The phone interrupted our evening, “don’t answer it”, my wife said. “It’s that lawn care salesman calling back”.  Thirty minutes later, the phone rings again and I pick it up, thinking it might be important but quietly hoping its the salesman.

“What’s this guy going to offer”, I wondered.  Whatever it is, I’m not buying but I just want to hear his spiel.  Sure enough, he was calling to sell me lawn service and he launched right into his sales pitch. I didn’t ask questions or show interest, I simply said yes at the appropriate moments and took notes as talked.  Here’s the selling tactics I observed:

We’re Professionals, We’re Special

“You know the EPA won’t let consumer apply the same stuff as the pros, what you put down from Home Depot will only green it up but it won’t build up your lawn”.

My yard needs something I can’t give it. I need him to give my yard special treatment.

The Industry Sucks, But We’re Different

“The whole lawn care industry will sell you stuff to green up your grass and make it grow faster. You can do it yourself if you’d like but you’ll just green it up and grow more weeds.”

It’s a conspiracy, everyone’s in on it, EXCEPT him : )

The Special Sauce

“Anyone can make your yard green but we build up your root system for a healthier lawn.”

Perfect, he’s better than everyone else but I can’t see the root results, I’ll just have to take his word for it.

Here’s the point where I give my first thanks but no thanks.  I say he definitely knows a lot about grass but I’m not in the market for a lawn service.  I don’t tell him this but come on buddy, it’s just fescue.  There’s a lot more important things going on in my life right now than blades of grass.

The Fear Tactic

“Do you know how much a good lawn will raise the resale value of your house? It’ll bring it up 3-5%, bare minimum.”

If I don’t hire him tonight, I’ll get thousands of dollars less for our home when we sell it someday.

Tell a Story Tactic

I didn’t capture the whole story but his grandfather told his day 40 years there are two things that sell a house, the front yard and the front door.  His dad is a “dingbat”, he didn’t listen to his grandfather and couldn’t sell the house. 

So he makes the product more personal, it really does work, his dad didn’t listen and paid the price.

Experience Tactic

“I’ve been doing this for 20 years.”

I politely say no again and he turns up the sales pitch.

• You don’t have to start out with the full 7 steps
• What I want for your lawn is to put you on 5 step program
• Save money on grub control, weed & feed, and grass seed
• We’ll get rid of your grubs, guaranteed!

He’s pressing the right buttons, I can save money and don’t have to commit to a whole year. I’m not interested but he makes it seem like a good deal, if I was remotely interested he might have swayed me there. I thank him for his time, say I’ve learned something but I’m not interested.  Somehow I knew that wouldn’t be the end of it.

Free Trial Tactic

“Let me work with you, I’ll show you results.  What you’re spending your money on right now won’t work.  I’ll give you the first treatment free if you just try it.”

I’m starting to feel a little squirming from him.  He senses my disinterest and wants to close a sale so he starts throwing in free trials.  I probably could have talked him into an additional deal but I was starting to get irritated.  Again I come back with “no thanks” and he decides to give it one last try.

Guilt Tactic

“So you’re not looking to improve your lawn huh?  What you just don’t care about it?”

Now he’s really getting under my skin. Like a good sales person he won’t take no for an answer. Of course I have no intention of buying and don’t want to waste anymore time.  I brush off his next appeal of “just let Let me do the first two applications and you can see how it goes”.  He finally gets the picture. Now that he sees I’m a dead lead he’s off the phone in seconds, surely off dialing someone else who hopefully cares a little more about their blades of grass.

Smart Sales Strategies
Retailers are offering sales announcements, special deals, and exclusive coupons to people that sign up for their email newsletter, rewards program, or store credit cards. When a customer signs up for any of these, the retailer increases their chances the person will spend more money, more frequently since the retailer now has the opportunity to market directly to their postal or email inbox.  Although the store may not make as much on the initial discounted purchase they hope to continue to sell to those people over time.

Online Shopping
One thing many of the retailer newsletters will do is direct customers to deals online where they can save money with coupon codes or reduced/free shipping.  Even if the customer never sets foot in the store again, they can still make the retailer money by shopping online.  Instead of making a person come into the store and wait in line to make a sale they can offer them the ease and convenience of clicking a Buy button on their home computer.

