This column strives to achieve some insight into “best practices” through some of Mike Vicchitto’s very own worst practices. Every Tuesday Mike offers up the biggest mistakes, oversights, blunders and bonehead moves he commits in the fast-paced world of software-as-a-service, where he’s a Marketing Manager moonlighting as a Sales Account Executive (at the same company.) Perhaps, in the process, we may learn a thing or two.
This is extremely embarrassing, and unfortunately completely true. However, in the spirit of this column, I must come clean.
Last Friday, I stayed at work beyond 5 PM to help a colleague with some overdue work. My assistance was only required intermittently, so I wanted to use my time productively. I had recently been assigned a new territory, as business had been picking up in the region. We had just brought on 2 clients from New Zealand, and I had a long list of leads to follow up on down under.
I decided to finally set up a Skype account and integrate it with CRM so I could do all this fancy international calling, click-to-dial, auto-call-logging and whatnot. Once I got it all working and started calling, it was so easy and so much fun, I really got into it.
I didn’t have a ton of luck getting any Kiwis on the phone though, and left a dozen or so voicemails. I mentioned this to my colleague who made the astute observation:
“Well yeah, isn’t it Saturday there? What are you doing!?”
Just trying to get ahead?
Ok, bad pun, but I really screwed this one up. I’ve yet to realize any repercussions, but the embarrassment is not going to make the next calls any easier. And it definitely puts a dent in my credibility as their territory’s representative. How could I have not done any research before I got on the phone? It seems so elementary in hindsight. I am usually very diligent in researching my specific prospect before my calls – it never occurred to me to research the territory’s culture, customs or politics (or time zone!) to better prepare me for these calls.
I’ve begun my penance, and have since learned that Australia is also referred to as Oz, the capital is Canberra, NOT Sydney, and their most deadly natural hazard is the heat wave. There are also about 7.5 times more sheep than people in Australia.
Hopefully I can leverage some of this new-found trivia towards rebuilding my international business relationships. I did ask one prospect in New Zealand if he was a fan of Flight of The Conchords (mainly because he sounded EXACTLY like Murray) and it turns out he lived in the same town as Bret and Jemaine!
Now if only I can convince my company that I need to go on location for a walkabout to promote our products…
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Dis is inspirational
Mike, I’ve been there, and would never have given the time a thought, at least your info will be there for them on Mon., so all is not in vain?
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