Assumptions — there’s an app for that

Recently, while surfing for free apps to download to my smart phone, I came across many apps that fictionally predict things about people and their behavior. From the benign to the ridiculous, my piqued interest was ignited by deviant imagination and the “Assumptometer App” was visualized. Although it doesn’t exist, here are some of its possibly more poignant uses.

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Gate 7B at Chicago O’Hare International Airport — the location of the final leg of my trip to Calgary — was strikingly similar to any gate at any airport. I’m not talking about the architecture or the décor. I’m speaking about the look and feel of the people awaiting mass transit. Oftentimes, a great number of those awaiting a flight are assumed to be traveling home. Therefore, my Assumptometer would have alarmed and caused me to notice that many of the persons travelling to Calgary, Alberta, Canada looked almost exactly like those that I have landed with on many harrowing experiences while arriving at Yeager Airport in Charleston, WV. 

Why?  People at Gate 7B and my native species look curiously like our favorite clothier is  L.L. Bean. Not that there is anything wrong with it, but I must say the waiting area was aglow with brown khaki, olive green and other muted tones and outdoorsy multi-pocketed shirts and pants. All were also shoed in hiking boots, cross trainers and the occasional earth-toned leather lace-up. In short, these were my kind of people and whether we were fashionably challenged or not mattered little. I felt instantly akin and knew what these people were about, or “abooot,” if you will.

While writing this article on a plane at 34,000 feet, I began to ponder the question of “Do the clothes make the man, or does the man make the clothes?” Well, the obvious answer is yes…to both queries. For instance, if a potential customer of mine comes in our store looking for a set of tires and has on a shirt that is two sizes too small, inside out and backwards, with his gut hanging out and sagging below his belt line, my new Assumptometer app would instantly alarm, displaying the following assumptions about the customer, who is most likely named Bubba: 1) he has no clue as to the size of the tire he needs; 2) he’ll be an easy sale because noticeably, he’ll use anything that’s “close”; 3) he won’t care if we mount the tires’ white-letters in or out as aesthetics is an unknown concept; and 4) he’ll be 45 minutes late for his installation appointment, as he was seemingly rushed during getting dressed for this meeting.

The Assumptometer could also help with other forlorn conclusions when being used on this customer’s immaculately clothed alter ego — Mr. GQ, perfect from head to toe, possibly a Romney cousin, nonetheless, a very couture tire shopper. What would my app say about this guy?  1) He knows the tire size his car needs, plus all of the optional styles and sizes he can use in addition to the proper caster-camber adjustment needed if he down- or up-sizes; 2) he will be a hard sale because he’s hung up on upstaging the expert with his vast and very vernacular database of vulcanistic terminology regarding all things rubber; 3) the white letters will be mounted out for sure; and 4) he’ll be 10 minutes early and try to haggle with me on the price again because he spends way too much money on clothes.

My new Assumptometer app has been occasionally wrong in trial runs, but it’s not far off. Sometimes it can be affected by pyrite intuition radiation influence, which occurs when I’m trying to encourage a rampant DIYer gone wild that he should let us perform the service on his vehicle because he just can’t seem to fix it himself. The customer I’m talking about knows a guy who lives across the street from a guy whose cousin dates a girl whose grandfather was a WWII tank mechanic that keeps leading my customer down the path of possibilities about what could be wrong with his car. The hardcore DIYer takes great pride in repairing his own vehicles, yet his greatest triumph lies in the fact that he didn’t have to pay me to do it. It’s like playing a horrible round of golf because you didn’t want to pay someone for lessons and the only thing that keeps you coming back for more pain is that one putt, drive or chip shot. Even though you may be a terrible golfer, the drug of getting lucky is a pretty powerful thing. 

I’ve tried to convert this type of DIYer for years and without a great deal of success.  The Assumptomer app hasn’t helped much either because it tends to make us start thinking like them! Yes, I say, admit it now and you will be free. Comments from us like, “Well, I guess that might work,” or “I can see how that might be a possibility,” actually empower this type of behavior. I just had one of these customers a few days ago and my Assumptometer app screen suddenly displayed a magical assumptive statement. “He doesn’t want to pay you to work on his car, but he does want it fixed.” Eureka! Free of my frustration, I quipped, “I know you don’t want to pay me to work on your car, but would you like us to fix it and be willing to pay us for the work?” It was the old forgotten “six of one or a half-dozen of the other” sales tactic, a brilliant tactical adjustment made possible by shaking my smart phone with the Assumptometer app running in an attempt to relieve the stress of wanting to shake some sense into the customer.   

This customer is easily recognized, and he shares a lot of the same traits as Bubba and Mr. GQ. Regardless of the garb he adorns himself in, the telltale sign is the fact that he’s riding in someone else’s car because he and his automotive guidance counselor buddies can’t fix his. Whether in earth tones and leather lace-ups, or a three-piece suit with wing-tips, he’s walking. If you treat this potential service client the same way you’ve always done, I bet the Assupmtometer will yield data showing you the same results – frustration and stress coupled with multiple returns. So I say, shake it up by assuming a more direct and effective approach and the results may surprise you.