> Not to be offensive, but you sound like the guy who I don’t want to be.

Interesting comments and perspective.

A few decades ago I was faced with the challenge of selling a product I designed. I sold the way engineers do, which is to say I sucked at it. That launched me into an effort to learn. And, with friends and mentors, I did. I sold millions of dollars in products in the years that followed.

Selling is art and science. If you think of it as an engineer, you are not going to succeed. If you think it is "dirty" or "manipulative", stop trying to be an entrepreneur and go find a job. You will fail.

To be clear, there is such a thing as vomit-inducing sales and marketing schemes. Thankfully, that's the exception rather than the rule. Why? Because nobody wants to be sold this way.

Here's what is important to understand in selling: You cannot force anyone to buy anything.

Say you have a hotel. You can have beautiful gardens. Incredible rooms. Superior service. Great offers, activities and pricing.

And yet, you cannot force someone to take a vacation (or where to go). You just cannot.

What can you do then?

Well, start from the perspective that nobody knows you exist. Which means that you are three standard deviations away from anyone --when they are ready to make the decision-- choosing to book a room at your hotel. You do not exist.

Realizing this, if you believe in your product, you should want to make people far and wide aware of it. You want them to know you exist. You want them to know about your hotel when they are ready to take a vacation.

If the people you want as customers life within a small radius from your hotel, you might be able to afford sending everyone a beautiful brochure once a year and maybe even inviting them to a brunch event every so often. That's great.

Anything much beyond that requires a different approach. Still, if your audience is small and well defined it might be easier.

Once you start getting much beyond that, it can become exponentially more difficult. The internet, like it or not, has created a situation where you have to rise above a certain threshold for you to even as much as exist in the minds of potential customers. Which means there's a way to do it and there are many ways to waste your time and money while doing nothing but remain below the visibility threshold.

You don't have to like it.

You do have to understand that there's a way to do it in order to succeed and a way to die trying.

If you are not willing to understand the realities of selling today, again, with respect, find a job.

If I were to drop you in the ocean five km from shore with nothing but your clothes, your survival depends on several things:

- Accepting your reality
- Wanting to survive
- Knowing how to swim with minimal effort in open water
- Start swimming

As it applies to selling:

Accepting your reality means that you have to understand you are not going to succeed at selling unless you stop being judgmental about how selling has to be done today. That doesn't mean becoming a scam artist. Reputable companies like Ford and Hewlett Packard have to adapt their sales strategy to market realities. Only then can you have a plan that will lead to survival.

Wanting to survive should be obvious. Entrepreneurship is hard. If you are going to reject sales and marketing for ideological reasons that are not in alignment with reality, go find a job. You won't survive.

Knowing how to swim. Most people would drown if they were dropped into the ocean far from shore. This is true even if they know how to swim in a swimming pool. If you are going to survive in that environment, the day I drop you into the ocean should not be the first time you experience it. You need to train. And fail. And train some more. And learn how to swim in open water. As someone who learned to swim long distance in open water, I can tell you it is very different from messing around in a swimming pool.

Finally, start swimming. If you want to sell your product, you have to start. And you can't invent a new way to sell just because you don't know how or don't like how selling is done today. Don't invent a new open water swim stroke when you are 5 km from shore. You will not survive the experience.

In short, I think you have a decision to make. If you want to be an entrepreneur, get with the program. Or not, and just find a job.

Sorry for the tough love. I hate seeing people waste their time.