No
…or rather “No thank you”.
One after another all the people going to and from the car park said “No”.
No, they did not want to enter a prize draw to win a Mini – or even £10,000 which is the alternative prize the company has just added.
I can usually rely on somebody to go for it – which is why I consistently get two entry forms filled in every day and thus comfortably fill my quota of people to talk to about my business.
But not yesterday. Yesterday they were in a hurry or their parking ticket was running out or they had ice cream in their shopping bag and it would melt… or to put it another way, if they didn’t want to enter my draw, one excuse was as good as another.
So today I changed tack. Instead of setting the target of two forms filled in, I set one of five “no’s” – the assumption being that before I reached it, I would pass my old target of people to talk to without even trying.
This is what happened:
“Hello, can you do me a favour?”
- Yes, what can I do?”
“Well every day I try and find 5 people who don’t want to win £10,000 or a new car – would you be one of those?”
The first four people looked at me as if I was mad. Then they made an excuse and scuttled off.
The fifth said: “What do you mean ‘people who don’t want to win £10,000.”
“Exactly that,” I told her. “I need people to enter this prize draw and I don’t like them saying ‘No’ so I ask for people who don’t want to enter and that way I get a result. It’s much more satisfying.”
She looked at me and weighed me up. Then she decided to be awkward: “All right then, I do want to enter your draw.”
Wearily I opened my folder and started writing down her name. Then she wanted to know what it was all about and I had to tell her that as well. Finally she wanted to know how I could save her 25% off her household bills to begin with and why that saving would increase as time goes by.
And as a final insult, she insisted I go round tomorrow to do an asessment.
She’ll probably want me to sign her up as well. Really! some people have no consideration…
There is a postscript to all this. As I was driving off, congratulating myself on my appointment, I suddenly realised that I had failed to get my five “no’s”. I was still on four – so I took the exit and ended up in the PC World car park. For some reason it was empty and then it transpired that there had been a power cut. The staff were all outside sending the customers away.
Fortunately for me the young man who explained this also said he was too busy to enter a draw so instead I gave him a card.
“What’s this?” he said.
“It’s about money,” I told him. “Are you interested in money?”
- I certainly am.
“Saving it or making it?”
- Well both…
And now he says he’s coming to our open evening….
Just think: If I’d been going for yes’s – or more precisely, one appointment a day, I would never have met him.