I have been consulting with my marquee client for five and
one half years. It’s been a great engagement. My client has become one of my
best friends. I have been able to help him make his vision a reality. Over time,
sales have soared and the company grew from fifteen employees to sixty five. A
great company, a leader with a vison and a determined dedication to reach its
goals.
The company manufacturer’s pollution control equipment. It
is a great market. When we complete a project the result is clean air, clean
water or both. The payoff is job creation, a cleaner environment and profit for
the business. What could be better?
We design and build equipment for business, industry and
municipalities all over the United States, North America and the world.
So then, where’s the problem?
We don’t do much business in Michigan, other than with the
automotive companies. It’s our home state. This fact bothered me. What to do?
The answer to the problem was to reach out to the other
major corporations, utilities and municipalities in the state. I was convinced
that if we could get in front of environmental engineers at these huge
organizations and tell our story, doors will open, we will be invited to
compete for environmental equipment locally and book sales in our backyard. It
sounds easy enough. It’s not.
We have two monster big utility companies in Michigan. They
have significant needs for our type of equipment partially due to the need to
replace older, poorly performing equipment and partially because of the
government. A nudge from the EPA will gets everyone’s attention.
So, last year I started attempting to reach out to these
utilities, locate decision makers in their organizations and get in the game.
The problem was getting the names, phone numbers and e-mail addresses of key
contacts. Who to call? When I did penetrate the curtain protecting these people
from me, they either didn’t respond or turned out to be the wrong person. I
wasn’t surprised by the recurring outcome but I didn’t stop trying.
To my surprise, I got word from a colleague at another
company that the big utility was hosting a picnic for their employees and vendors.
This was exactly where we needed to be. I got the contact information for the
organizer. I asked an associate to reach out and ask if we could attend. By
golly, they said yes.
Our outside salesman and I went to the event, set up the
display table and proceeded to meet people and tell our story. We identified
and spoke to the right people. The outcome from the picnic is an open door for
conducting lunch and learn presentations for the decision making engineers. And
that’s where we find ourselves today. The door is open, the carpet is out and
the decision makers are welcoming us to compete for their business.
Was this luck. No, I don’t believe in luck. That’s magic.
I’m not on the magic team. My take on this is that it is a case where planning
met opportunity. We had an opportunity, recognized it and went for it.
Will we book business from this event? I can’t say. What I can
say is that we now are on the radar of the right people because we went to a
picnic. And, the food was pretty good too.
