Statistics show that it will take seven visits to your website before you manage to close a sale. Or seven visits to a client from your salesman.
If you put yourself on the customer’s side, it’s not that strange. You need to trust the person you buy from, you want to do some research to make sure the product they offer is good at the right price.
What if I tell you that there is a shortcut?
It’s 8.43 am, I’m on a train to Gatwick Airport. It’s not too busy so it feels like I might be on the wrong train. The person sitting in front of me must have the same feeling as I hear she asks the person next to her and who just nods on an unfriendly manner.
We stop at East Croydon and the announcement clearly states that this train stops to Gatwick, so I fee relieved and I continue reading my book.
The guy who, understandably, that unfriendly nod didn’t convince him, asks me then: “is this train going to Gatwick? I didn’t pay attention to the announcements’. I reply: “I hope you or else we both have a problem”, trying to be funny and make that person feel I’m approachable. So we start a conversation and one thing brings to another and eventually we find out we might have some business we can do together. We exchange cards with the promise that we should get in touch after our trips.
It’s not the first time this has happened to me, it has been the case in parties or planes. And what it shows is that if you are nice to people, they trust you. They still don’t know how I am in business but the personal connection has given them the confidence to do business with me.
What I have learned is that opportunities are everywhere and if you are nice to people you get a better chance to grab them. When you are a small business or a freelancer, it’s better to be good and an unfriendly nod.