Reflection on Rapportness

“A Different Path to Commercial Success: From Intuition to Methodology”

When I began my journey helping companies that were struggling to stay afloat, I quickly realized that most solutions being applied were based on conventional wisdom—what consultants preached and what was taught in business schools and universities. In the field of sales, marketing—in its many versions and trends—was treated as the only valid approach.
The problem? For many companies that had already tried everything to boost sales, it simply wasn’t working.
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One of my earliest clients was a national leader in the furniture manufacturing industry. For years, they had enjoyed a monopoly on a specific product. But then, a competitor entered the scene, offering a similar solution at a much lower price. The company’s market share began to shrink dramatically. By the time they brought me in, their sense of urgency was unmistakable. No feature or quality could justify their higher price anymore. Their dominance was evaporating.

“What can we do?” the director asked me.

My response was straightforward: “Be honest. Tell the truth. Commit to delivering an experience that genuinely satisfies your customers—beyond simply providing a good product at a good price.”
Back then—in the late 1990s—I didn’t yet know the technical distinction between needs and expectations. My advice came from pure intuition. But it worked. And that same approach has proven successful throughout my professional career.


Over the years, new marketing trends have emerged, offering ever more sophisticated techniques for attracting customers. But despite these innovations, many companies still struggle to generate sufficient revenue to remain profitable. Why? Because the starting point is often wrong.
At a 2023 conference in Amman, Jordan, I addressed an audience of researchers from over 50 countries and asked a simple question:

“How many of you like intrusive advertising?”

No one raised a hand.


So I followed up:

“Then why are we dedicating this three-day conference to exploring methodologies that rely on marketing and artificial intelligence to sell through those very tactics?”

This was the same intuitive insight that had guided me decades earlier with struggling companies. And it still applies. If we, as consumers, dislike advertising and pushing sales techniques, why are our sales strategies built around it?
Given the disruptive nature of the alternative approach, I felt it deserved a name—one that clearly signaled a departure from conventional commercial thinking. I called it Rapportness.

The Expansive Emotional Management methodology for selling in hypercompetitive environments is rooted in a simple but profound idea: Outperform customer trust and loyalty.
That means going beyond transactions to build emotionally resonant relationships. It’s not about manipulation or persuasion—it's about connection, integrity, and delivering value in ways that truly matter to the customer.