In my previous Time to Win, I highlighted that it’s important to be vulnerable and know what we don’t know. Very few people in sales, marketing or leadership are willing to say, “I don’t know, but I’ll find out.” When you admit to not knowing the answer and you are willing to dig in to find it, you may discover a better answer than the customer was expecting, and you will be showing them you embody five important attributes of winning, which also happened to be Good Karma Brands’ core values:
- Honesty: I know what I don’t know and I’m honest about it. #vulnerability
- Listening: I am showing you that I heard what you said by getting an answer for your question.
- Follow Through: I said I would get an answer for you and I did.
- Work Hard: I will dig in and find solutions and answers for your questions.
- Over-deliver: Did you get the answer to the one question you are being asked or did you dig in and learn the answer? If you learned from it, you will now be better positioned to over-deliver for this customer and others.
How do we get better at knowing what we don’t know? The best way is to continue to gain knowledge about your partners, their industries and about your own products. The more we know about their business and ours, the more we will understand and be confident in what we don’t know. To increase our knowledge about your customers’ business this week, try to do the following before each one of your meetings:
- Make a Google Search about the business.
- Read one article about that business from a premium publisher.
Premium Publisher: a professional publisher like the Wall Street Journal, not from a Social Media Site from some random like this blog 😊
- If you learned and enjoyed the article, follow that premium publisher.
- Find one more article from that publisher about another industry and partner that interests you.
- Take the information you learned and…
- Ask your customer informed questions based on what you learned
- Forward to customers and potential customers
- Share on Social Media
