HOW TO SELL
AN IDEA
by Elmer Wheeler
----------------
HAVE YOU ever approached your boss with a red-hot idea for
increasing efficiency--only to have him become resentful instead
of enthusiastic? Have you ever offered your wife or the
neighbours "good advice"? If you have, you know what I mean when
I say that people resent having other people's ideas forced on
them.
When someone approaches us with a new idea, our instinctive
reaction is to put up a defense against it. We feel that we must
protect our individuality;and most of us are egotistical enough
to think that our ideas are better than anyone else's.
There are three tested rules for putting your ideas across
to other people so as to arouse their enthusiasm. Here they are:
Rule One: Use a fly rod--not a feeding tube. Others won't
accept your idea until they can accept it as their idea.
It was said during World War I that Colonel House was the
most powerful man in the world because he controlled the most
powerful man in the world--Woodrow Wilson. "I learned that the
best way to convert him to an idea," explained House, "was to
plant it in his mind casually, to get him thinking about it on
his own account."
When you want to sell someone an idea, take a lesson from
the fisherman who casts his fly temptingly near the trout. He
could never ram the hook into the trout's mouth. But he can
entice the trout to come to the hook.
Don't appear too anxious to have your ideas accepted. Just
bring them out where they can be seen.
"Have you considered this?" is better than "This is the
way." "Do you think this would work?" is better than "Here's
what we should do."
Let the other fellow sell himself on your idea. Then he'll
stay sold.
Rule Two: Let the other fellow argue your case. He
instinctively feels called upon to raise some objection to save
his face. Give him a chance to disagree with you--by presenting
your own objections!
"The way to convince another," said wise old Ben Franklin,
"is to state your case moderately and accurately. Then say that
of course you may be mistaken about it; which causes your
listener to receive what you have to say and, like as not, turn
about and convince you of it, since you are in doubt. But if you
go at him in a tone of positiveness and arrogance you only make
an opponent of him."
Franklin used this technique, against great opposition, in
his sale of the idea of adopting the Constitution of the United
States.
"I confess," he began, "that I do not entirely approve of
this Constitution; but Sir, I am not sure I shall never approve
it; for having lived long, I have experienced many instances of
being obliged by better information or fuller consideration to
change opinions, even on important subjects, which I first
thought right. I cannot help expressing a wish that every member
of the convention who may still have objections to it would with
me on this occasion doubt a little of his own infallibility, and,
to make manifest our unanimity, put his name to this instrument."
Abraham Lincoln used the same technique in selling his ideas
to a jury. He argued both sides of the case--but there was
always the subtle suggestion that his side was the logical one.
An opposing lawyer said of him:"He made a better statement of my
case to the jury than I could have made myself."
Another technique is to sell the other fellow the idea as
his, not yours. "You gave me an idea the other day that started
me thinking," you begin.
Tom Reed, for many years Speaker of the House, was an adroit
persuader. At a committee hearing he would remain silent until
everyone had had his say, making notes of all objections. Then,
when everyone else was argued out, Reed would say, "Gentlemen,
it seems to me that what has been said here can be summarized as
follows..." Reed would then present his ideas--and sell them.
Once Dudley Nichols, the movie director, wasn't satisfied
with a scene in one of his pictures. To remedy the situation,
he said to Rosalind Russell, the star, "Wonderful, wonderful, but
I could see, Miss Russell, when you hesitated that brief instant,
that you were thinking about the possibility of playing the scene
down just a trifle more. Shall we try once the way you were
thinking?"
Rule Three: Ask--don't tell. Patrick Henry, another famous
idea salesman, was a political unknown when first elected to
Virginia's House of Burgesses--but every resolution he introduced
was passed. Listen to him in his famous "Liberty or Death"
speech and see how he uses questions to get his ideas across:
"Our brethren are already in the field--why stand we here
idle?"
"Shall we lie supinely on our backs?"
"What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is
life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price
of chains and slavery?"
Try saying the same thing in positive statements and see how
much antagonism it would invoke.
When you put your ideas across with questions, you give the
other fellow a share in the idea. You don't tell him--you ask
him for the answer. You're giving him a chance to sell himself.
Try these rules the next time you want to put an idea across
to your boss, your family or the neighbours.(#)
LINKS TO OTHER "Art of Living" ARTICLES ON THE SECOND FLOOR
SIMPLIFY! SIMPLIFY! by Thoreau
GOING HOME by Hamill
THE ART OF PAYING A COMPLIMENT by Adams
PUT YOUR BEST VOICE FORWARD by Price
THAT VITAL SPARK--HOPE by Whitman
BUT WHAT USE IS IT? by Asimov
NO WONDER by Sangster
MAKE AN APPOINTMENT WITH YOURSELF by Finkel
HEARING IS A WAY OF TOUCHING by Lagemann
THE SPECIAL JOY OF SUPER-SLOW READING by Piddington
YOU'RE SMARTER THAN YOU THINK by Lynch
I'M A COMPULSIVE LIST-MAKER by Bluestone
HOW TO RELAX by Kennedy
THE ONE SURE WAY TO HAPPINESS by Callwood
TOO MUCH SEX, TOO LITTLE JOY by May
HOW TO BE A BETTER PARENT by Homan
FIVE WAYS TO IMPROVE YOUR LUCK by Gunther
THERE IS SAFE WAY TO DRINK by Chafetz
TAKE MUSIC INSTEAD OF A MILTOWN by Marek
VIEW FEATURE RECIPE
ENTER CUISINE CORNER
Under construction but accessible too.
(Recommended)
ENTER CHILDREN'S ROOM
Specially adapted short stories for young people of all ages, from all over the world, by Amy Friedman.
(Very good fables.)
ASCEND TO THIRD FLOOR
Heavy stuff that were lifted by several decades to its present location, ZDS' third floor.
You can't find writers who can still keep their distance from their topics like these two.
(Highly recommended for the philosophical. Not too easy to digest in one sitting. Anyway, it's better than tons of history and anthropology books.)
DESCEND TO FIRST FLOOR
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