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The following post is not intended as a political commentary about any candidate, but rather a sales analysis that uses a public figure as an example.

On January 7 while campaigning in New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton was asked the following question by Marianne Young, “My question is very personal. How do you do it?” She was referring to the challenges that Hillary faces in campaigning for public office and managing her personal life. During her answer Hillary became emotional and began to cry.

Senator Clinton admits that this tear-up may have helped her win the New Hampshire election. Was it contrived or was it real emotion?

In January of 1993 her husband, Bill Clinton, became President of the United States and served until 2001. She undoubtedly had to deal with a lot of stress regarding her husband’s “extracurricular” activities before and during this period.

Since her husband has left office she has been very visible as a New York Senator and has been vigorously campaigning for the Presidency over the last year. In this entire time and through all of these events, is there any record of her crying or even showing any significant emotion in public before January 7 of this year?

On February 4 in New Haven, Connecticut Hillary welled up a second time while speaking to a small group of women at Yale. For at least 15 years Hillary has been in the global spotlight and we had never seen her cry, yet in a one month period she teared up twice in front of the cameras.

I feel confident in assuming that the crying was orchestrated. That kind of craftiness can get you in trouble with your customers and it may ultimately cause problems for Hillary. When we do things in sales that are not consistent with who we are, it ultimately turns our prospects and customers off. People resent being manipulated in any way.

What are some examples of ways we try to manipulate customers that almost always backfire?

1. Trying to exude a personality that is not our own, but one that we think the customer will prefer.
2. Pretending to deeply care about a customer’s personal life when we really don’t.
3. Acting like we are really having a bad month, when we’re not, in order to get a mercy order.

While Hillary won the New Hampshire primary she hasn’t done so well since. I can’t help but believe that one of the reasons is the lack of emotional authenticity that she has recently demonstrated.

Ironically - or maybe not - Marianne Young did not vote for Hillary in the primaries.

You’ve got to be real with your customers. Any time we are less than genuine or authentic our customers can tell and we lose credibility. Sales is a relationship game and the foundation of relationships is honesty.

If you’re not already a subscriber, <click here> to receive Sales Vitamins™ by email or <click here> to subscribe to the RSS feed. © 2008 Scott R. Sheaffer

Are you considering selling, or do you already sell, to a city, county or state? Are you eyeing that RFP from the GSA? Consider the following as you allocate your selling resources when selling to the public sector.

Everyone competes, or so it seems, for public sector business, which is part of the problem. Just like with very large corporations (i.e., the Fortune 500 and their ilk), public sector entities can require an inordinate amount of selling effort, are slow to pay their bills (ironically with your tax dollars in this case) and require you to sell at very low margins. They are normally worse in these areas than the private sector. If there is ever a time that you need to evaluate the return on your selling effort, it is when selling to the public sector. Put caps on the sales effort you are willing to make and the minimum margins that are acceptable. Build in a “stop loss.”

Have you ever played a game with someone and realized later that your opponent was playing with a different set of rules than you? No wonder you lost. That’s the case when selling to the public sector. Your company has to find customers, keep expenses under control and generate profit. The public sector has no real customers in the traditional sense; tax dollars are allocated to them and they don’t have to show a profit. You are playing a different game here; the motivation of public sector employees can be different than what you might be expecting. For this reason the selling principles that work in the private sector don’t necessarily translate to the public sector. Your everyday “off the shelf” game plan probably won’t work.

Government RFP’s can be interesting, but in most cases you’ll want to avoid their siren song. Unless you have an inside line you stand an almost certain chance of being the “designated loser” before the RFP is even issued. For all the fanfare about vendor objectivity in the public sector, there isn’t any. Give up that dream; move on with your life. Buy a lottery ticket instead. Use your selling time more productively somewhere else, like the private sector.

The public sector frequently buys outside of formal agreements and contracts, despite what their buyers may tell you. I’ve seen too many times where something was needed in a hurry and they bought within hours with no bidding. Witness the repair of the Pentagon after 9/11. There was no formal and tedious RFP process and it got rebuilt, quickly.

The public sector can be a challenge to sell profitably. Before you embark on the odyssey of selling to the public sector be sure to carefully and realistically weigh the costs and benefits. In many, if not most, cases your selling efforts are better spent elsewhere in my opinion.