Gift Card Promotions
Another tactic that stores are using to prop up sales without cutting as deep into their bottom line is the use of gift card promotions. The Smart Money article gives the example of DSW Shoe Warehouse that offers a $10 bonus gift card for use Jan. 14 through Feb. 3, when a person purchases a $50 gift card.

Since a percentage of gift cards go unused or under-used, retailers can increase sales without actually selling merchandise in some cases.  In another example, Best Buy is giving $10 cards to those who buy the “Spider-Man 3″ DVD and videogame. People pay full price for the item but still feel as though they saved $10 on their purchase.  The retailers come out ahead when that customer never uses the card or maybe even uses it towards buying a $20 – $30 item they wouldn’t have purchased without the gift card.

Smart Shopping
As a consumer, you can still take advantage of the sales, discounts, and promotions offered over the holidays, just make sure you use them to save money, and don’t fall into the trap of spending more because of them.

Have you read my post on How 5 Minutes Can Save You $120?  If so, beware the advice I gave because it may come back to bite you!

How 5 Minutes Can Cost You $180
Comcast just pulled a version of bait and switch on me today; don’t fall into the same trap. I didn’t give the details in my original post, but I was able to drop my cable bill $20 a month for 6 months by upgrading from Expanded Basic to Digital Cable.  What I didn’t know is that I was actually setting myself up to lose money in the long run.

Comcast Baits the Trap
At the time Comcast offered several tiers of service: Limited Basic, Extended Basic, and Digital Cable.  I felt I was paying more money for cable than I needed to be. We receive many, many channels we don’t watch and wanted something in between the Limited & Extended Basic plans in terms of channels available and rates.  They didn’t offer such a package and wouldn’t give me a discount on Extended Basic but did make the offer to drop $20 a month from my current bill if I upgraded for “free trial” of Digital Cable.  I wasn’t really interested in Digital Cable but wanted the discount so I agreed to the deal.  I specifically asked the phone rep if I could switch back to Extended Basic after the 6 months ended and he assured me that I could.

The Trap is Sprung
My six months has ended so my cable bill jumped back up, not to the Extended Basic rate but the even higher Digital Cable rate.  I took in my digital box today to cancel Digital Cable and revert back to Extended Basic and they informed me that was no longer an option.  Comcast is phasing out Extended Basic and slowly moving channels over to Digital Cable in preparation for a 2009 change to all digital broadcasting.

Comcast’s Bait & Switch
Comcast knew what they were doing six months ago when they baited me into changing over to Digital Cable.  They knew Extended Basic was going away and that I wouldn’t be able to change back to the service when my promotion ended. 

I’m not sure what angers me more, the fact the phone rep lied to me last spring or the horrible customer service they offered when delivering the news today.  Their only response to my protests about being lied to was:

“We apologize an uninformed associate gave you the wrong information but we can’t help you.  We’re not allowing anyone to transfer to Extended Basic”.

A company that values their customers and discovers that one of their employees misled a customer will take the necessary action and correct the wrong in the eyes of the customer.  The fact that Comcast isn’t willing to do that leads me to believe they knew exactly what they were doing when they made the offer and intentionally lied to me in order to convert me over to Digital Cable.

Financial Implications
Now I’m faced with the option of paying an extra $15 a month for Digital Cable ($180 annual increase) or looking for an alternative.  For whatever reason, Comcast is the only cable option in my part of the city so I’ll have to research the Dish network or DIRECTV.  Be aware of this tactic since Comcast seems to be heavily promoting the Digital Cable route.  As I stood in line today I heard the reps try and push the digital box on many other customers.  You’ve been warned : )

Investors Business Daily Free Trial

Are free trials a selling tactic, a useful tool for consumers, or both?  I received a lot of comments and emails on the Free Trial Offer post the other day and decided to dig into this one a little more by looking at a free trial offer from Investors Business Daily.

Investing Research
The story actually begins 8 years ago. When I graduated from college and started my first job I went from making no money at all to earning $40K a year.  Suddenly I had all this money coming in and decided I wanted to invest some of it but didn’t know where.  I signed up for the Investors Business Daily  to learn more about investing and would pour through it every day during my lunch break and after work.  Soon I began working insanely long hours, with no time to read the paper so I canceled the service and dumped all my money into a mutual fund.

