How to Pickup Girls

One night I was at my favorite local dive bar and there's this guy sitting next to me and he's trying to get something going with this girl and all he can talk about is himself. What he did today, what he's doing tomorrow, what kind of car he drives, what kind of sports he's good at.

In other words, he was giving her product information - features and benefits.

She was bored in about thirty seconds and started basically ignoring him a couple of minutes later.

He switched gears. "Can I buy you a drink?"

Another wuss. The neediness of the "Can I buy you a drink?" was palpable.

She looked down at the full glass in front of her and the expression on her face was priceless. You could see how exasperated she was with having to deal with yet another boring idiot with no clue.

"No thanks" as she picks up the full glass and shows it to him. She was visibly relieved when he walked away.

Are You That Guy?

If you think you're going to sell people with nothing but product information... think again.

As consumers, we're all that girl in the bar. We've all heard the same boring bullshit a million times.

Nobody really cares about product information. They may smile and nod politely as you ramble on, they might even let you buy them a drink. But trust me, you're not taking her home with features and benefits.

This whole how to pickup girls thing isn't just a metaphor. It's what's really going on.

As a marketer, whether you like it or not, whether you believe it or not, you are the guy at the bar and the visitors to your site are the girl. The exact same social dynamics are going on. Exactly the same - even if all the visitors to your site are men.

So, how to pickup girls?

The first step is to realize that it's not a talent, it's a skill. It's not secret knowledge, it's not something mysterious. It's something anyone can learn and do.

But all skills require study and practice. The cool thing about practicing the marketing game is that the rejections aren't as in your face as they are at the bar.

But never forget that the social dynamics are the same. It doesn't matter what your gender is, if you're trying to sell something, then you're trying to pickup girls.

If selling as social dynamics is new to you, here are two places to get you started:

Rules of The Game by Neil Strauss - This really is a How to Pickup Girls book, but you can read it from a marketer's point of view (frame), focus on the social dynamics and really get a lot of solid information that you can transfer directly to your salesmanship.

And of course, the new mother of all selling as social dynamics books:

Pitch Anything by Oren Klaff - If you haven't read this one yet, you're really missing the boat.