Word of Mouth

A few weeks ago my friend went into Kid to Kid (a local children's consignment shop) to see if any of her old baby toys could be sold there. She had her one and two year old in tow and brought in several armfuls of things into the store by herself. It was busy inside, children were running around, mothers were shopping, and employess were ringing up sales. A sales woman approached her, and said, "I can tell you right now, we will not take anything like that." as she waved her fingers over a pile of my friend's things. She then looked through the remaining items quickly pulling one at a time and making comments like, "stain." "tear." "too old." She did not make eye contact or try to interact with my friend at all. In fact the only time she even looked up was to tell her that her kids couldn't play with the toys. (even though the particular toy they were playing with happend to be one of their own).

My friend gathered her items up, brought them all back to her car by herself, loaded up her kids. And started to cry.

I wonder if this sales woman has any idea the effect she had on my friend and in turn the negative effect she had on Kid to Kid's business? My friend has told that story to me and to many of our other friends, I am telling it to you, hopefully creating a word of mouth epidemic encouraging people not to shop at Kid to Kid. Sadly for them word of mouth is pretty powerful.

On the flip side, I also want to share with you a positive sales experience that hopefully will create a word of mouth epidemic to support business.

The other night, Sonny got home late after selling a car. When he sat down at the table to eat some now over cooked taco soup, he told me about the sale he had just had.

Sonny answered his phone a few days before and listened to a thick Middle Eastern accented voice offering to buy one of his cars for a couple of thousand dollars less than the asking price. The man was living in Arizona, finishing his degree before returning to his home in Saudi Arabia to work in the oil industry. He had just sold his vehicle and only wanted to spend the amount he profited on a new one. (He just happend to want a new one that was out of his price range.)

Sonny thanked him for his call and explained to him why the car was priced the way it was. "Because we are a small dealership and have less overhead than most large dealers, we are able to keep our prices low, but we really don't have that much mark up in the car to sell it for what you are asking." Sonny explained. He told him that the amount he was offering was less than what a dealer could currently sell the vehicle for at auction but reassurred him he wished he could help. They said "good-bye" and Sonny hung up the phone, thinking the man would just find something closer to home.

The next day, the gentleman called again. He told Sonny about his experience in calling dealerships throughout Utah, Arizona and California. He asked each dealer the same question and offered the same amount for the car he was looking for. He told Sonny that most treated him horribly. Salesmen told him he was "***ing crazy" to ask for such a price and "there was no dealer in the world that would sell it for that." They left him feeling insulted and upset. Sonny was the one dealer who was kind and helpful, because of his pleasant phone call, he now wanted to buy the car from him. He borrowed some money from a friend and boarded a plane with his new wife to fly to Utah and pick up the car.

Sonny picked them up from the airport, getting to know the young couple a little better. He drove them to the dealership, filled out paperwork and handed over the keys to their new car. Shaking hands, the customer walked away happy even though he had to pay a little bit more than he originally wanted and Sonny was happy to sell the car even though he had to take the extra hours to make it happen.

Now this is the kind of story that helps business. Sonny left his dealership that night knowing he had created a happy customer. Someone that will hopefully tell his car buying story to someone else and with the power of word of mouth create positive results for our business.

As consumers I hope all of us out there realize the power we have through word of mouth. I, myself have decided to use that power to its fullest potential, even though in the past I have not been very outspoken about negative or positive buying experiences. I think these stories give me a good base to judge them though, if they make me cry or use any words that require me to write *** in place of letters- bad experience. If they pick me up from the airport and stay late at night just to help me out- good experience.