Service Referral
Fast forward to the present. I was visiting with a co-worker yesterday who subscribes to Investors Business Daily and always raves about the investing news and tools they provide.  He encouraged me to give it try but I balked since I’m used to reading all my financial information online.  When he mentioned they have an online digital edition as well and that I could sign up for a 4 week trial period I decided to check it out.

Free Trials
After researching the offer a little I realized this was a perfect example of how free trials are both sales tactics and good consumer screening tools. I would never sign up for a service that charged a monthly fee without knowing more about what value it would offer me in return for my money.  A referral is what began the process but my interest would never have made it past that initial conversation without the free trial.

So the sales tactic worked, it convinced me to sign up for a service I would not have otherwise.  Of course, this was a type of service I had already been interested in and had been considering so it benefits me as well.  The free trial allows me to see if I can put the financial information in Investors Business Daily to good use without costing me any cash.

Protecting My Paycheck
Since signing up for the free trial requires you to put your credit card on file, I was sure to check out the terms of the offer and the cancellation policy before signing up.

“For free trial access to eIBD and the IBD Investing Tools on investors.com, please enter your credit card information and billing address. You may cancel any time during the four-week free trial period. If you opt to cancel, you will not be billed. Otherwise, after your free trial period, we will bill you for your subscription automatically, at the current monthly rate of $28.95 (US). Thereafter, your eIBD subscription will renew automatically on a monthly basis, and we will charge the credit card we have on file.”

After calling the 1–800 number they provide to make sure I could easily cancel if I decided against the subscription I felt like I had covered my bases.

Trying It Out

After signing up for the free trial I was taken to an upsell page where I was given a long list of trial offers for other financial services and products. I opted against any of those and was taken to the confirmation page, one free trial at a time is enough to keep track of. The free offer was an effective selling tactic, now I just have to take advantage of the trial period and decide whether the service is for me or not.

Come on, sign up and give it a try.  The first 30 days are free, if you don’t like it just bring it back.

Sound familiar? How many times have you been talked into signing up for a service or buying a subscription because they offer a free trial?

“I’ll just see what it’s like”, you tell yourself.  “If I decide I don’t want it, I’ll just cancel.” The trial period goes by quickly, life gets busy, and suddenly the time to cancel has passed and you’ve been billed for the first month.  You call back to cancel when you see the charge come through on your card.  Sometimes they’ll give you a pro-rated refund other times they won’t give back a dime.

The free trial is an effective technique for sellers.  Their ideal scenario is that you will fall in love with their product or service and decide you must have it.  Another common situation is one where you aren’t really using their service but forget you signed up and the recurring payments on your credit card stay under your radar for a while before you cancel.

Of course a free trial can be a valuable offer to you as a consumer if there is a product or service you’d really like to try out before committing to it.  Just be aware that companies can use the free trial offer to entice you into closing the deal.

Warning Signs
• First 30 Days Free  • Absolutely No Obligation 
• Risk Free Trial        • First Issue Free
 

Tactic In Action
When I bought my last cell phone several years ago Sprint PCS was offering a 30 day trial of their Vision service that allowed you to browse their online content with your phone.  The salesperson convinced me to try the service when I activated my phone and sure enough the trial period came and went and I didn’t cancel. 

Not only did I get charged after the 30 days were over, Sprint also billed me for my “free trial”, they “forgot” to give it to me for free. The half hour I had to spend on the phone convincing customer service they had billed me incorrectly for something that was suppose to be free was definitely not worth the few minutes of time I surfed around the web on my phone.

Protect Your Paycheck
Trial Period Reminder – As soon as you sign up for a trial period, mark on your calendar two days before it ends to remind yourself to cancel.

Beware the Asterisk – Many free trial ads are followed by an asterisk that give the fine print of the offer.  Make sure you know the rules before giving anyone your credit card number.

Just Say No – Often times the process of canceling a free trial is more hassle than it’s worth.  Unless you’re actively looking to review and buy a product or service, just say no to free trials.

Sales Tactics
Free Trial Offer is the 7^th sales trick in the Sales Tactics Revealed series. Be sure to check out the first six if you haven’t already: Don’t Miss Out, You’ll Be Sorry, Buy Now, Pay Later, Rebate Ransom, Sales Events, and Preferred Customer.

