Should we ask prospects how they prefer to be pitched?

Don Draper would never ask a company how they prefer to be pitched. Would you? (Image from freemusing.com)

This is the fourth post in an in-depth series on selling in the communications consulting world.

Sometimes your read someone else’s words and they just make sense to you. For me, this afternoon, those words were:

“I am no better than anyone else and only as smart as those who I am around. I usually learn something new everyday and that is what this game of life is all about.”

The words are from Shane Mac’s novel of a post (totally worth the read) about his experience launching startups. I highly recommend it. In addition to Shane, the other smart people I learned from this afternoon were Gini Dietrich and Heather Whaling. What they and Shane taught me? Don’t forget to look at things from a different point of view.

See, throughout this series of “selling” posts, I’ve been asking my peers for their tips and tricks when it comes to investing in new business and closing a sale. But the whole time I’ve continued thinking that the pitch needs to focus on what the agency can do for the prospect. Capabilities. Ideas. Strategy. Tactics. Budget. A relationship building approach but a conversation started by the agency.

But maybe that’s not the only way or even the best way. Gini shared that her agency, Arment Dietrich, takes a different approach:

“Instead of doing proposals and online audits and all of that, we ask questions. We listen. We have them present to us as if we’re new business prospect. And we treat them as if we’re investing in their business. Because we are, in a way.”

Interviewing the prospect, huh? You mean actually showing them you care most about their business? Did anyone else read this one and just start nodding your head because it made so much sense? Yep, me too.

Heather told a story about how she recently met with a prospect she “really” wanted to bring on at Geben Communications. She met with the company and talked about how she thought they could work together to achieve the brand’s goals. But when she was invited to a second meeting and was asked to develop a strategy outline, Heather took this approach:

“At that point, I explained that I couldn’t do that until I had a contract in hand, which would trigger me being able to spend the necessary hours doing research and learning about their industry. I was prepared to walk away, even though I *really* wanted to land this client. Emails got passed up the food chain and the CEO was so impressed that I was willing to stand my ground that he hired me for that company and another company he leads. It was a fantastic lesson for me, helping me realize that the clients/people I want to work with understand that time equals money and that they can’t expect me to give away my time.”

Gutsy? Yes. Smart? Yeah, I think so. Definitely a different way to consider approaching a sales opportunity. And what I like about it is how she basically said “I run a business, you run a business, you get how this goes, right?” I think people can respond differently to that approach, but it worked well here for sure.

Shane’s perspective was from a slightly different angle because he was talking about customer development. But it was absolutely relevant to this topic:

“I spent a lot of the past few months on customer development. (which is hard as hell and probably the most underrated task when rolling out a product) Asking people what they thought of the product. Was it priced to high?”

My first experience with social media was from a customer service perspective. I used to be a Sprint community manager on Twitter and responded to customer issues. So you would think I’d be dialed in to listening to the customers’ point of view. Listening is a part of client relations I always practice and preach. But I must admit I don’t think I ask a prospects or clients often enough — How do you like to be pitched? Until now.

If you’ve ever worked for a company or if you work at a corporation now, what agency pitch approach do you prefer? The comments are yours and I look forward to your thoughts.

I should have asked a long time ago. I’m sorry it took so long. But I’m listening now and I’m ready to learn something new. So what do you think?

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