A few days ago I did a blog saying ‘how to buy a financial product’ – now I am telling you why you bought it…well see if you can see the symptoms. When I say he, it includes she – so in this story when I say ‘he the client’ and ‘she the beautiful sales person’ , you need to switch genders. If you are a girl reading this, well the salesman becomes a ‘handsome man’. Other than that both genders show similar buying patterns. Sometimes women seem smarter, and sometimes men. Sadly in India there is not enough psychological buying research….

So here are the reasons:

1. You are a middle aged man and the girl who came to sell to you was good looking, young, well dressed and liberally perfumed: Well physically speaking, the sale happened in your mind the minute she stepped into the room that you were sitting and she smiled! So what she say did not really matter too much – all that you had read, understood, applauded, liked on FB, heard somewhere was ALL LOST immediately.

You could not look stupid in front of such an attractive sales person, could you?

You had to buy that complicated sounding leveraged derivative product which was tracking the Japanese yen vs US $ reverse……OMG now you wonder what you bought…!

2. Because they gave you food: A big nice foreign bank invited you to lunch and made the sales presentation over lunch. Half the sales was done by the nice sumptuous food that you were busy eating. You may not know, but food is a strong player when it comes to hormones of your body – and it had played a nice role in pushing you into action.

3. Because she repeated what you said: ‘I am worried about my retirement’ is what you said and she said…’yes sir I heard you saying ‘I am worried about your retirement’ and I have a perfect solution to end all your worries. – when somebody agrees with us, we are thrilled. So thrilled that we think she agrees with us. Of course even if you had said Brian Lara is the greatest right hand fast bowler she would have gushed ‘Sir you are so well informed about cricket’ – that is what she is programmed to say IMMATERIAL OF WHAT YOU SAY…

4. Because she said this product has one defect: When a salesperson tells you ‘Sir this is a great product – but it has one defect – it pays ONLY 13% p.a. unlike other products which pay 15%p.a. So suddenly she is convinced YOU that this product has a defect AND SHE IS UPFRONT IN TELLING YOU THAT. What better way to win your confidence than telling you that the product has a defect. Now you are so impressed with her HONESTY also. Brilliant girl, she has completely won you over. Set game and match?

5. Because she was excellently trained in picking ‘buy’ signals: As soon as she entered your house your wife said you have a long portfolio which she does not understand. From that moment she pitched simple products, easy to understand, easy to track, and hey NOT A ULIP. Your previous 3 buys where ulips where you lost a lot of money…so now she tells you ‘this is not a ulip’ . Your wife is excited and says ‘see Subramoney also says we should not buy a ULIP…so we are right.

When I say ‘do not buy ulips’ – i do not mean that Endowment plans are better than ULIPs. I just meant (read my lips) say NO TO ULIPS. I actually mean say no to endowment. Say yes only to simple term insurance bought on the net…..