I was talking earlier today to Pam Carvell, Life President of the Hotel Marketing Association for the UK… we’ve known each other since I built her first website a few moons ago… we were talking about how sales & marketing have changed over the years…
Once upon a time, if the MD of a big company liked you then they would simply give you the order… today that process has been hugely complicated, ensuring that what once was a few jovial conversations is now too much of a slog to be worthy of any great effort… chances are, if they go out to tender without knowing who the winner is first then how do you know if you’re not just wasting your increasingly valuable time? You don’t…
So you can spend a year dancing through hoops, only to get disqualified at the last hurdle without even knowing the blinking thing was there!
Once it was 3… now it’s 33… what is the question? #behca http://t.co/L4gEb59Wo3
— Who loves yar baby! (@wholovesyarbaby) August 4, 2014
This changes sales into more of a marketing exercise… where you have to lay out your offering and allow the fishes to nibble… to swim round and check the other side… to visit other sources of nourishment… returning under their own steam, when they are good and ready, to finally take a bite.
How many times do you need to have contact with a prospect before they turn into a client?
Once it was 3… now it’s 33… and god forbid if you are not pitch perfect each and every time!
For me pitch perfect is not about being suited & booted, t’s crossed and i’s dotted… I’m not a tender sort of dude… I’m a man of action who in a world full of waffle cuts to the chase… if you don’t like my direct demeanour then we are unlikely to do business… so I’m increasingly finding myself saying it as I see it… I always like to think I have done that but I know I have held back in the past because I felt others might think it not “pc”.
But what’s the point… in 33 engagements I’m bound to relax and let my guard down, saying something “wrong” which I felt was right… so I guess the answer is to be real… be hard core authentic…#behca... say it as it is in your head and if someone doesn’t agree then we can agree to disagree and if this means it’s a deal breaker, do me the courtesy of letting me know so I’m not dicking around wasting anymore of my time ;)
You really want to be talking to those people who appreciate your brilliance…
Let me hear you tweet it from the rooftops #behca
Thank you.
Jon