 minute “conversation” included a high starting price which got lower and lower every few minutes; his side-kick showing up midway to add pressure; him ridiculing my $5 soaps; and some motor-mouth smooth talking. I eventually got suckered into spending $55 on a face wash, and $10 on a bar soap.
At the end of the day, I was annoyed at myself – I had never spent more than $10 on a face-wash and yet, in my hand was a bar soap and a “Dead Sea, cucumber extract” 120ml bottle of face-wash which cost me a ridiculous sum of money (in my opinion, at least!). I had absolutely no intention of buying any face-wash that day, or even spend any money on anything apart from a novel, but yet, he had managed to break my willpower!!
Sure, it wasn’t the most ethical way to make a sale… but did it work? Yes.
As the textbook states, such tactics may work in one-time selling situations for short-term gain, but it can do serious damage to long-term relationships with valued customers. But damaging long-term relationships goes against the basic fundamentals of marketing strategies, so why did he do that? Probably because he had no interest in really marketing the product to me, but more so in the commissions that he would receive in the sale.
Ugh, high pressure sales tactics, every true marketer’s nightmare – there’s probably a Marketing Director cringing somewhere right now!