Some people will choose not to interact with you. Many of those people will be “invisible,” in the sense that their decision not to interact with you will be made before you’re even aware that they exist. A potential job applicant that never applies to your open position, a potential romantic partner that doesn’t swipe on your dating profile, a potential customer that walks by your shop.
Tell most people this, and they’ll shrug their shoulders and say “their loss!”
That could be! But your loss, too.
We can’t interact with everyone, of course. There’s a real opportunity cost to every person we spend time on. But if a hundred people walk by your store and not one comes in, how many times will you say “their loss” before you take some interest in why they’re making that decision?
“The perfect employee/partner/customer will choose me regardless of what signals I’m sending,” is a silly thing to think, but many people do think exactly that. There’s a wide, wide chasm between what’s true about you and what people can realistically understand from early signals. Your signals could be wrong! People aren’t psychic, and maybe you’re doing a bad job of communicating “who you really are.”
Maybe it is their loss – but it’s your responsibility to communicate well.
The Opportunity Machine 