The Apple Store as a “Dealership”
Listening to: Nu Steppa - Salmonella Dub
Found on the Unofficial
Apple Weblog. Into
the Mac trap - the Apple store compared to a car dealership:
After a quick (“This is it?”) tour around the first floor, where the
polycarbonate-encased parts, software cables, and digital cameras were displayed,
I was drawn to an intimidating, neo-mansion-like glass staircase leading to the second
floor. All I could see from below was a dark and empty theater at the top; high walls
blocked my view of everything else. Was I supposed to go up there? Oddly, there were
no signs beckoning.
It reminds me of of Seth Goldin’s tale of
being on the Yahoo sales team:
So, now I was at Yahoo, playing for the winning team, and I was invited to go
along on a sales call. I was vibrating in my shoes in anticipation.You’ve probably already guessed the punchline. It was one of the single most inept
sales presentations I’d ever seen. A lousy powerpoint. A non-charismatic, non-empathetic
salesperson who faced the wall and read the fine print on the slides aloud. At the
end of the presentation, he mumbled something about being able to take a check.A few minutes later, the prospect handed over four million dollars.
Yikes!
Sometimes it seems like the very best stuff sells itself. That explains why some
car dealerships have waiting lists and sell stuff for a premium, while others look
like ghost towns.Sometimes, salesmanship is overrated. What matters more is real marketing, marketing
that involves making the right product, not hyping it.
