It's Not Rocket Science
Posted on September 06, 2013 by Vicky Walker, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.
A lighthearted look at one of the key elements to successful revenue generation.
Here’s a riddle for you: What must you keep from the moment you give it to someone? The answer is below, somewhere.
I had a wonderful colleague and friend, Bob who was in sales for a cutting edge, international image analysis company. I had the pleasure of being a reseller for his software. It was in the mid 90’s when quantitating an image was a brand new approach to microscopy. That was a great wave to ride on and it was unbridled success for everyone.
Bob is the best in the business, not only because he is a superb teacher (an absolutely critical component in sales), but because of his dedicated attention to his customers. When Bob interacted with his customers, you would be convinced that they were his only customer… ever.
One of Bob’s customers was in the aerospace Industry in California. He was working directly with them on how to optimize the use of his company’s software for the quantitative analysis of microscopy images of the tiles from the space shuttle following their re-entry from space. Really cool. Bob was at the keyboard with his customer beside him, going through the steps to ensure consistent, accurate results. In an effort to casually describe the software’s user friendliness and intuitive interface, he offered the idiom “it’s not rocket science”. His customer smiled wryly and leaned over “Actually Bob – it is rocket science”. Too funny!
Bob is one of the most affable guys you’ll ever want to meet. Wise too. He always said “half of sales is just showing up”. It’s true … be there for your customers. We come now to the answer to the riddle. What must you keep from the moment you give it to someone? Answer: Your word.
In the end, customers choose to interact with someone they can trust over anything else. You are the single most important agent to mitigate their risk when making the decision to do business with you. If you say you are going to respond with a certain time frame, then build in a system to ensure that you do so. Use a reminder system: task lists with alarms set to remind you in enough time to actually do the job from scratch, sticky notes on your car’s steering wheel, a string on your finger, or call you mother and get her to remind you. No, don’t call your mother … it’s your job, not hers. You get the point. Sometimes circumstances may not allow for you to keep your promise. Alright then, stuff happens. Stand accountable for it – say so, and explain why without blaming anyone else. Also share your plan for what you are going to do about it and re-establish a new timeframe for completion. Then do it.
Through fast changing and highly competitive times, people crave to be in partnership with someone they can count on. Just show up … with what you promised, when you promised. It’s not rocket science, but it could be.
