• by November 2, 2007

Being a planner, I often see one major area where reps come up short: reading people.

I've often been on the receiving end of a cold call and thought that if the rep could just pick up on my verbal tone and as a result adapt to the signals i'm sending, then I'd be willing to schedule that meeting.

Or when they see in a meeting that I am constantly looking at my watch but [they] keep droning on, they should get the message that I'm ready to wrap up the meeting.

One of my key roles in dealing with clients is learning how to read their body langugage & non-verbal clues and how to adapt (a fidgety client?Scrap the formal media plan presentation and give them the abridged version/ starting with the flowchart).

One other area where things come up short is in personalizing the meeting request. I can spot a scripted approach a mile away. Throw away the script, talk to me person to person, and I'm likely to take the meeting. After all, I want to stay abreast of the latest happenings. But serve it up in a way that resonates for me & not you.

In cases like this, it has to be about the client you're trying to make in-roads with, not you. It's like this when agencies are working with their clients and when salespeople are working with their agencies.