How To Get What You Want

May 15, 2023

A marketing guru was teaching a room full of eager entrepreneurs.

He said . . .

“If you were opening a hamburger stand, what’s the most important thing you’d need to succeed?”

Of course, since it was a marketing class, a student replied, “Great marketing.” But the guru merely smiled and said nothing. So the other students chimed in with their answers:

“A competitive price.” “A good location.” “A great hamburger.”

The guru said, “Those things are good. But if I can have just one thing, my hamburger stand will beat yours.”

The guru paused for effect. The students listened intently. You could have heard the proverbial pin drop. Finally, a student cried out, “What is it?”

The guru replied: “A hungry crowd.”

Everyone smiled. Everyone agreed. Nothing was more important–not marketing, price, location, or quality. A hungry crowd was the most important thing a hamburger stand could have.

The first time a man looks at an advertisement, he does not see it.
The second time he does not notice it.
The third time he is conscious of its existence.
The fourth time he faintly remembers having seen it before.
The fifth time he reads it.
The sixth time he turns up his nose at it.
The seventh time he reads it through and says, “Oh, brother!”
The eighth time he says, “Here’s that confounded thing again!”
The ninth time he wonders if it amounts to anything.
The tenth time he will ask his neighbor if he’s tried it.
The eleventh time he wonders how advertisers make it pay.
The twelfth time he thinks it must be a good thing.
The thirteenth time he thinks perhaps it might be worth something.
The fourteenth time he remembers that he’s wanted such a thing for a long time.
The fifteenth time he is tantalized because he cannot afford to buy it.
The sixteenth time he thinks he will buy it someday.
The seventeenth time he makes a memorandum of it.
The eighteenth time he swears at his poverty.
The nineteenth time he counts his money carefully.
The twentieth time … he buys it.
And then he begins telling his friend what a wonderful thing he’s acquired.

Do you want people to agree with you? Do you want people to be hungry for what you want? Then you need to sell the benefits of what you want with the kind of overwhelming repetition described above.