Yesterday I had a rather intersting, albeit promising, sales call. I had a teams meeting with the whole 3-person board of community engagement of the city of Brownsville, Texas– the southernmost city in the state. Firstly, I had expected a meeting with just the head of community engagement, which is what I told would happen. So, now I’m trying to get a read on 3 people instead of one, two of which had their camera off, and one of them spoke only broken english and had connectivity issues. The one guy with his camera on opens with zero introduction as to who they are and plunges into this monologe as to how he’d ask me about me but he felt like he already knew me based on all the research he’d done. Now, there isn’t all that much out there on our group out there for him to research. So this was strange, and mildly creepy. The rest of the conversation was unlike most first sales calls I have of this type. Usually I can direct conversation with the right line of questioning to find where we might fit best in the community the client represents. Usually in these first calls the client has no idea where an improv comedy group could fit in their community, and so we have to find it together. I usually help this along with the right questions, layering them to lead them to particular points. Then, once we find a fit, we have a second meeting to work out details. However, this call was completely different. He plunged immediatly into long monologes on what their city is doing this summer, the kind of events they plan, and what he thinks we might fit into. Initially, it felt like he was in control so I tried to take it back by asking questions. However, the longer this went on, the sooner I realized that he was anwering most of the questions I would have asked without me asking them. So, I just let him roll. He was talking most of the time afterall. As I soon discovered, this wasn’t some kind of discovery call for him. He had an exact event in mind for us to put on. With date, time, and venue already selected on his end, it was just to see if we could pull it off. So, I let him “run the show” so to speak. Of course I answered his questions with questions and delayed the budget conversation as I normally do, but for the most part I just let him roll. And at the end of the conversation, he asked for a proposal. I got a quick idea of a budget and said I could have one to him by weeks end. I suppose the takeaway here is to be willing to modify your approach. I was used to having to direct conversation to get information from clients. Sometimes, the call isn’t discovery in nature at all. The client has already decided what you could fit for and just wants to see if you’ll do it! So, the moral is to adapt. Roll with the punches!
By folgerjt19
BoweryJE22 One thought on “Rolling with the Punches: When a Client throws a Curveball”
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It sounds like you had an interesting and unexpected sales call, where the client already had an event in mind for your improv comedy group. It’s important to be adaptable in sales, as every client is different and may have different expectations. In this case, it was helpful to let the client “run the show” and provide information about the event they had in mind. It’s also important to delay the budget conversation until later in the sales process, as this allows you to build trust with the client and demonstrate the value of your services before discussing cost. Overall, it’s important to be willing to modify your approach and roll with the punches in sales, as this can lead to successful outcomes.