Opportunities comin’ back around

When it comes to marketing and sales, is there a deeper “low” than when you lose a deal?

Perhaps you’ve spent hours and hours working with a prospect. You’ve done multiple demos. You’ve spent time visiting them and discussing work.. and you’ve learned a bit about their personal interests. They like what you have, and you think they are a perfect fit for your solution.

But in the end, something causes them to choose a competitor.

How do you handle the relationship at that point? Well, oftentimes we kick off the dust and move onto the next opportunity. That is a wise course of action.

However, how far off of our radar do we push that lost opportunity?

All the way off the table, and out of our rolodex?

If so, we may be missing out on future opportunities.

Yes, while it may not be productive to root against our competition, the possibility exists that things may go awry with their new client. Perhaps they take too long to deliver on the promises that they presented during their sales process.

Or, perhaps a new technology comes along that interests the customer. If you can beat your competition by adding that solution to your offering, well, that may be the incentive that the “lost” opportunity needs to re-think their situation.

We must find ways to stay familiar to all of our opportunities, current and former.

And, never spend too much time staring at what your competition is doing now. Yes, it’s good to know a bit about what they are doing. But if you keep looking ahead and anticipate the needs of your potential customers, you will have a lot more of them in your “WIN” column in the end.

 

 

Photo Credit: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Utrecht_huisvuil.jpg

The Bursting Bubble

Quick — when I say “bubble”, what do you think of? Most likely, it might be “burst”.

When it comes to business, I’m sure we’d all agree that keeping ourselves in a bubble is a bad idea. If we are isolated from our customers, our prospects, or our competitors, we risk missing out on a very important thing = what people really care about.

Yes, we may  be working very hard at our office. That can be a path to productivity.

However, here’s the problem – what are we working very hard on?

Is it what we think is important? Is it what our customers and prospects think is important?

Working hard in an isolated environment can be a very bad think.  The best intentions will not save us. In that environment, the product or service that we are working on will suffer.

So, if we find ourselves in this kind of work-related bubble, how can we burst out?

One way is to make time to attend conferences.

Sometimes we think we should attend events, trade shows, etc. But we decide not to in the end, because “we’re too busy back at the office”.   This type of decision can be harmful.

In fact, we should take the opposite approach. What we learn at conferences will help make work EASIER. The knowledge we gain will make us more productive. The conversations we have and insight we gain will help lead us to producing a better product or service.

Look for conferences related to your industry, and your area of expertise. If you are a software developer, attend programming-related conferences. BUT don’t stop there.

Who do you sell to?   Attend trade shows and conferences specific to the industries of your customers. You will gain tremendous insight into their personalities, needs, and more.

Yes, expose yourself, and you’ll burst out of the bubble.

 

 

Photo Credit: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bubble_1.jpg

Brett Favre leads two teams to victory

I’d like to share a marketing success story from a service provider that primarily offers print and fulfillment solutions.

RESCO recently created a video that did many things very well.

• It was topical — it was all about the “Brett Favre returns to Green Bay in a Vikings uniform” story.
• It was a video of the right length – just under 4 minutes
• They utilized social media to help make the video go viral (Blogs, Twitter, and more)
• It showed off the company’s personality

As of this morning, there have been over 25,000 views. (2K more than yesterday!)

Here is a link to the video.