Is Door to Door Solicitation Old News?

After reading pages 370-372, I realized how eerily similar Zheng He's (the Muslim captain who sailed around the world) plan is to the ones of many americans now in days. Zheng He's intentions completely mirror the intentions of a evangelical, or solicitor going door to door in hopes of being listened to. Zheng He made sure to have a sweet bargain by giving the foreigners gifts as soon as they agreed with trade, and I find that similar to the free Knick-Knacks that you get anywhere where ideas are being thrown at you. Zheng He also brought many men with him, and in today's view, the more people you bring to convince somebody of something, the easier it'll happen. Zheng He is the solicitor from the past with a much larger goal of course, but I still find it hilarious at how uniform and "door to door" his plan feels. And I am aware that this comes across as a little juvenile for a blog topic, but to give a more serious definition. I feel that Zheng He was both successful for his persistence but also for the fact that few foreigners had traveled the world, so Zheng He was able to provide this for them. And in the end, everyone was supplied with some sort of lump sum that then commenced the trade between the two. In modern society, solicitation takes place hundreds of times more than Zheng He's trip, but we have learned to ignore the persistence and buy that bronze plaque: "No Solicitors".