Remember the high school cafeteria where all the coolest kids sat at their own table?  You wouldn’t likely sit there without an invitation, what some people wouldn’t give for an invite like that.  Hopefully we’ve all grown up some since high school but everyone likes to feel special and a preferred customer invitation can still be hard to turn down.

Retailers love to pull out the Preferred Customer tactic when gunning for sales. A common approach is to send out a letter or email announcing a big sales event that is open to special customers only. “How did I become a preferred customer?”, you ask yourself.  “Oh well, who cares, I don’t want to miss out on preferred customer pricing”.

The truth of course is that retailers invite you because they prefer that you spend your money with them instead of someone else, making you a preferred customer. 

Warning Signs 
• Everyone Else Pays $100, You Pay $70  • Invitation Only
• Available Only for Preferred Customers  
• Use Your Preferred Customer Card

Tactic In Action
I received some sales letters from a local company a while back that epitomize the Preferred Customer tactic.  Here are some excerpts:

I truly appreciate your business. To prove it I’ve created an exclusive savings event just for you, something that WILL NOT BE ADVERTISED to the general public and will be available by invitation only!

Just mention this letter’s Special Financing and Savings and simply show your salesperson the enclosed card!

Because you’re a Preferred Customer, we want to offer you the price normally reserved for our Supplier Representatives for a LIMITED TIME only.  Supplier Pricing is the special low price offered to the representatives who sell supplies and services to us.

Offering Supplier Pricing to the public is a very rare event. On top of this special pricing, you can take advantage of Half-Off Delivery too!

What do you think?  Would this letter send you running as a preferred customer to the sale?

Protect Your Paycheck
At the bottom of the sales letter there is an interesting footnote:

“Because of the competitive nature of our business, some items may already be priced at or below Supplier Pricing.”

What I hear them saying is that they already offer the equivalent of Supplier Pricing on some items to the general public. If anyone can buy things at this price, what benefit is there to being a preferred customer?

In general it’s best to steer clear of Preferred Customer events.  They’re just a gimmick to get you into the store and give the retailer an opportunity to sell to you.  If you do attend one, remind the salesperson you’re a “preferred customer”. Tell them as a preferred customer you want special pricing below the advertised rates.  Chances are you’ll get a big fat NO.  If they’re willing to negotiate further then by all means take advantage of your preferred customer status : )

Sales Tactics
Preferred Customer is the 6^th sales trick in the Sales Tactics Revealed series. Be sure to check out the first five if you haven’t already: Don’t Miss Out, You’ll Be Sorry, Buy Now, Pay Later, Rebate Ransom, and Sales Events.

Shop, Shop, Shop
Why is it that every holiday seems to be all about shopping?  We finally get a day off work, a break from earning money all week.  We finally have time all to ourselves.  At last, we can forget about the office and do whatever we want, yet the retailers get us to hit the stores looking for deals.  How do they convince us, by having a “fabulous” sales event!

Reasons to Shop
The sellers have turned every holiday or life event into either a day we shop or a day we shop to prepare for. Every time you walk into a store, they are reminding you of some event that you need to spend money on, for example:

• Beginning of Summer
• Back to School
• Father’s Day
• Christmas
• Thanksgiving
• 4th of July
• Easter
• Labor Day
• March Madness
• Mother’s Day
• Valentines Day
• Halloween
• New Years
• Memorial Day
• Graduation

When there is no holiday or life event, they make up reasons to have a big sales event:

• Inventory Sale
• Customer Appreciation Event
• Spring Cleaning Sale

Warning Signs 
• 4th of July Blowout   • Holiday Sales Event
• Open now for our special Thanksgiving offer
• Countdown: 3 weeks, 2 days, 5 days until Christmas

Tactic in Action
Why do we drag ourselves out of bed the day after Thanksgiving?  We have a day off, why can’t we just enjoy it?  Why do we have to spend all day long being stressed out and waiting in line?   I’ll tell you why, Black Friday is the first day of the year some retailers start to make a profit.  They WANT you in those stores, they NEED you in those stores, and they’ll do whatever they can to get you there and spending money. 

Protect Your Paycheck
Shop Offseason
Retailers will sometimes stock up on certain items to sell during a sales event.  Think decorative lights during Christmas, candy for Halloween, or summer clothes for Beginning of Summer Sale.  Once the event, holiday, or season is over they may find themselves with too much of certain products and start discounting it for faster sale.  Try to shop at the end of sales events instead of the beginning and you can save money.

