I came across this headline phrase earlier today. It immediately caught my attention and set me thinking. My first thought was that it is most definitely true. Looking at it from my own perspective, if I feel that I am being put under pressure to make a purchase it will have the opposite effect, putting me off rather than encouraging me. Rather like the relationship many parents have with their teenage children; if the parent reminds the teenager of something they need to do the result is often a backlash which results in the thing not being done at all. (My apologies to any teenagers reading this – but it’s true!) What is intended as encouragement can become a barrier.
On the motorway, if I am making a correct and legal overtaking manoeuvre and some lunatic comes charging up behind me at an illegal speed with lights flashing and horn blaring (effectively screaming at me to get out of the way) I find that my correct and legal manoeuvre seems to take me longer than it normally would. Do any of my readers find themselves responding in a similar fashion? We probably shouldn’t respond in that way, even though it is the idiot in the other vehicle who has the problem rather than us, but it is an instinctive reaction. The more we are pushed in any aspect of human experience, the more we tend to dig our heels in.
With regard to the ‘buying’ part of the headline statement, we hear talk of retail therapy. After a difficult time, a depressing series of events, a period of just feeling one degree under, a lot of people find that a shopping expedition is just what they need as a pick-me-up. A trip to purchase new clothes, new shoes or new items for a favourite hobby or interest is just what is needed to put the world to rights. It is true that people do love to buy, but on their terms!
One of the key skills of marketing, whether online or off, is to present your products or services to potential customers in a way which captures their interest without making them feel that they are being pressured in any way. The ‘hard sell’ will usually be counterproductive. Far from drawing customers in it will send them to someone else’s website. Within the internet marketing community we speak of building relationships with our customers; of nurturing them. This is the approach which will ultimately give us the sales we need to keep our businesses going. Invite your website visitors in, don’t drive them away.
So the headline is undoubtedly true. Always try to encourage people to buy rather than bully, brow-beat or pressure them; your results will be much, much better.
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