3/2/2022 Joe Girard's SecretJoe Girard sent 10,000 greeting cards a month but that wasn’t the reason why he made it into the Guinness Book of Records. Joe was a car salesman in Michigan in the 1970s. He sent a card every month to every person that had bought a vehicle from him. Each month’s card had a different theme; a Halloween card in October, a Valentine's themed card in February, ‘Enjoy your Vacation’ in August. And inside of each of them he wrote the same thing - ‘I like you’. Joe Girard sent 10,000 greeting cards a month but that wasn’t the reason why he made it into the Guinness Book of Records.
Joe was a car salesman in Michigan in the 1970s. He sent a card every month to every person that had bought a vehicle from him. Each month’s card had a different theme; a Halloween card in October, a Valentine's themed card in February, ‘Enjoy your Vacation’ in August. And inside of each of them he wrote the same thing - ‘I like you’. Joe is listed as the greatest salesman having sold over 1,400 cars in one year, and over 13,000 Cars and trucks over a 12 year period . And none of them in bulk; each one to an individual customer. To put his achievements in context he sold vehicles one at a time and yet sold more vehicles than 90% of all other dealers in North America. What Joe did worked. With so many streams of advertising coming at us and the ease with which our inboxes and letterboxes are filled by marketing messages means that we probably can’t emulate Joe's success by sending cards to our clients and contacts. However in sales, negotiations and mediations we can use his technique. We are hardwired to reciprocate. Research has shown that attempts to get people to complete a questionnaire were far more successful when the questionnaire was sent with a $1 bill than when they were told they would be paid $50 upon the return of the questionnaire. Rather than sending a card, or paying the other party, you can still get benefits from a token concession. This might be allowing the other side to choose the time, date or venue for the negotiation or bringing them a coffee and a doughnut. These ploys might seem transparent but again research has shown that the human urge to reciprocate means that a token gesture is often paid many times over in the value that is given back. This also works in mediations where the parties have often lost all trust in each other and generally can only see the bad side of their opponent; yet a small concession can start a dialogue which leads ultimately to a settlement. Even more so if it is tied to the message that you like the person; we assume that someone who has a lot in common with us is more likely to like us. And in turn, we are more likely to like people if we think they like us. It seems a little liking can go a long way !! Try it. Give something away, or tell someone you like them, and see what you get back.k here to edit. Comments are closed.
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AuthorRichard Marshall is an Accredited Civil and Commercial Mediator with over 25 years experience as a Litigation Solicitor, as well as being a qualified Solicitor-Advocate. He is the founder of Striving to Settle, through which he works as a mediator and provides negotiation training. www.strivingtosettle.co.uk Archives
August 2022
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