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Salesbeings
Jul. 6th, 2008 09:11 pmOver the years, I've tended to categorize salesbeings into three categories. As the man says, “Just a useful distinction, to clarify thought.” The categories aren’t hard and fast; poor business ethics, for example, tend to make me downgrade a salesbeing to a lower category.
Salespeople understand what their organization can produce, and what prospective customers need. They help to put the two together. Everybody wins. Sales people can be extremely important for a commercial organization.
Salescritters don’t understand what their organization can produce, or what prospective customers need. Or they just don’t care very much. The important thing is to make a sale and get a commission, or at least to remain employed and collect a salary. They may commit their organization to something that it simply doesn’t have the resources to do in the available time (or at all), or the customer to purchasing something they don’t need and can ill afford. They may claim that a product has features that the customer is specifically looking for, when it really doesn't. They can cause trouble for an organization.
Salesthings don’t understand what is physically possible, and may attempt to sell something that not only has nothing to do with their organization’s business, and doesn’t exist, but violates the laws of physics. For example, a salesthing for a software company who tries to sell a mining-exploration company on a potential new product that they can just pour on the rock to make the rock go away, on the principle that “one of our guys is a chemist, I’m sure he can figure out how to do it.” They tend to cause a different kind of trouble than the salescritters, primarily by being so obviously incompetent and insane that they scare away clients who might actually be interested in what the organization can do.
Salespeople understand what their organization can produce, and what prospective customers need. They help to put the two together. Everybody wins. Sales people can be extremely important for a commercial organization.
Salescritters don’t understand what their organization can produce, or what prospective customers need. Or they just don’t care very much. The important thing is to make a sale and get a commission, or at least to remain employed and collect a salary. They may commit their organization to something that it simply doesn’t have the resources to do in the available time (or at all), or the customer to purchasing something they don’t need and can ill afford. They may claim that a product has features that the customer is specifically looking for, when it really doesn't. They can cause trouble for an organization.
Salesthings don’t understand what is physically possible, and may attempt to sell something that not only has nothing to do with their organization’s business, and doesn’t exist, but violates the laws of physics. For example, a salesthing for a software company who tries to sell a mining-exploration company on a potential new product that they can just pour on the rock to make the rock go away, on the principle that “one of our guys is a chemist, I’m sure he can figure out how to do it.” They tend to cause a different kind of trouble than the salescritters, primarily by being so obviously incompetent and insane that they scare away clients who might actually be interested in what the organization can do.
