Building Connections with Whom You Are Selling to

I read a story illustrating salesmanship which was about Sir Francis Younghusband's first trial of climbing Mt. Everest. When he sought permission of climbing the mountain from the Tibetan side from the then ruling Lama, the Lama was surprised why this Englishman wanted to do that. Guess how Sir Francis explained it to the Lama? He told the Lama that he was from a sect whose Gods could only be worshipped on the top of mountains. The Lama took this explaination easily as it was quite understandable for religious people.

That might be an example of personal selling which suggests building connections with your customers. But it works for nonpersonal selling too, such as advertising, public relation, sales promotion, etc. Get to know your targeted customers, and build a relationship with them - that's what customer relationship marketing is asking for. If we expand this point to our daily life, doesn't it work for other human relationships too, like friendship, marriage, or family?