Sales Tactics
Sales Event is the 5^th sales trick in the Sales Tactics Revealed series. Be sure to check out the first four as well: Don’t Miss Out, You’ll Be Sorry, Buy Now, Pay Later, and Rebate Ransom.

We have your money!  We’ll give it back if you follow these specific steps.  Make one mistake and we’ll keep the cash!

Sound like a ransom note to you?  Think again, it’s actually the crumpled rebate receipt in your wallet!  When you buy something with a mail-in rebate the seller is holding the money you “saved” for ransom.  The crazy part is that we willingly volunteer our money for ransom AND feel like we are saving money! The Rebate Ransom technique is the next trick we’ll discuss in the Sales Tactics Revealed series.[Photo credit ninjapoodle]

Three Strikes You’re Out
In the heat of shopping frenzy we’re overcome by the seeming great bargain and fall for the rebate, strike one. We pay full price and add the rebate to our “To Do” list. Life gets in the way and we put off submitting the paperwork, strike two.  The day before the deadline we rush to mail in the paperwork and overlook a minute detail in the fine print, strike three. We’re out the money!

If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone.  According to a Business Week article from 2005 an estimated 40% of people fail to apply or have their application rejected for rebates every year. This is a very effective tactic; retailers get us to focus on the discount price while still charging the full amount.  With so many people not redeeming their rebates for one reason or another they’ve found a way to offer discounts without actually honoring it almost half the time!

Warning Signs
• Only $1 after Rebate!   • Free After Rebate

Tactic in Action
I think most everyone has encountered this scenario at least once so an example probably isn’t needed.  Whether we’re too busy to mail it in, we lose the receipt, we don’t feel like sorting through the terms & conditions of each rebate, or the check just never comes there are many reasons why rebates fail to pay out.  Despite all these problems, we continue to fall for this sales tactic.  What can we do to protect ourselves against it?

Protect Your Paycheck
Rebate Reminder
Often times, the price after rebate really is a good deal IF you can get your money back.  Before you decide to purchase the item, schedule the date when you’ll mail in the rebate information.  Write the date the rebate is due on your receipt at the checkout counter.  Then when you get home login to Rebate Reminder and setup a reminder so you don’t let your money go unclaimed.

Time Is Money
Remember, time is money.  How much time will you spend getting back your money from the rebate company? Is it worth the money you’ll save? Sometimes it feels like sending in your rebate info is more paperwork than buying a house or doing your taxes!  Want to see how much time other people have wasted, just do a Google search on “rebate hell”.

What Box Do I Check for Tax-back?
When you purchase an item with a mail-in rebate you pay tax on the full price, not the price after rebate.  Guess what, there’s no box on the rebate form to check to get your money back. On a big ticket item such as home appliances, big screen televisions, or computers that tax can add up.  Remind yourself that you’re taxed on the purchase price, not price after rebate.

Sales Tactics
Rebate Ransom in the 4^th sales trick in the Sales Tactics Revealed series. Make sure to familiarize yourself with the first three as well: Don’t Miss Out, You’ll Be Sorry, and Buy Now, Pay Later.  If you’ve gotten something out of this series, you can subscribe via feedreader or email for coverage of upcoming sales tactics.

Think back to a shopping trip where you almost made a purchase but wisely walked away because you couldn’t afford it.  Bad news, the marketing gurus have found a way to stop that from happening!  When your better judgment screams NO, they use the “Buy Now, Pay Later” sales tactic to ease you into a big purchase. 

This tactic is a retailer’s dream come true.  They can sell to us whether we can afford it or not!  They get us to spend money we don’t even have on what they’re selling.  Instead of feeling uneasy about being able to pay for it, we feel satisfied, like we got something for nothing.

All About the Payment
Buy Now, Pay Later is dangerous for consumers because it puts our focus on the size of the payments, instead of whether we can afford the item.  The sellers love this approach; it breaks down our resistance to spending and makes their sale so much easier.

Using this tactic, the people selling to us delay our decision of whether we can afford something until AFTER we agree to buy it.  The financial implications of the sale sneaks up on us after the sellers already have our money and we’ve passed the return period.  The bad news is this isn’t even the worst thing about the tactic.

