Why do some people just mistrust sellers?

Maybe your sales process is too pushy? I'm not sure. All of my selling has been really laid back... after providing a bunch of content for free. Usually I have people asking me if I have anything further to sell.

Some people just don't want to be sold to. It can simply be explained by realizing that it is nothing more than human nature. There doesn't have to be a logical, concrete reason. Some people just don' want to be sold to, period. Nothing you can do about it but move on and focus on the people that actually matter. Wasting time worrying about them doesn't accomplish anything for anybody.

Maybe they have been scammed before or just don't like getting emails regarding them being suggested products? Most people do seem to like the free stuff.

The trick to selling anything is to make the person want the product, before ever asking them to give you money.

You are either doing a poor job at what I suggested above or you are feeding from a poor quality, unqualified traffic source.

Stop reading the unsubscribe comments. Nobody ever unsubscribes for a flattering reason, so they are just going to bring you down. Besides, you don't want people on your list that don't ever want to part with their money. You are not paying your autoresponder for charity work.

Eduard...the best sales technique that I ever learned across 15 years of being a salesman was NOT to sell anything.

I've said this in other posts, but it bears repeating because it's been a while. Whenever a potential customer would approach my store, my first goal was to make him or her smile. I didn't care if it was a 10 year old kid, a 45 year old mother of four, and a 70 year old man; I didn't even talk about my store until I had a smile on his or her face.

Once that mission was accomplished, I'd just start talking to them. Some would banter back and forth, some would cut me off and tell me what they wanted. I never tried to sell them anything, though. I'd just show them what they wanted, bring it out of the showcase and let them feel it and hold it, maybe compliment it to them...and then I'd get their money before they realized what I was doing.

It's almost like being a verbal pickpocket. Over time I'd build up a relationship. At first it'd be a 5 minute thing, but then they'd come back and it would build over time.

Email marketing, from what I understand (as I don't do it myself yet) is very similar. Don't sell anything. Add in a subtle link or two, but just give out advice for the most part. Ask people how they're doing. Share a joke or anecdote about your life.

That's what the people who I allow in my inbox do (Pat Flynn, Spencer Haws, Tiffany Dow, Paul Myers, etc).

-- j

Why should they trust you? There are too many people constantly trying to sell scams, so most people take a defensive stance as soon as they realize, that you're trying to sell them something.

Before trying to sell to a person, you have to gain his trust and prove, that you can actually offer something valueable.

I run a business and get called all day by people trying to sell me stuff. By default I get my staff to field the calls and I never speak to any sales person. The other day a telephone directory came through the door and guess what? My company wasn't listed! I can bet the sales person called my office.

My point is... there are millions of people like me that have a natural urge to avoid being sold to even through we might need it. When I DO buy anything I normally go looking and then I love to be sold to!

Human beings are of such nature that when they trust anyone, they're dishearten when he/she mislead them. As a practice, sellers try to give misleading information to sell their products. So, people don't want to rely on them. That's why I agree with 'Pavels' reply of gaining trust and proving own-self as real valuable offerer of something.

I agree that this is human nature, but I believe some of it is short-sighted. I have signed up to a LOT of lists (and I purchase a good amount of products too) because they keep me up-to-date on what is working now. I would never be able to read/participate on enough forum threads or what have you to stay current and I don't have the time for that. But let's say I missed the recent Google Penguin update, for example. I would have known about it within 24-48 hours, regardless of what I'm working on. Why? Because the emails I get from marketers let me know about it! Sure, they also have something to sell and because I work in that niche, I sometimes buy. But even if I didn't buy, the emails themselves give me a wealth of information. Folks who don't like to "be sold to" I suspect are relatively new marketers who think they've already "got it" and don't need to learn anything new.

Because of too much fraud online I guess.

Don't put alongside everything you give of any value for FREE, buy this now for Blah Blah Blah.

Let them go away and experience what the value you have given them can actually do for them and they will be back for more, on top of that they will be asking you if you have better stuff that they can buy, they are completely disregarding what you have give them because they have seen it all before and been scammed most likely.

A lot of this probably depends on the market---if you're marketing to other marketers then they'll probably realize that it's part of the game. But even on IM lists, I've unsubscribed to most because after their 7 day "free report" or whatever, then all you ever get from then on out are sales pitches. I don't need that crap filling up my inbox.

Then you've got people who just expect that everything on the internet should be free and will hate anything with a price tag.

Your comment: "Doh! Of course I'm trying to sell you something!" might be telling...It seems that your attitude is that people should know and expect for you to be selling something. But obviously they don't know or expect that, because if they did then there wouldn't be any issues. So you might want to think about how you frame and explain what it is that you do and what people should expect so that their expectations meet with what you are offering.

One more thing...marketing is when you get people want your product. That's the opposite of selling.

Selling is pushing someone to buy something and people are naturally resistant to being pushed to do anything. However, good marketing makes people want your product and so they've already made the choice that they want it and so it's them buying the product of their own free will (probably not even realizing that their desire for the product came from your marketing.)

So focus on marketing your products and not selling things to people and you'll do a lot better.