Up early, got dressed, and this time made sure Boy was dressed and ready to go before I went outside. "Which do you want, bud--front yard or back?"
You'd think I'd asked him if he preferred hanging or the gas chamber.
He finally made up his mind he'd work on the front, since it has no trees to go under and around. Which is fine by me, as long as he does something other than stay in his room all day.
Got out the now-cured Murray, loaded her up with gas, and got to work. Cut, cut, cut. Tell Boy that he won't pass out from simply cutting the grass. Lots of dust, which made things terrible for both of us. Took a while, but he got the front more or less done, more or less neatly. Not that I'm complaining--I decided long ago I'd rather have it short than to have all the mower tracks straight. Unless I'm the one doing it, and THEN they have to be precise, but I won't bother him with his ability to stay in line. Just cut it, little fellow.
He finally got done on his part, and I moved to the back. Cut cut cut. Finish. Cat and Rebecca bring out a big jug of ice water to me, and the volleyball and the kitten for themselves, and we sit down in the back by the pine tree while I cool off.
They bother the cat for a while, and he attacks the volleyball before scooting up the pine tree. Fearless feline--he explores every limb up to about 30 feet or so, going out to the far ends of each one before turning around. While he does that, the girls keep hitting the volleyball at my head.
Reba took the younger two kids to the grocery store, and the Second Great Task of the Afternoon fell to me--namely, hauling Rebecca around to various merchants and service providers to see if they would be willing to purchase advertising space in the middle school yearbook.
I can't stand asking people for money.
Oh, I could be a salesman if I wanted to be, but it is one thing I DO NOT want to be. Still, she had an assignment, so after I got my shower and we got together her paperwork, I figured I might as well try to help her as much as I could with my patented selling tips.
1) Show your client you're interested in his services or product.
First stop was the UPS Store to make copies of her contracts, so since we were already there, and had just given THEM some business, we asked the nappy bearded punk who was the cashier if they'd be interested in supporting the school. "Uhmm, you'd need to talk to the guy who owns the store, and he's, like, gone, because it's Saturday, and so he'll be here on Tuesday."
Fair enough. Sadly though, the thing we heard most often.
As for other examples of Tip #1, we went next door and ate lunch at the Mexican place. Good food, and a lot of it, but sorta pricish for lunch. No matter, she asked the co-proprietor if he'd like to purchase an ad, he said he'd have to talk it over with el jefe supremo.
Oh, well. On to the next tip.
2) Be friendly and courteous and speak distinctly--you are a reflection of your product, and people must know what you're selling.
As I mentioned this morning, Rebecca is very quiet. This is not good for someone doing cold calls. Especially ones that are only one step removed from telemarketing. It's hard to sell these because the whole idea is cockeyed--you're not really expecting ANY money to come back to you from these ads--it's basically a donation. (Which flies in the face of Tip #3--Believe in your product.)
So anyway, talking to everyone was hard for her, because she doesn't realize just how quiet she is. I'd help her along some, but that really wasn't the thing to do, but SOMEone needed to tell them they could call the number on the contract, and that we could leave the ad rates with them, and stuff such as that. At least she had a good attitude about it. She'd say, "I did that one all by myself," and I'd pick on her and tell her that I had done ALL the talking. She did pretty good, all things considered, though.
We wound up visiting at least twenty different places, and had about half who said they might be able to help. SO, even though we didn't get any commitments (that ol' "boss'll be back after Labor Day" story) it was still a pretty good afternoon, if for no other reason that we got to ride around town and play, without having any deadlines to meet or other siblings to mess with us.
Home, and help finish putting away groceries, supper, then to bed with us all.
Posted by Terry Oglesby at September 5, 2006 01:14 PM