Guess What, There’s Interest!
First the retailers convince us to buy from them using their store brand credit card, whether we have the money or not.  Then they add in finance charges on the money we borrow to buy something from them.  So they fool us into feeling as though we can afford their item and then jack up the price by tacking on exorbitant interest!

This tactic works out pretty well for the seller, more sales and extra interest income.  Unfortunately, for every winner there is a loser.  While they make out, we consumers get hosed.

Warning Signs 
• Low Monthly Payment       • No Payments for 1 Year
• Only $40 a Month            • No Money Down!
• 90 Days Same As Cash     • Just 3 Easy Payments! 

Tactic In Action
“I’m paying in cash”, I said for what felt like the millionth time.  The blank stare made it obvious he didn’t encounter this situation frequently and wasn’t sure what to try next.

The Buy Now, Pay Later tactic began soon after the test drive, once we started talking dollars with the car salesman. “What kind of payments are you looking to make?”, the salesman asked. “It’s not size of the payment, it’s about the price of the car!”, I shot back.  “I’ll be paying in cash and am looking to get the lowest price I can.”  He furrowed his brow then launched into his pitch.  “I can put you into this one here for under $400 a month.”

After re-iterating I was paying cash, he came back with the same tactic again. “No point in paying it all up front, how low do you want your payments to be?”  The Buy Now, Pay Later tactic must usually be so successful that he didn’t have any other tricks up his sleeve!  After several more of his attempts, I finally made it clear I was interested in the final price and wouldn’t be distracted by talk of low payments.  After we negotiated a sales price it was on to the sales manager’s office.

“I’m paying in cash”, I responded to the manager’s spiel about a special financing offer. He scowled and asked, “Why pay for it all now?  Why not keep the money and finance through us?”  After several rounds of refusing financing he realized they weren’t to make any money off us via this tactic.

At that point, he mixed in the You’ll Be Sorry tactic.  He talked about the potential problems an extended warranty would cover and “strongly encouraged” us to buy it.  I told him of our plan to put money away every month to cover any future auto expenses, this way we’d only have to pay in the event something went wrong.  “If you buy the extended warranty you’ll be covered right away.  You don’t have to pay for it up front; we can roll it into your loan.”  Once again, I reminded him we were paying cash and firmly refused the extended warranty.

Upon realizing we weren’t going to fall for either the You’ll Be Sorry or Buy Now, Pay Later tactics, the manager quickly finished the paperwork and rushed us out of his office so he could focus on the next customer.

Protect Your Paycheck
The Buy Now, Pay Later tactic can eventually lead to mountains of debt if not overcome.  Here are some things to keep in mind as you try to beat this strategy.

Lifetime Payment Plan
You can pay for anything given enough time.  According to the US Census Bureau the annual household income for 2006 was around $48,000.  Based on those numbers, the average person earning this income each year would earn well over $1 million in their lifetime. So if you think about it, on a payment plan you can afford most things being sold to you, right?

Let’s stop and think about this for a minute.  Think about how much you hate making payments every month.  Why create more for yourself? Who wants to be on a payment plan their whole life?

You Really Will Pay Later
The majority of people who buy on a payment plan end up paying more than sticker price for an item.  Interest charges or late fees can add up to 35% onto the total price.  Sellers know if you fall for Buy Now, Pay Later, they can keep making money off you with late fees and interest charges far into the future.

Your Electronic Speeding Sign
Before easy credit, we only spent what we had.  Now companies are extending credit to practically everyone and we can spend on whatever someone wants to sell us.  Charge cards make it so easy to swipe and carry; we often don’t realize how much we’re spending until we get the bill at the end of the month. What we need is something to remind us of how much we’re spending day to day.

How many times have you cruised past one of these electronic speed signs on the side of the road and been surprised at how fast you were actually going?  Today’s powerful and comfortable cars and (relatively) smooth highway systems make it easy to be unaware of our driving speed.  Similar to the way charge cards allow us to obliviously spend over our budget. 

Some companies offer a feature that you can think of as an electronic speeding sign for your credit card.  You can setup telephone and email alerts to let you know if you have spent more on your card than you have budgeted.  Adding alerts for charges over a certain amount, a certain percentage change in your balance, or a certain balance exceeded can be your own electronic speeding sign to remind you that you’re falling for the Buy Now, Pay Later tactic.

