A Lesson in Storytelling, Salesmanship and Persuasion From Young Sheldon
We’re all salespeople in life.
We live in a world where we sell ourselves, our ideas, our thoughts, and our desires to someone else every day. We’re always persuading people.
A research scientist sells her thesis to get funding. A candidate sells his skills to get a job. An employee sells his ideas to his colleagues.
We all deal with people. Convince them and persuade them.
If you’ve watched Young Sheldon, you know how intelligent Sheldon was.
But academic intelligence is not everything.
While watching the show, I realized intelligence and smartness look different for everyone. Just because one person is smart does not mean someone else isn’t.
‘You are not only as good as you are better than someone else.’ — Brianna Wiest
In Young Sheldon, Georgie had his long list of flaws but there’s something he excelled at- persuading people and influencing them.
Every character has flaws. But there are things we can learn from everyone.
What made Georgie a great salesman?
Remember when Georgie bought a bunch of snow globes and went door to door trying to sell them?
He had bought them for less than a dollar (negotiated 50 snow globes for $35) from a store that was going out of business and sold them for $5 each! A profit of $215? Not bad at all!
He was unsuccessful in his first attempt because he was simply trying to make a sale. He wasn’t giving people a good enough reason to buy it.
When a potential customer asked, ‘Why would I want that?’ He’d reply, ‘Because it’s pretty,’ or ‘It’s Texas’.
Door-to-door sales is hard. Having a door slammed in your face is brutal. But Georgie did not give up. He changed his strategy.
He exchanged his casual shirt for trousers, a white shirt and a tie. As a result, people took him seriously.
He used storytelling. He understood human nature. This, in turn, helped him understand his customers better.
Based on that, he modified his pitch. He began his pitch not by talking about the snow globes but by asking questions and telling stories. The kind that would evoke emotions within people- make them reminisce, feel nostalgic and arouse their interest.
He listened to people talk and reminisce attentively. He showed genuine and sincere interest in what they had to say. He encouraged them to talk, asked appropriate follow-up questions and chimed in when required.
He smiled and was polite and friendly. He validated their feelings. In other words, he sold happiness and memories.
Eventually, the customers talked themselves into buying the snow globes.
He made them feel like it was their idea to buy the snow globe. As a result, the customers didn’t feel like they were being sold to.
We see this quality of Georgie in other instances too- when he was working at Dale’s store. He was friendly to customers and complimented them which helped him sell more.
Later, helped Missy do a brief candy-selling business at her middle school. He understood demand and supply.
While extracting platinum out of gravel with Sheldon, he correctly assessed that people don’t want to hear facts. This is true in most cases because buying decisions are not logical. They are emotional and justified by logic.
This power of influencing people comes with great responsibility. Power can be both good and bad. Make sure you use this power to do good and serve others.
In the words of Ginni Rometty, use ‘Good Power.’
PS- I’m currently reading Ginni Rometty’s memoir ‘’ and it’s an incredible book. Her story is extremely inspiring.
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Thank you for reading!
