When people wave their red flag in front of you, do you really see it?
I’m not the biggest person in the world for short, pithy statements, but one of my favorites (which, as far as I know, is only attributable to me) is this: People will show you how they will fail. Whether we’re talking about jobs, business relationships, or personal relationships, it’s a truism. There’s a corollary statement to that one, too: You will fail if you ignore these signals.
I was reminded of this as I discussed a customer relationship issue with a client of mine today. My client has a key account that was in the process of taking their business elsewhere. This happens to be a company that I am fairly familiar with; their culture is anti-sales and anti-relationships. When my client and I worked back through the initial sales process, I discovered that they had told my client’s salesperson that he would forever be dealing only with the purchasing manager; that their key managers simply didn’t have the time to deal with salespeople.
“So,” I said to my client, “they told you up front how the relationship would go bad. Or, more properly, they told you that you would never have a relationship.” My client stared at me for a second, and then said, “Yes, I guess you’re right – but we’d always done everything they asked!” I responded that I’m sure they did, but that there was no value to this with the company. In short, the customer had told my client of the eventual failure of the business relationship – but my client was so excited simply to have the business that he didn’t make any plans for the eventual collapse.
In short, my client ignored the red flag waving in front of him. That’s the source of most bad hires, most bad deals, and most bad relationships. We already have the senses to spot the red flags – it’s just that, as natural optimists, we don’t find them. So, to help you out, here are some of the most common situations and red flags that will happen to us in selling:
Lack of Respect: This happens all the time, and salespeople are the world’s best at ignoring it. Does your contact regularly leave you cooling your heels in the waiting room? That is a lack of respect for your time. When I was selling, I would wait – occasionally – for a maximum of 15 minutes past the appointment time. “But, Troy, if I don’t wait, my competitors will, and I’ll lose the business!” Nonsense. I found that if I simply left after fifteen minutes, telling the receptionist to have my contact call me to reschedule a meeting for a time when it was more convenient, that I seldom had to wait again. And I NEVER lost a customer because of it. Salespeople constantly want respect from their customers – but if you don’t respect the value of your own time, how do you expect the customer to respect you?
Restricted Contacts: This is one of the biggest ones, and it happened to my client. My client knew – and the customer’s contacts knew – that the Purchasing Manager was not the ultimate decision maker, nor the economic buyer, of their services. By not allowing the salesperson to meet the end-users or the key influencers, the customer was letting my client know that they were contributing no value, and that establishing meaningful relationships was not part of their company culture (and I’m familiar with the company – relationships with vendors are not in fact part of the culture). That doesn’t mean that my client shouldn’t have accepted the business, but it does mean that they should never have counted on the business.
Slow Pay: Sometimes customers will pay in a slow fashion because the money is tight. More often, however, slow pay is due to the same lack of respect that I referred to earlier. Customers that habitually pay slowly may be telling you that there is a problem with the relationship; are you listening?
In the Hiring Process: This deserves its own article, really; I’ll just hit a few of the high spots here. I’m constantly amazed by managers who interview and hire salespeople who show up late for interviews, who can’t compose a decent sentence, who have major mistakes on their resume’, or who show them in other ways why they shouldn’t be hired. We do these things because we end up liking the person and making an emotional investment in them; hire in haste and repent in leisure.
I advise you to watch and listen for the red flags when you hear them – when someone shows you how they will fail, take heed – and they will ALWAYS show you.
