Newswise — Tuesday, January 24, 2012 8:30 am-- Charlottesville, Virginia
What does a man who dropped out of the mainstream and didn’t watch television for 20 years know about selling things in America? In 1996, Michael Penny left a scandal-ridden yoga ashram. In 2003, he opened a tiny mattress store in Central Virginia, and two years later, began manufacturing Savvy Rest Organic mattresses. Since 2006, the company’s profits have grown over 1000% and Savvy Rest products are now sold in over 60 retail stores across the country.
Savvy Rest has ranked in Inc. magazine’s 500/5000 fastest-growing U.S. companies list for the last two years. What follows is Penny’s personal advice to the business community on “Selfless Selling.”
When I was a 19-year-old psychology student back in 1973, hanging out meant partying and carrying on. I felt no guilt about it, but I did find myself feeling anxious and edgy--about nothing. I had nothing serious to be anxious about. I knew there had to be a way to feel more relaxed, so I searched for it. When I came across yoga and meditation I immediately became a regular practitioner because they made such a difference in my daily life. They took the edge off.
After graduation, with the “real world” looming, I joined a yoga community and lived there for 20 years. We offered programs in yoga, teacher training, meditation, and other communication and self-discovery methods. Our yoga teachers needed to understand and deliver a program’s content, but there was also a powerful underlying effort to deeply affect the participants. This would happen routinely for guests during a weekend or week-long retreat.
What made these transformations happen was not any specific act. It was the teachers’ and hosts’ underlying intention to fulfill the guest’s deepest need at that time, coupled with acts of kindness that had no expectation of reward. Kindnesses were done in the spirit of selflessness. No monetary reward, no ego stroke, no personal agenda of any kind--that’s what creates an environment of selflessness.
I never considered myself a salesman. I still don’t. When I started my business and had to sell products, I didn’t know how because I had led such a sheltered life. So, I figured there must be real salespeople who knew more than I did. I listened to tapes and read books, articles and blogs about selling to try to improve my performance. Although it all was very interesting, I felt as though the techniques and programs I was reading about were manipulation based. The goal was always about closing the sale or maximizing profits, and almost never about genuinely meeting a customer’s needs.
I like profit, and it’s necessary for my business to thrive. But I don’t want to hold dollar signs before my eyes. That’s not how I want to live at home, at work, or at play. I don’t want to think about how I can exploit others to achieve a goal. Although I’m not a practicing Catholic, the real mantra I grew up with was “Love thy neighbor.” And that hasn’t changed. To this day I don’t understand how anyone can practice religion--as I learned it, anyway--and use other people to maximize profits. That doesn’t mean we can’t have goals. It doesn’t mean that others do not help us achieve our goals. It means that manipulating others shouldn’t be a methodology for getting there.
It’s a matter of intention. In a sales situation, is my goal to close a sale or is my main goal to genuinely serve and have an authentic relationship with a customer? It’s easy to test yourself. Just observe your thoughts when you’re with a customer. To the degree that you are thinking about closing your sale or getting your profit or your SPIF, to that same degree you’re not really present with the customer. Profit should be a by-product of your products’ benefits and your relationship with your customers, not the goal itself.
The inspiration behind Selfless Selling is that the only goal is to have an authentic relationship with your customer. The relationship itself is the reward, and that orientation liberates you both. What is best to fulfill their needs? Your customer is a human being with human needs. No one wants to be bamboozled, schmoozed, or manipulated. If the products and information you offer do meet the needs of your customer in that present moment, a sale will be the natural outcome. When everything is aligned, including some factors you can’t control, everything will unfold as it should.
If you make a sale just to score that sale, a few things happen:1. You miss the opportunity to have an authentic relationship with another human being.2. Your customer misses the opportunity to have an authentic relationship with you.3. There is nothing in the experience for a customer to “pay forward” to another human being.4. You make no difference in someone’s life other than to sell them an object.5. You make no difference in changing the dominating values in our culture or our world.
There are several ways to practice Selfless Selling. For me, the simplest way is to feel the vulnerability of a person who is coming into the store. After all, I am asking this customer, someone who doesn’t know me, to lie down on a bed. Then, I ask questions and try to empathize with the need this person has, as if she or he were my parent, my sibling, my child or my neighbor.
When I treat all customers this way, some of them will purchase; some won’t. Just as if I used manipulative techniques, some would buy; some would not. But if I treat everyone selflessly, I never feel that I have taken advantage of vulnerability--and the odds are good that when they leave our store, some people will feel very differently than when they have left other mattress stores.
One of our values at Savvy Rest is to remember that all of us are only one breath away from the other side. The other side includes dream states and sleep, and at the end of it all, the end of life. While we’re on this side--conscious, present and unafraid--it helps to remember that we are all vulnerable, and we are vulnerable together. Why forget this truth just because we are selling something? Selflessness is a powerful practice.
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