Most People Ask Me That

Dear friend,

The riddle first, as ever. Your century today, and the customer in it knows nothing about what he is buying and is frightened you will find out.

Two merchants greet one nervous man,
Same shelves, same bottles, same good plan.
One speaks the language of the trade,
One says: most people ask me that.
Same wine, same price, same Saturday.
Why did one man walk out with none?

Hold your answer. Story time.

The Story

Two wine merchants in the same town, and their cellars, all together now, were equally good. Into each, on the same Saturday, walked a man who had been asked to bring something decent to a dinner and had no idea what decent meant.

He was not stupid. He was a competent adult in every other part of his life, and he had walked in already braced, because he knew that in this shop his ignorance would be visible, and nobody enjoys that.

The first merchant was knowledgeable and generous with it. He asked what the man was looking for, and when the answer was vague he began to help: did he prefer something fuller or leaner, old world or new, was the dinner fish or red meat, what did he usually drink. Each question was reasonable. Each was also a small examination the man could not pass, and by the third one he had understood that he was being found out, kindly, by an expert, in public.

So he did what people do. He said he would have a think, picked up a bottle near the door with a label he half recognised, and left, having spent less than he intended and learned that this was not a shop for him.

The merchant would have told you he had been helpful. He had. That was the difficulty.

The second merchant heard the same vague answer and said, before anything else: most people who come in for a dinner have no idea, and there is no reason you would, so let me make it easy. Then three questions a person could actually answer without knowing anything: roughly what is being cooked, what would you like to spend, and do you want something safe or something to talk about.

Nothing about grapes. Nothing that required a vocabulary. And he ended with a sentence that did as much as all the rest: here is what I would take, and if they hate it, tell them I chose it.

The man bought two bottles at the price he had meant to spend, went back the following month with a different dinner, and within a year was the sort of customer who asks what is good this week and takes the answer. He never did learn much about wine. He did not need to. He had found a merchant who did not require him to.

The Lesson, Since You've Earned It

Your customer is more afraid of looking foolish than of spending money, and your expertise is what frightens him. Every trade has a vocabulary, and every customer who lacks it knows he lacks it, and arrives braced to be exposed. The kindest expert in the world, asking the natural questions of his trade, is conducting an examination without meaning to, and the customer will fail it and leave rather than sit it a second time.

So the first job in any conversation with a person who does not know your trade is not to help them. It is to make not knowing safe, out loud, before the first question: most people do not know this, and there is no reason you would. That sentence costs nothing and it changes what the next ten minutes are. Without it, every question you ask is a test. With it, every question is you doing the work on their behalf.

Then ask only what a person can answer without your vocabulary. Not which style, which method, which grade: what is it for, what would you like to spend, how much do you want to be involved. Those three will get you to the right thing in nearly every trade, and none of them can be failed, which is the entire point.

And take the last piece of the fear off them, which is the fear of having chosen badly in front of other people. If it is wrong, tell them I chose it. You have made yourself the one who is judged, which is exactly where the expert should be standing, and the customer walks out carrying a bottle rather than a risk.

Two cautions. This is not talking down; the second merchant explained things when asked, and plenty of his customers learned a great deal over the years, because it had become safe to ask. And beware the trade that secretly enjoys the examination. Expertise displayed at a nervous person's expense feels like competence from the inside and like a closed door from the outside, and the door stays closed for good.

Three questions, and think of your last nervous customer:

1. What did you ask them first? If it needed your vocabulary to answer, you set an examination, and the ones who left early were the ones who knew they would fail it.
2. What is your sentence? Most people do not know this, and there is no reason you would. Say it before the first question, every time, until it is simply how a conversation in your business begins.
3. Who carries the risk of a bad choice? If the customer does, they will choose the safe thing near the door or nothing at all. Say the words that move it onto you, and watch how many more people buy the thing you actually recommended.

The Answer to the Riddle

Why did one man walk out with none?

Because he was helped by an expert in the expert's language, and every helpful question told him what he did not know. The second merchant said one sentence that made ignorance ordinary, asked three questions nobody can fail, and took the risk of the choice onto himself, and the same nervous man bought two bottles and came back for years. Neither merchant was unkind. One of them simply understood that the customer had not come in to learn about wine. He had come in to leave without feeling foolish, holding something he could put on a table.

The verse:

Ask him which style, and watch him shrink,
Then choose the label near the door.
Say most folk don't know, and don't think
It matters, and he'll come for more.

Until next time. Go and write the sentence that makes not knowing safe in your trade, and say it before your first question to the next customer who looks braced.

P.S. The same fear governs your written material. A page that assumes the reader knows the terms has already lost the reader who does not, and the reader who does not is the one who needs you most and pays without haggling. Write the first paragraph for the man bringing a bottle to a dinner, and the experts will forgive you, since they are not the ones deciding on a Saturday whether to walk in.

Also in the archive: The Words She Typed, Boots in the Same Ditch and The Fourth Lever.