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Working at home and not selling

November 30, 2007 | Filed Under Networking, Sales 

I was talking to a friend of mine the other day, and she told me she needed to find a job working from home but didn’t want to sell anything. Since I work from home, I was her go-to person and she wanted to know what opportunities are out there that don’t involve any sales.

The only one I could think of was Mystery Shopping. Unless you can get in your car, have a route, and do it 40 hours a week (or more) you’re not going to pay your bills Mystery Shopping - you’re going to spend a lot on gas, and really, if you have to get a sitter for the kids there go the rest of your profits.

So she asked again "But there HAS to be somethign I can do without (insert visible shudder) SELLING something!"

I asked her what she considered selling. When it came down to brass tacks, it seemed the problem was that she didn’t want to tell people that she was doing something and ask them for money. (For those of you that are wondering, I do manage to keep the shocked expression off of my face when people say things like this to me!)

Thinking just my words weren’t going to be enough, I went for an example, "Have you ever gone in for a job interview?" I said…"Of course!" she said. Well guess what…if you’ve been on a job interview you’ve sold something, or not, depending on the outcome.

The blank stare at this point was pretty classic. But then the blank stare changed, and my friend squinted a little while her brain went into overdrive.

This is step one of realizing that life is marketing, and sales is everywhere. It’s a tough perspective to grasp, because so many people are conditioned to "hate" sales and think of negative images associated with sales.

She was still squinting, and looked like she needed just one more nudge. "You’re married, right?" She nodded. From the day you met the man who is now your husband to the actual ceremony…how long was that? "Two years" she said. That’s called a sales cycle. Sometimes it’s shorter, sometimes it’s longer, but for your marriage you went from introducing the product to the potential customer to closing the deal in 2 years.

She countered with, "But he chased ME, I didn’t have to do anything!"
I replied, "Did you put on makeup? Did you wear nice clothes to go out to dinner? Did you laugh at his jokes?"
Yes. Yes she did.

The most important sales cycle is the marriage, because at the moment of the ceremony it exemplifies all that is good and right about sales. Two people just feel they’ve found the person that’s the perfect fit. No one feels they were "sold" on the other, and yet, both were. The preening and nitpicking over what outfit to wear is like making a presentation to a potential business client.

And when a client hires you, or buys your product…if you’re selling and marketing yourself and your product the way you should be….your customer won’t feel like they’ve been sold anything, they’ll just be releived and happy to know they have you.

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