A Sales Pitch

A sales pitch: A man came to our door the other day marketing car repair rewards cards. The card was designed where the purchaser would put down a deposit to gain access to the card. The card contained around 20 reduced price/free services, that when used, would allow the purchaser to receive back their initial deposit.

The argument: Everyone with a car needs car repairs at some point. By using our rewards card you will save money on your car repair needs.

The purpose: To encourage people to buy a rewards card.

The audience: The audience in this case is specifically Provo students with cars looking to save money on car repairs.

The goal: The goal is not only to sale rewards cards but to ensure that the auto shop has repeated business. Because card holders have to use all of the services on the card to receive their deposit back, they are motivated to go to the repair shop for all of their repair needs.

How he did it:
First, the salesperson used ethos to try and sale the repair cards. He was dressed in a jumpsuit like the ones typically worn by auto-mechanics. By looking like an auto-mechanic, the sales person was essentially saying that I should trust his opinion on the rewards cards because he knows what’s best when it comes to car repairs.
Second, the sales person used logos. The first thing he did was hand me a card so that I had the product in my hand. He made it harder to say no when he did this because I would have to openly reject him by handing back the rewards card. This made me emotionally involved in the sales pitch.
However, the weakness in the argument was his evidence. First, the evidence was not very specific. He talked very little about the money I could save by using the card, or how good their repair services were. Because I knew little about what was on the car or how good their repair shop is, I had an easier time rejecting him.
Second, his evidence was not very typical. As a student that is in Provo for only a limited time, I was not convinced that I would use all the services to get my deposit back. He did little to personalize his pitch to his student audience.

This is why I felt the argument was not very effective. He failed to address is student audience effectively, thus I did not fully see why I would need the auto repair card.