‘Tis Better to Give Than to Receive
The following is an email message I received today:
Re: Scheduling a Call, Wednesday, May 27
Marcelle—
You may recall I tried contacting you last year on behalf of our client who had retained our firm to help them buy an interactive media agency. We helped our client develop a significant strategic relationship, and we continue to meet interactive and traditional media agencies that are interested in some type of transaction, either selling their company, acquiring a company, or developing strategic relationships.
I’m hoping we can schedule a call at your convenience to get re-acquainted. We’d like to get an update on how business is going for you, and give you an update on how our practice has evolved over the past few quarters. Even if M&A or partnership development are not on your immediate “To Do” list, we still would like to catch-up. Our business is about relationships, and they usually take a long time to develop. [COMPANY] approaches the market differently than other investment banks in our space, and I firmly believe it’s worth your time at least to know of the alternative that we offer.
I can suggest a possible call for the afternoon of Wednesday, May 27, but can be free almost anytime late next week and the following week with a bit of advance notice.
I’ll follow up you with you by telephone over the next few days, but please feel free to call me in the interim.
Regards, [CONTACT]
* * * * *
On the surface this message seems well thought out and articulate. But it instantly rubbed me the wrong way, and I quickly figured out why. Here’s a fun little exercise: let’s break down the message…
How many times the contact was the subject of interest: 5
How many times the contact’s firm was the subject of interest: 7
How many times my needs were the subject of interest: 0
While I appreciate the sales attempt from anyone just trying to do their job in this tough economy, this message provided absolutely no compelling reason for me to respond. Other than the firm’s own interest and desire to “catch up,“ what was in it for me? What’s more, the perspective makes me question the contact’s focus and doubt the firm’s ability to represent my company’s best interest.
I feel I can only criticize this solicitation because I myself have been guilty of this offense! I’m absolutely positive that in my early years I sent many of these types of emails, feeling proud of my company’s work and confident that anyone I messaged would certainly want to hear about my success. Good news is that we can all continue to learn and I had a great reminder today of the importance of clearly articulating value.
Posted by Marcelle Turner on May. 20, 2009
Comments
Thanks for the comment Diane! Ironically I’ve received two more emails similar to this from different people in the past week. Ugh! 
Posted by Marcelle on 05/27/2009 12:42 PM
Wow, that’s a bad email. It’s as if the writer was being paid by the word.
Every once in a while, I get a sales call. It’s basically someone saying, “I don’t know you and I know nothing about you but I think we’d be great together.“ In this day and age of Google, it tells me a lot when a sales person does absolutely nothing to find out anything about me and my needs.
Posted by Ken Okel on 05/28/2009 10:50 AM
Our CEO put it this way: Your conversation word count should include more about their business and less about your business and more about what you “seek to do” for their business vs what you “have done” for other businesses. If they are interested, they’ll learn all about what you have done, by asking other businesses. Makes a world of sense.
Posted by Stacey Eizenbach, Market Mgr. on 05/30/2009 09:19 AM
Ken, Stacey—Excellent points! Thank you for your contributions! Cheers - MLT
Posted by Marcelle on 05/30/2009 10:35 AM
This is really important to remember. I think it’s very easy to talk about yourself and your business mainly because it’s what you know best. It takes guts to make “semi-cold calls”, but those sales people should realize that they could connect with you on social media outlets first to build a relationship, then ask to give you a call. Might be a better approach!
Posted by Erik Folgate on 07/08/2009 10:50 AM
Great post. Don’t we all recognize in this the times we’ve forgotten our purpose. Most striking to me was this phrase: “Even if M&A or partnership development are not on your immediate “To Do” list"Not only has the writer focused on self/client’s interest instead of speaking to yours, the offer to “catch up” follows immediately on a stated assumption that your interests may have no alignment with theirs. As if to say, but I’d like to take more of your time anyway for the sake of my ego…
Always a good reminder to think of the benefit to your audience.
Posted by Diane on 05/26/2009 11:17 PM