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Hot Tub Cash Machine
By: Rick Greene, MAS
Issue: 2010jul
Business is everywhere—if you know where to look.
When times are tough, the tough get … more business than most everyone else. And there is promotional products business everywhere, all around us. All day, all night, during business hours, when you are relaxing, web surfing, flying to Detroit, buying toothpaste, in the hot tub, everywhere. Even in the gutter. But you’ll only find it if you are a bold, different and memorable corporate branding specialist. And you are that, aren’t you?
Here are two dynamic and offbeat case histories to demonstrate my potentially lucrative point. Let’s begin in the hot tub and we’ll end up in the gutter.
This first case history happened this month, just a few weeks ago. Eric, one of my salespeople, a bold, different and memorable kind of a guy, was in the hot tub at his condo complex, enjoying a soak with some neighbors. Enter the new neighbor, with whom Eric quickly struck up a friendly conversation. He learned two things—the new guy’s first name and that he was the president of a local chemical company. That’s all he had to go on. The next morning, Eric hit Google hard. He put in the new neighbor’s first name, the words ‘chemical company’ and different local cities until he got a hit—a big hit. It was his neighbor on the cover of an industry magazine. And the chemical company in question was raking in a few hundred million per year.
At this point, Eric put the resources of our company at work. He connected with his marketing assistant and customized our company PowerPoint presentation to speak to this chemical company. He then e-mailed the presentation to his new best friend, reminded him of their meeting in the hot tub and offered to be of promotional assistance.
Two days later, the phone rang. It was Mr. Hot Tub Chemical President, asking if Eric could create a custom award to honor his father, the previous company president. In two weeks, they’d be saluting this gentleman for his almost 40 years of leadership and a WOW of an award was needed. Again, Eric called upon our resources and sent an e-blast ideas e-mail to our creative group across the country. One of our account executives turned Eric on to a custom bronze award company, who did a virtual sample that the potential client loved and he became a client. We sold the company a gorgeous bronze award that was nearly $10,000. And, as the client’s assistant told us, Mr. Hot Tub Chemical President was “bouncing off the walls with excitement” for the award dinner event next week. Eric is a personal hero with a new major client all because he was chatty in the hot tub, gleaned a few morsels of information and ran with it.
Next, I take you to the gutter where you will find trash, damp storm drains, occasional fish heads, various and sundry filth and some fabulous new accounts.
Say what, Rick? Been inhaling fumes? Let me continue.
A couple of years ago Laurie, another of my bold, different and memorable account executives, was meeting with our artist to pick up some samples to present to a client. They were to meet just off the freeway for the drop, on the way to her presentation. As Laurie stood in a parking lot by a hotel next to a trash dumpster, she saw something in the gutter.
It was white. It was rectangular. It was filthy. It had a suspicious-looking stain on it. It was a business card—a business card for a large company that exhibits at many tradeshows. The title on the business card was marketing manager.
Ka-CHING!
Laurie shook off the card and kept it. A few weeks later, she called the marketing manager and said something along the lines of “I found your card in my desk and I’m not sure where we met, but I thought I’d give you a call and remind you that I provide branded merchandise to some of the largest companies in Southern California. I’d love to stop by and chat about how I can be of service to you.”
Laurie got the appointment and crafted a new relationship with this sales lead from the gutter. She got a first order for trade-show merchandise for about $3,500. And a second order. And a third order. And she became the primary promotional products resource for this loyal account.
Just last year, at an end-user trade show we were holding, Laurie came clean to her client and told her where she had found her business card a few years back. The client thought this was hilarious and they both had a big laugh about it.
What is the moral of these two different stories?
It’s that business is everywhere. No matter the economic climate or the state of the stock market. It’s everywhere. You just have to look. Be aware, keep your eyes open and your senses alert. Always be selling and always be smiling. Learn to harness positive energies and create magic. Be chatty, social and tell everyone what you do and how you can help them. And their friends. And their spouses who run $200 million dollar companies.
And go to the hot tub. Tonight. It’s a cash machine, baby.
Rick Greene, MAS, is the western region vice president for HALO Branded Solutions/Lee Wayne Corporation, immediate past president of SAAC and the author of the fictional fantasy novels Boofalo! and Shroom!, available at Amazon.
rick.greene@leewayne.com
818-782-1049 x111
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