Selling vs Serving: If Selling Makes You Feel Guilty, You're Selling Wrong

We live in a world where selling is associated with taking advantage of people.

Movies, jokes and office one-liners reinforce it: "he's such a good salesman he could sell ice to an Eskimo."

Let's be clear: whoever sells ice to an Eskimo isn't a great salesperson. They're a con artist.

The guilt half of every sales floor carries

I've met enormously talented people who sell with the handbrake on, because deep down they feel they're taking something from someone.

That feeling doesn't come from selling. It comes from having watched bad selling: pressure, half-truths, fine print, promises somebody else has to keep.

When someone sells that way, the guilt is correctly placed. It's a signal, not a character flaw.

Selling is a way of serving

If your product solves something real and you understand what the person in front of you needs, not selling to them is bad service.

Think of a doctor who avoids recommending the treatment you need so as not to look self-interested. That's not prudence. That's negligence.

Selling is helping someone make a decision that's good for them. Manipulating is engineering a decision that's only good for me.

Serve or manipulate: the only test that matters

Before every close, ask an uncomfortable question: would this person be happy with this purchase six months from now?

If yes, push with everything you have. If no, your job is to say so. That conversation costs one sale and builds a business.

Companies that grow steadily aren't the ones that close fastest. They're the ones with the fewest regretful customers.

The stubborn chef syndrome

There's another trap: clinging to your own recipe. A chef cooks a dish nobody likes and concludes the customers are uncultured.

Many of us do that with our offer. The market gives feedback — in words or in purchase decisions — and we decide the market is wrong.

Behind that is the ego, which would rather be right than serve. Selling more gets simple when you drop the recipe and give people what they need.

Where this comes from

It's part of Section I of my book *Vende más*.