Sales Tactics
That wraps up the third sales trick in the Sales Tactics Revealed series. If you haven’t already, be sure to read the first two, Don’t Miss Out and You’ll Be Sorry.  If you’ve gotten something out of this series, you can subscribe via feedreader or email for coverage of upcoming sales tactics.

Fear of the Unknown
As we go about our lives, there is always a chance something unpleasant could happen.  We don’t fret over the countless things that could go wrong because it’s likely they won’t.  That is, until someone informs us of potential danger and offers to sell us protection against it.  They know if they can trigger fear in us their chances of making money just went up.

This tactic can be used for a wide range of products and services.  Many of you may have encountered this trick through a sales pitch for an extended warranty or some type of insurance.  It can also be used as an upsell to convince you to upgrade to the higher quality product that won’t break down or the service with better coverage.

Fear Factor
The sellers frighten us into paying money NOW for a product or service that either prevents or covers a POTENTIAL FUTURE “threat”.  So they get our money today and they know chances are good they’ll never have to give us our money back.

The crazy part is, they take our money and we feel better!  They scared us into parting with our hard earned paycheck and now we feel safer.   Who do you think wins when we fall for this tactic?

Warning Signs
• Don’t Let it Happen To You! • Sign Up & Sleep Easy
• Put Your Fears to Rest        • No More Worries
• Don’t Become a Statistic!    • New Victim Every 5 Seconds!
• Let Us Protect You!           • Don’t Wait Too Long! 

Tactic In Action
A friend of ours rented a car recently and unknowingly encountered a master of the “You’ll Be Sorry” tactic.  As she signed the paperwork for the week long rental the sneaky salesman asked, “Would you like to add the protection of rental car insurance for just $10 a day?”  She declined, mentioning her auto insurance covered rental cars. 

“How high is your deductible?” he asked, his mouth watering for an upsell.  Upon learning she was responsible for the first $500 he moved in for the kill.  “Well, would you rather pay $70 or $500?”, he asked persuasively.  He followed it up with the knock-out punch,“Some insurance doesn’t cover all the potential costs of an accident.  You’d be better off paying less and getting full coverage.”  The fear reaction kicked in overriding her logic and our friend caved, signing up for the insurance.

Our friend lived with the “threat” of paying a $500 deductible every day she drove her own car.  What was different about the rental car?  Nothing, of course!  She was just duped by the “You’ll Be Sorry” tactic.  The salesman comparing the cost of rental insurance with the amount of her deductible was definitely just a ploy.  The $70 insurance was a definite expense vs. a $500 deductible she probably wouldn’t have to pay.  Of course, all he had to do was use this tactic and her logic went out the window.

Protect Your Paycheck
You’ve likely experienced the “You’ll Be Sorry” tactic before and were probably aware they were laying it on in an effort to make a sale.  Here are some things you can do to prepare for the next onslaught and think about when you’re under attack.

Nothing to Fear but Fear Itself
Do you want to spend your money on things you need & want or something the sellers scare you into buying?  It’s your money, how dare they frighten you into spending it!  If you started spending your hard earned money on products and services to protect you against potential threats, you’d be broke before you finished signing up for them all!

Build a Contingency Fund
Create your own contingency reserve.  Put aside the money you would spend each month for the service into a separate bank account.  You get to keep your money if nothing goes wrong and if it does you’re covered!

Second Opinion
Always get a second opinion.  It doesn’t have to be from an expert, just someone who has knowledge of the item and doesn’t have a vested interest in making a sale.  Use your resources: friends, family, co-workers, or search the Internet to validate the claims of whoever is trying to sell to you.

Check Your Coverage
How many times have you tried to cash in on some type of coverage or return a product because it didn’t protect as promised and gotten the line, “I’m sorry, that’s not covered under category 17.2a”?  First they scare you into buying the protection and then when you try to redeem it they try and get out of it!  If you do go for the product or service, make sure you read the fine print.

Sales Tactics
An understanding and awareness of the strategies that others use to sell to you can save you a lot of money.  If you haven’t already, be sure to read the introduction to Sales Tactics Revealed and check out the details on the first tactic, “Don’t Miss Out”.