What does it take to sell in an uncertain marketplace? Listen, it is a myth that people are not spending money when the economy and the marketplace is really shifting. They are, but they’re, but they’re buying from people who are relevant. They’re buying from people who are solving the right problem. The biggest mistake that I see salespeople or business owners making today is they do not really understand what their customer’s issues are. And if you don’t understand what your customer’s issues are, you’re not only not going to sell to them. You’re not going to attract prospects. There’s a great story about a company in Southern California who really understood this issue. The company is Western waterworks, and I feature them in my book, thrive, turning uncertainty to competitive advantage. Listen, they were facing unprecedented competition. They were really getting priced out of the marketplace and with nowhere else to turn, they went out and talked to their customers, ask them what their issues are.
And they found gold. They found a void in the marketplace and the salespeople isn’t that what we’re looking for. We’re looking for the void, the place, the opportunity that isn’t being filled and from their customers, they learned that bids were not being, um, brought in on price. They would get a bid from, um, from a vendor, but when the bill came, it was often much higher. They also discovered that a lot of jobs were not being done on time. And that really frustrated customers and that service levels were not at the level they needed to be to really create an incredible customer experience. With that information. Western waterworks went back and created their grand guarantee. They actually guaranteed customers. They would deliver on exactly what customers wanted. They would deliver on the fact that that bids would come in at price. They would deliver on getting jobs done on time and they would deliver exceptional customer service.
If they didn’t. They promised to pay their customers $2,000. What happened? Customers ran to the grand guarantee. They found opportunity in the marketplace and they found a way to compete. They found a way to not only attract new customers, but to attract prospects by giving them something they wanted. And you can do that to talk to your customers, identify the problem, the real issue there, urgent need solve that problem. You’re not only going to gain competitive advantage, but you’re going to turn all of this uncertainty into major opportunity. Understand there is always opportunity in an uncertain, highly shifting majorly competitive marketplace, but you have to solve the right problem and you solve the right problem by talking to your customers. All right. I’m Meredith Elliott. How to learn more about how to turn uncertainty to competitive advantage, go to my website, value speaker.com. You’ll get free tips and resources and together. We’re going to turn uncertainty into major competitive advantage. I’ll see you next week.