A Salesman's Epic Fail and a Lesson in Homework

By Kyle S. Reyes, Owner of The Silent Partner Marketing

It doesn't matter how great your business is...you're going to make mistakes.  Sometimes plans will fall through or distributors will drop the ball.  These things happen, and as business owners - there's nothing you can do to avoid them.

But other mistakes are completely avoidable.  And sometimes they are so silly...you can't help but to laugh.

Like this phone call I received the other day.

Salesdude: "Kyle...Matthew here from (name removed to protect the silly) Digital Marketing. I want to talk to you a bit about how we can improve your digital advertising with SEM and SEO."

Me: "Tell me more."

Salesdude: "Well, the company you are using is just falling really short. They are really dropping the ball. You're not showing up in relevant searches. You're throwing your money away."

Me: "Really? You think the company is dropping the ball, huh?"

Salesdude: "I'm telling you - I'd dump them in a heartbeat. Clearly they can't perform. They need to do research like us."

Me: "It's funny, you mention research. I totally agree. I think it's EXTREMELY important to research. Take this phone call, for example. Had YOU done a little research before calling me....you would have found that YOUR COMPANY was hired by us in February...and has been managing our SEO and SEM ever since."

Salesdude: *crickets*

Me: "Well, THIS just got awkward for you, now didn't it?"

The budget that this advertising company oversees for this client is approximately $20,000 PER MONTH.  You'd think he would've done a little homework before calling, huh?

My lighthearted email to the regional manager who SOLD us on doing business with this company concluded with this message:

"Reasons why this could have happened, he says:

-He was doing it late at night (presumably while drinking copious amounts of cheap sake).
-He had lots of cookies cached on his computer (like...Nabisco amounts of cookies).
-Your company had problems with the transition to enhanced campaigns and didn't make us aware of it (in which case *I* will need copious amounts of sake after the owner finds out).

However, your rep's call has me strongly questioning how our campaigns ARE operating...."

Here's the thing.  Up until that phone call, I believed that this company was doing a GREAT JOB with the digital advertising.  The call made me wonder if somehow I had overlooked something.
After looking through the data again, I found that there were in fact NO problems.  The numbers were strong...and the salesman had just used it as a sales pitch.  

SHADY.

The General Manager of the company sent me a personalized email apologizing for this.  Much appreciated.  
But lesson learned - some mistakes will happen.  Others can be avoided.