The secret behind “Sell me this pen”

Many people have seen the movie “The Wolf of Wall Street”. Do you remember the scene where Leonardo DiCaprio is making his new sales employees selling “this pen” to him where — of course — no one seems to be able to make the sale. This at first sight ‘impossible task’ has been analysed by many sales experts and today I want to share this outcome, this sales-secret, with you.

Let me start off by giving away the secret to the success of “selling me this pen”: emotions. Every human being has emotions. Emotions can be influenced by its surroundings. This is exactly what you do when telling stories to e.g. a Sales Manager when trying to sell him a specific pen. When the emotions are played right, the sale will be a fact.

Do you remember, when you were a toddler, your parents telling you bed time stories to make you feel happy and peaceful? …
SPOILER ALERT: they played your emotions.

The story

Tell him a story about himself, the Sales Manager, working on a contract for over 3 months straight, night and day. Finally, after a tremendous period of time including hard labour and stress, the sale was made. Of course, the Sales Manager is about to sign the contract, so he reaches his pocket for his pen — a regular, chewed off, $0,50 ball-point pen … Wouldn’t he rather remember/frame this special moment by putting his signature on the contract with his special, hand crafted, German engineered pen, only used for signing off contracts? A special pen for special occasions.

Key Takeaways

Emotions — that’s the key to sales success stories.

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Pieter Op De Beéck

Written by

Generalist // Multipotentialite // Business Innovation Consultant // Husband and loving father

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