I got an email the other day from a guy I know. He sells enterprise-level software for data analysis that’s used by marketers to study their customer data. It enables you to drill down in massive databases to glean all manner of insight about the behavior of your customers — very powerful stuff. I’ve talked with this salesman a few times over the phone and via email about what we do at Spur Communications and how we use customer data to drive so much of what we create. We don’t need his product at the moment but agreed to leave the door open to future opportunities. He sent me some helpful information in a report via email and we agreed to keep in touch.
Imagine my surprise when I got the email from him the other day — he wanted to introduce himself as my new representative and sent me a copy of the material that he’d sent in his last email. Not the end of the world, but embarrassing none the less. This is a company that is supposed to have a handle on customer data. They are supposed to know what their customers and prospects have received, what they’ve said, and have an idea of how they will react. They ought to be able to get access to the data to manage day-to-day relationships. Not a lot of damage was done. It’s still a great product and I know it. But damage was done and it didn’t need to happen. The result is brand erosion. A slow abrasion of all the effort that went into their marketing up to this point, the same way that drops of rain eventually make a trickle that becomes a river. They made a brand promise and didn’t fulfill it in a manner that reflects poorly on their product. Not a lot, just a little. Chances are they don’t even know that it is happening.
Do you suppose this could be happening to you? It may be worth taking some time to evaluate exactly what your brand promise is and how you deliver it. Finding out that your downspouts aren’t draining from the foundation now could save you from waking up floating down the river.
if i understand the scenario correctly, there appears to have been a communication gap between your last dialogue with the software vendor and the time you received an email from him in which he proposed to act as your rep. was his proposal presumptuous? it appears to have been the case, from your perspective. i got the impression that you interpreted his push to represent you as misleading of his brand promise. i would sympathize if (and only if) this person WENT AHEAD and represented you without your prior consent. in that case, not only would it have been poor brand management but also unsound business practice.
all things considered, as you pointed out, no major harm done to you. but in light of the tough economy, one can see how some are wildly driven to push their sales/marketing efforts to extremes. however, there are clear risks to credibility (something which is strongly tied to brand integrity) if such efforts impact client relationships when such relations are undermined by blatant pre-meditated and pre-emptive measures that sour a hand shake agreement.
now more than ever, brands must pay close attention to clarity of intent. imagine if everyone did so, we’d be spared with much grief and awkwardness.
You make a great point Autom. And, again, this isn’t a big deal. I was just surprised that a company that leads the customer data analytics market would not be able to track the difference between a prospect who’s never been contacted and one with whom they’ve had several, in-depth conversations.
Thanks!
understood, Dave. and i can certainly empathize with your reaction…in any event, onwards n upwards!