Being the Bug Guy - Part I

It has been my intention for quite some time to offer some written advice about the art of selling pest control. Calling it "art" strikes me as a bit funny, since it most often feels like mere work—and grueling work at that; However, considering that we are all God's artwork and reflect his glory, the pest control salesman, like an architect or the church organist must live up to his role in the design of God. This is a Christian way of approaching this topic: The aspiring pest control salesman, or any salesman, should not first ask, "How may I be successful?" but instead, "what is my role as a pest control salesman?"

Firstly, to consider that role broadly, the pest control salesman is engaged in a division of marketing called "personal selling." Personal selling has many advantages over advertising and is suited to particular products and services. For example, the business my father works for, Altec Machining and Molds, is not likely to pay for television space to advertise their newest liquid-cooled molding service for making plastic parts. There are at least a couple reasons for this: They would be telling far more people about the molds than who actually want to know about them. The masses of consumers are interested in buying various plastic products, not in making plastic things themselves. So the audience of the add is too broad. Secondly, a television add, or even an add in the paper is not capable of delivering all the details of such a complicated service. For these two reasons alone, personal selling is essential in the plastic-injection molding business. Actual people are needed to go make relationships with other business people and explain Altec's products and services.

But while intra-business personal selling is accepted as normal, personal selling to individual consumers is looked upon with more suspicion. And I think there are good reasons for this. In our age of mechanized, mass production, whatever products we need for comfortable living are available at whichever retail chain is in ascendancy--and at a very low price, compared to what the same product would cost if made in a pre-industrial society. Therefore, the peddler of wares for the home must convince people that his product is either so unique that it can't be found in stores, or that it is of such quality, that it would be too expensive if sold in stores. The peddler’s argument is essentially that (1) ordinary people aren't educated enough to know that they need this product or (2) ordinary people aren't educated enough to know that they need a product of this quality.

There is both truth and falsehood in these statements. First the truth: I learned when I was in Amway that countless millions of tons of water are needlessly transported from factories to stores, because when ordinary consumers choose a product like laundry detergent, they pick it based on its price and quantity. A concentrated laundry detergent, one with less water in it, just doesn't sell as well, because people have to be educated to know that it's just as good and better for the environment (since it’s easier to ship). It doesn't follow that Amway detergent is the one to buy, but the Amway people have made a good point. Rainbow vacuums are another great example. These water filtering vacuums—speaking of the type of vacuum, not just a brand name—truly function better. They don't let any dust through them at all. And they never need filters. But they will probably never sell well in stores because they're icky to use. A salesman has to take you by the hand and empty the first fuzz-and-hair-filled, muddy mess for you in order for you to get used to the idea. By far the best candidates for personally sold products are health products, like dietary supplements, because of the vast variety of these products and their complicated features. Doctors (whether traditional, chiropractic or naturopathic) are some of the biggest hucksters around. They simply rely on their ethos to sell you drugs and vitamins that you may or may not need. But just because doctors abuse their inflated ethos doesn't mean that they aren't needed as personal sellers of health products.

Now for the falsehood in the peddlers argument: The critique of that argument, that "ordinary people aren't educated enough to know that they need this product," is that most ordinary products are good enough. While it is true that many Wal-Mart products appeal to the lowest-common-denominator consumer, many of them meet a standard quality that is good enough. Suppose it is true that the peddler’s product is better. That doesn't mean that it is worth the price that the peddler is asking. Cutco Cutlery is a good example. When I was selling these knives, both my customers and I were convinced that they were the best knives in the world. Why else would Cutco offer the "Forever Guarantee?" But every once in a while I would meet someone who would look at me in disbelief: Why would I want to buy these knives for $750, he might say, when I can go down to the store and buy a set with similar features (hard, stainless-steel blades and composite, dishwasher-safe handles) for about one fifth the price? "Ah," I would respond knowingly, "but the knives in the store do not have the Double-DTM edge." I resorted to the gimmick and many times this convinced people. (The Double-DTM edge stayed sharp for about seven years on average and then the company would sharpen the knives for free, provided you paid the shipping and handling.) But, again, every once in a while, someone would explain that they didn't need the Double-D edge, because they knew how to sharpen their knives. These people always bugged me. Looking back, I see that it was because they were right. And they finally sold me on the truth: People do have a lot of dull, ugly knives, but they don't need to spend $750 to fix this problem. They merely need to buy a set that is good enough and that has sharpenable, not serrated edges.

So, while there are some products that people need to be educated about, like dietary supplements, which truly fit the bill for something to be sold personally, many others are just gimmicks. In the case of Cutco, people are being educated, but of the wrong thing. They should be shown how to select a decent set of knives and keep them sharp, but there's no money in that!

And now to return to the thesis of this article. A pest control salesmen is a type of personal seller and, as such, he ought to be aware of the legitimate and honest uses of personal selling and the great many gimmicky, dishonest uses of it as well. Salesmen, particularly salesmen who sell to average individual consumers, do not have a good reputation and this is for good reason: Many products, like Cutco Cutlery, sell by virtue of their marketing scheme and not by the virtue of their quality considered in relation to their price. Fortunately, pest control is one of those products that is a logical one to consider selling personally, as opposed to with advertising, and consider it we shall in the next installment of this discussion.