Ignore This And Lose A Customer

The deal was almost done. All that remained was to have a conference call between the company’s senior management and the consulting firm they were about to hire. Then the papers would be signed and a customer relationship established.

But on the conference call, things went horribly wrong. It was evident from the lead consultant’s conversation that their firm had not done its homework. Knowledge about the company that could have been gleaned from its Web site and by Googling it was missing.

It was painfully evident that the consultants hadn’t done basic prospect research.

The deal was undone. No customer relationship was created.

The consultants ignored one of the most basic fundamentals of the sales profession.

Know your prospect.

Raise your hands if you learned this in the very first part of your first sales course.

Wait, keep them up until I count.

Yep! Pretty much everyone learned that fundamental early on.

Normally people think it’s the inexperienced that ignore the basics.

But even an experienced professional with years of experience can forget a fundamental.

I hope they had plenty of other customers and didn’t need the business. (In this economy? Yea, right.)

It staggers me that someone as experienced as this person would ignore such as basic fundamental. Especially in this economy when every customer is needed.

Regards,

Glenn

Follow me on Twitter @txglennross