Conscientious Versus Over-Confident Quick Sanity Check

Fascinating social media news emerged through a British insurer this week. They had a product banned by Facebook. In part you suspect, because Facebook didn’t think of the idea themselves.

In widely reported events, Admiral Insurance developed a quote process for drivers wanting car insurance for the first ever time.

By analysing their Facebook posts, they aimed to offer discounts for the appearance of personality traits linked to safe driving.

These were listed as being identified as conscientious and well-organised. As The Guardian reported;

These include writing in short concrete sentences, using lists, and arranging to meet friends at a set time and place, rather than just “tonight”.

In contrast, evidence that the Facebook user might be overconfident – such as the use of exclamation marks and the frequent use of “always” or “never” rather than “maybe” – will count against them.

The clear Sales crossover is to question which type of written or spoken word do you lean towards?

Salespeople are stereotypically renowned for being ‘over-confident’. If you’re fully in this camp, is it worth toning it down a notch?

Will removing ‘always’ and ‘never’ from your vocab help gain vital prospect trust?

Similarly, do you like long school teacher pleasing elaborate sentences and leave aside minutiae of detail?

Would short sharp prose interspersed with lists and tables and precise data gain vital prospect trust?