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This afternoon I began reading a book on subliminal persuasion. It’s not the first persuasion book I’ve read, but it is the first with an emphasis on subliminal.

And it goes against everything Judith and I believe in as Soft Sell marketers and advocates for the Soft Sell, heat-centered perspective—i.e. marketing with consciousness and conscience.

Just the use of the word “subliminal” is enough to go against how we want to market. But in case you might not have a formal definition, here it is (from www.dictionary.com):

Subliminal — existing or operating below the threshold of consciousness; being or employing stimuli insufficiently intense to produce a discrete sensation but often being or designed to be intense enough to influence the mental processes or the behavior of the individual

 And for persuasion:

Persuasion—to induce one to undertake a course of action or embrace a point of view     by means of argument, reasoning, or entreaty.

There are a number of problems with the juxtaposition of “subliminal” and “persuasion” as they are here defined, contradiction being the obvious one.

But I want to focus on what the author of the book I’m reading has to say.

Read More→

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A Special Bonus for You
“How To Build Your Soft Sell Marketing Platform”
1 hour audio download

Go to Bridging Heart and Marketing – Platform Bonus
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We define Soft Sell Marketers as care givers and change agents, and ordinarily medical doctors should fall into that category. After all, they aren’t trying to sell you stocks or get you to refinance your house. And typically they’ve taken the Hippocratic Oath which, according to Wikipedia, confirms, “I will prescribe regimens for the good of my patients according to my ability and my judgment and never do harm to anyone.”

Yet, many people experience the medical profession as sadly lacking in heart, money-hungry rather than placing a sincere care for patients’ well-being at the top of their priorities.

Just the other day I ran into a vivid example of why MDs suffer the fallout of their unconsciously hard-sell approach.

I called a local medical office I was referred to by a friend and was shocked by the rude lack of care in the outgoing phone message.

Follow along with me and imagine how you would feel when you phone the doctor’s office and the phone message is, “If you are a physician or hospital press one. If you need our address or fax number press two. If you need medical records press three. If you have billing inquiries press four. If you are a patient and wish to make, change or cancel an appointment press five. If you need to speak with a medical practitioner press six.”

How do you feel when you realize that you, as a patient, rank at the very bottom of the doctor’s priorities?

Bad enough. But it gets worse. When I requested an appointment for Jim (who’d had a couple of peculiar fainting episodes), the woman at the appointment desk said, “We can’t make an appointment without a referral.” I said that we’d been referred by someone who worked for the medical school and was not an MD. “As I said, we can’t make an appointment without a referral.”

So I said, “Okay, I’m a psychologist. I have a PhD. Can I make the referral and describe the symptoms in my referral?” “Yes. The fax number is xxx-xxx-xxxx.”

So I wrote up the referral and faxed it in – not mentioning that the patient was my husband, of course.

When I called back to make the appointment I was struck by the blind bureaucracy running the place. Why? Because, even though I am not an MD, my referral counted. It was all about bureaucratic protocol.

And then for the next shock. We couldn’t get an appt for 2 ½ months. When I complained that having to wait that long was completely unacceptable, no one suggested the possibility of seeing any other of the MDs who worked in that office.

So we called our friend who’d made the referral, and through his influence, we were able to get an appointment just three days later.

Hard sell, buyer-beware business tactics don’t just belong to the realm of finance and real estate. It’s lurking all around us, ready to be brought to light and transformed for the benefit of all.

Because Its All in the Connection

Judith

PS — Be sure to downlaod “How to Build Your Soft Sell Platform” by going to
Bridging Heart and Marketing – Platform Bonus

I can’t believe that it’s been nearly 2 months since I took an unanticipated hiatus from writing to you through our “Bridging Heart and Marketing”blog.
 
At first I was consumed with trying to get our new book organized and ready for a Fall publication date (which we see we’ll never be able to make). And BTW, the book is tentatively titled either “Bridging Heart and Marketing: Selling Without Selling Out” or “Selling Without Selling Out: Bridging Heart and Marketing To Sell With Integrity and Mutual Gain.”
(Any comments on the title that you’d like to make will be greatly appreciated!)
 
Then Judith and I found ourselves reevaluating how we want to use this blog. And I apologize for not including you in the discussion. You see, since both Judith and I are used to being  independent and have only recently begun to learn to ask for help – we’ve been wrestling with the issues by ourselves. Again, mea culpa.
 
We’re now clear that we will use this blog as a forum for Soft Sell marketing principle and tactics (as we have) as well as exposing non-conscious, non-conscience marketing which hurts all of us including those who do it. 

Our objective is inspire Soft Sell Marketing — what we see as marketing with consciousness and conscience.
 
So, we welcome and encourage your comments. They will inspire topics in the future and support us in coming to you with more of our own process.

Because It’s All in the Connection,

Jim