nickshanagher

How to grab attention in a busy world? Pay attention to what the world is focused on and share your ideas where they are likely to be found. Judy Cortstjens has a book to sell about how only 5 per cent of people who diet achieve success. I know nothing about it and you are welcome to investigate here if you are interested. How did I hear about it? Because she wrote a letter to the FT on a subject that I am interested in: how shoppers respond to promotions. Her thoughts however were in response to a John Kay article about an important idea: how competition actually works against consumers by encouraging misleading price offers. What Ms Cortstjens, who used to help advertise packaged goods, noted was: "I buy cherry tomatoes, family bottles of Diet Coke and seedless grapes every week, yet I have little idea of their prices per kilo or per litre. It is also beyond me to compare these prices across my regular stores. "Fortunately, in my case, this matters little as I h...

 A very good friend of mine told me a great story over the Easter weekend. She had been invited to a house sale, where a family were leaving the UK and wanted to flog off the contents of their home. The wife, an American, turned out to be a formidable saleswoman. The expected bargains were not on display and my friend felt obligated to buy a few things, quickly using her smartphone to check prices. The classic moment came when the saleswoman asked my friend how much money she had left in her purse. Two fifty pence coins was the reply. I’ll have those said the American. Everything she did not sell was put on a van and sent to a charity shop. My friend told me that only an American could possibly have achieved this house sale: having an inflated view of the value of her own possessions and the confidence to sell it to friends of friends. Which had me thinking about the value of scripted behaviour and the confidence that makes selling successful. Is this something on disp...