Business will always be business, and in a dog-eat-dog world, a salesperson will always do whatever they can to land a sale. It might not be the most ethical approach—one that pushes the boundaries of human decency—but, who cares, screw that, it gets the job done.

But being over-the-top confident and persistent does not mean success. It ups the success coefficient (or whatever other fundamental business term you might want to use here), but it doesn’t make it a clutch.

Especially if the client catches on to their business tactics and ends up taking them up on that overdone upsale offer quite literally. Through malicious compliance.

More Info: Reddit

Salespeople can be hard on customers, but customers can be hard right back at them, and all it takes is to take their words literally

Image credits: machu. (not the actual image)

So, years back, this one Redditor managed to snag some tickets to a Formula 1 racing event in Silverstone, a circuit racing track in England. Since the track is big, and viewing it live can be problematic, OP decided to get some binoculars to facilitate and upgrade the spectating experience.

One trip to the local optical retailer later, OP was greeted and served by a lovely sales lady. Not only was she helpful in fleshing out the right pair of binoculars for the good gentleman, but also seemed genuinely excited for the race as well. All in all, a pleasant purchase experience.

One Redditor shared a story of how they turned an arrogant binoculars salesman’s words right back against them with malicious compliance

Image credits: u/DanceLikeItsOuchy

Image credits: Chase Elliott Clark (not the actual image)

Well, actually, no purchase was made due to an inconvenience of about yea height and one that had too many words in their mouth. Yep, enter another salesperson, a guy who unpleasantly butted into the conversation by effectively pushing away the nice sales lady and started the process of selling the product all over again. Except he did so poorly.

Think cutting off the client and trying to sell the same binoculars the client already discounted together with the nice sales lady in the previous conversation kind of poorly.

OP was starting to get a bit annoyed at this point. Not only was the sales guy disrespecting his coworker, pushing her away and calling her “just a trainee”, but he kept on making the already stereotypically awkward sales process even more problematic by trying to not only upsell OP with better binoculars, but also upselling with insurance.

In short, OP needed binoculars for convenient F1 viewing, but the nice sales lady was pushed aside by an arrogant one and ruined it for everyone

Image credits: u/DanceLikeItsOuchy

“At this point, I really just want to walk out the shop, but I suffer from the occasionally debilitating condition of being English, and that kind of embarrassment is just too much to take. Instead, I’ll buy them, and go home, fantasizing about all of the cool things I should have said,” wittily remarked OP.

But here’s where the sales-dude started stumbling. After OP agreed to the more expensive binoculars just to make the problem go away, the salesman suggested insurance. That was a no from OP, but the salesman couldn’t take that as an answer and persuasion mode kicked in. “They are very delicate […]. You probably shouldn’t buy them without the insurance.”

Click. Malicious compliance. OP agreed. The salesperson, without truly understanding what kind of Jedi mind-trickery had just happened, rushed off to get the paperwork in order and came back, asking for OP’s name to finalize the deal. Only to be slapped with a well, actually, I wasn’t agreeing with the insurance, I was agreeing with the delicacy, I’ll probably break them because I’m a butterfingers.

The sales-dude ended up using his own arguments against himself—”You probably shouldn’t buy them without the insurance”—losing the sale

Image credits: u/DanceLikeItsOuchy

Image credits: Colin (not the actual image)

The sales-bro stumbled again, started backtracking on the other binoculars that were actually good for OP, but it was too late. They aren’t as good as these delicate ones, right? He politely thanked them for their time, and left.

For context, a LinkedIn article by John Smibert, interviewing author Cian McLoughlin, explains that the best salesperson is one who’s seen as humble and introverted. This means they listen well, and they’re willing to teach and challenge the client.

McLoughlin also notes that any salesperson who brings adaptability, perspective and a cultural fit to the table will be able to win customers. Most importantly, great salespeople are defined by great storytelling—war stories, anecdotes, case studies, they all work well to drive the sale home.

Folks online had a good laugh, but also shared their own stories in the comments

But enough about that. More about the people’s response, which was very positive. For the most part, it was lighthearted joking and commenting about that “debilitating condition of being English” and how there should have been a review left for that business.

Others shared more serious concerns for the lovely sales lady—how she needed to deal with the arrogance of her coworker on a daily basis—and some even shared similar stories. With varying degrees of malicious compliance.

Whatever the case, the post drew quite a crowd as over 17,000 people upvoted the post (with a 97% positivity rating), 700 comments, and a handful of Reddit awards. You can check out the post in context here.

But before you go, be sure to share your horrible salesperson stories and how they done goofed up in the comment section below!

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