We all know that when something goes wrong, or we get stopped by what seems like an unbeatable challenge it can make or break us. So, for the spooky season, we asked our team what challenges they’ve experienced and how they overcame them! Fill your chalice and get comfortable as we explore the scariest stories in New Business and Marketing, should you fall victim to the same fate. MUAHAHAHA!
When I was working on a pet food campaign I had a very negative response from a Co-Founder of a major pet food brand. I didn’t know if I had just caught them at a bad time, but they were quite rude when they told me that they didn’t want to receive emails from us.
Instead of being downhearted or being rude back I decided to do something a little different. I told them I was a customer of the brand (absolutely true) and it had made my puppy (I even told them his name) so happy – I even told them what his favourite flavour is from their range!
This worked out better than I thought it would and they could not have been more apologetic in their response. The Co-Founder gave me insider knowledge about the three new flavours they are bringing out, and offered to send me some for my puppy to try for free! He also said that what my client did was something they were considering, and copied me into an email passing our details on to the relevant person in his team who was leading the project.
Situation turn-around! The moral of the story? Have a thick skin and don’t give up too easily in the world of new biz!
One time I was working on a virtual roundtable, I made sure that I had got fantastic speakers lined up, that the invites were sent out and accepted by the attendees, then tragedy struck! The attendees all dropped out the morning of the event.
Honestly, at that moment the decision was made to postpone, so I made sure the next roundtable had more reasons to join. We double-checked we didn’t clash with any events (the day of or before) that would potentially hinder the chances of people showing up. As the roundtable was pre-lunch, I researched what snacks we could send out to sweeten the deal for attendees and act as a physical reminder to attend, and also gave me more reasons to check in the days leading up to the roundtable to make sure diary clashes hadn’t occurred. Then a fully subscribed roundtable became a fully attended roundtable.
It reminded me that people are very busy, and often last-minute changes can occur that mean they can’t attend an event. But by offering incentives, as we would have done with a physical event, the attendees felt special and that the client really wanted them to be there.
When taking on a new client, I struggled to provide value exchange to prospects when sending out campaigns due to a lack of content, time and there wasn’t a person who understood new business within their team and therefore the campaigns were typically led by us to sell client’s services.
We had a strategy meeting with our client to identify opportunities and excite them, this allowed us to identify and go through successful campaigns and revisit and reinvent one that went successfully. We looked at new ways to provide value and integrated a PDF into our campaign which increased not only our click-through rate but also our download rate.
After we were able to gain more knowledge on the product and offering that our client had gone out to market with, which identified sectors and other relevant areas to go out. This made me understand that being dynamic and reactive is an effective way of engaging with audiences.
One time we tried to engage with a whole new audience for an event that was a one-off because the client thought that it was the best way to bring in a quick win. Though being in this industry for a while I knew this was just a quick fix. Nevertheless, we worked tirelessly to promote and manage this event to the best of our ability. The client after going through all that trouble found that there is no such thing as a quick fix.
So, after the event failed to bring in the leads, the client wanted us to make a long-term strategy that looked at building a strong and formidable pipeline, which actually helped them a lot more than the one-off event.
We have a process for a reason, and it works! Make sure you tell your clients what will work and what won’t work because when the process is broken, like it was for the event, it becomes a pointless project that won’t be beneficial to you in the long run.
When we started doing our monthly webinar series I once sent my panelist Zoom link to all the attendees! This was a nightmare because they then had the ability to start dialing in as me! I removed myself from the webinar, and then quickly emailed all attendees explaining that I had made a mistake with the link they should use to attend.
I think it’s always best, to be honest, and own up to your mistakes, we’re only human – even in new business! Obviously, I check email campaigns before they are sent out now, but the experience made me triple-check campaigns and links before pressing send!
Get a second pair of eyes on things too as you can get content blind and miss the small details that can make it all scarier, so it’s always worth getting another perspective sometimes, especially when it comes to working in new business.
So, there you have it! Some amazing stories from pet food horrors to terrifying event issues! We all try to make the best out of any situation but of course, sometimes it can get downright bloody! So, when the clients not listening or the events are making you crazy, make sure to check out our content, where you can sink your fangs into the best New Biz knowledge!