Tonight, an interesting thing happened. A guy I don’t know contacted me via the contact form on this very site. I’m not going to the name the guy, his company, or his product, but this is more or less what he said:
Hey Jeff! I just started following you on Twitter and I really like your site. I work at an interactive design and product company, myself. You tweeted tonight about something I haven’t heard of — what curious what that is. Thanks!
Intrigued by this guy, who seemed genuinely interested in me, my work, and my social life, I did what any self-respecting web geek would do: I Googled him.
What I found is that he’s a PR guy for an agency whose work I have a great deal of respect for. I found his bio on the company site, and it seems we share some interests. Nice! From there, I discovered that his company had recently released a very nice-looking product aimed at web designers. I checked it out, was suitably impressed, and considered signing up for the product, as it really did seem like it could be useful to me. “I’ll check it out more later,” I thought.
So I quickly responded to the dude, thanking him for following and his kind words about my work. I explained to him that “Little Red Hen” is a karaoke bar in Seattle. Then I headed off to my yoga class.
After yoga, I checked my e-mail — said new follower had e-mailed again. This time, he said, more or less:
Since you’re a web designer, I thought you might be interested in my company’s product! It’s new and has been covered by all the hot tech blogs and blah, blah, blah, blah.
Suddenly, I was completely disinterested in him and his company’s product.
Now, I’m not saying this guy did anything wrong. He wrote a nice e-mail, is probably a nice dude, and may well be someone I’d get along great with. His product is indeed something that could be useful for me, and does in fact look like it’s very well-made.
But what I realized was this: his first e-mail, which barely mentioned the product, but was personal, friendly, and genuine, spurred me to — without encouragement — go check out him and his product. His second e-mail, which was all about the product, did nothing but turn me off.
Now, I’m no marketer, but the lesson I take away is this: in today’s world, the best way to get people interested in what you’re up to is not to tell them about it, but simply to be cool and wait until they ask. Because if you’re cool, they will ask — or they’ll ask Google, like I did.
Special note to PR dude: If you’re reading, let me just say that I hope you take no offense to this. I think your style of PR was better than a lot of the sales e-mails I get, and you do genuinely seem like a nice guy. I just thought my reaction to your messages was interesting. I hope to buy you a beer one day.
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001 // AdamD // 10.20.2009 // 12:04 AM
I agree this is pretty thinly veiled attempt to pimp his product. I also agree this is about a million times better than many of the pitches so many of us get.
Do you think it’d have been better if he waited a few emails, or didn’t respond right away in that manner? Or, would you prefer that he never mention it?
I think one can be too meek, hoping to be Googled and for you to stumble upon a project. To me—and we all react differently to this, which makes it difficult to gauge—his timing was the real issue here, not his method.
002 // Jeff Croft // 10.20.2009 // 12:09 AM
I guess I feel like if you make a genuine connection with someone, that someone will eventually wonder what you do, what you’re passionate about, and what you’re up to lately — and then they’ll find out, either by asking you, or some other method.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say, “make friends, not commercials,” but I do think that sort of mentality works in our industry. Just be cool. Make a real connection. The rest will come. I can honestly say that everything I’ve done in my career for the past 5 years or so has been a direct result of genuine, human connections I’ve made. I’ve never made any real effort to pimp myself.
That having been said, there are people (ahemAndy Clarkeahem) who pimp the hell out of themselves, and that seems to work, too. :)
003 // Michael Kozakewich // 10.20.2009 // 1:33 AM
I’d hate to think that someone who doesn’t know me might one day ignore an innocent email of mine, dismissing me for a salesman of some sort because of an episode similar to that one.
My own message to the PR guy is this: Stop ‘processing’ customers, and instead befriend the market. A great app can spread a lot quicker through word-of-mouth.
The #whuffie tag you added on Twitter is certainly appropriate.
004 // steve // 10.20.2009 // 5:28 AM
you fell for it at the contact form bit. Was a very broad starting msg.
005 // Brian Ford // 10.20.2009 // 6:26 AM
I think I pretty much agree, but I think I see the problem differently than you might.
I think because he went from 1) not mentioning a product at all in email #1 to only mentioning his product in email #2, he makes it seem like email #1 was only a way to get to email #2.
It’s like pretending to be into (oh, i dunno) emotions on the first date, and then saying, I’d rather stay in and get you naked on the second date.
I just think you can’t drop the pretense so quickly and abruptly, or else (even if it wasn’t) your first efforts seem calculated and a bit … creepy.
I’m not sure I agree that someone has to “wait” to tell you about their product until asked, but I do think they should wait longer than this guy did.
006 // Josiah // 10.20.2009 // 8:05 AM
Sounds like a story from someone who has never done sales. When I started my web firm I was a reluctant sales person and was very passive when meeting new business owners. Instead of trying to sell to them I’d chat and get to know them first, and then maybe soft-sell later if they’d ask.
I learned very quickly (through lost sales) that business owners want to grow their business (shocking I know), and if you have a product or service that will help them do that, they’ll listen to your sales pitch.
I agree that it does suck (all geeks hate sales guys), but if you believe in what you do, and that it can help someone there’s no shame in telling people about it. If you don’t your competitors will.
007 // a web developer // 10.20.2009 // 9:51 AM
Hey Jeff! I just started reading your blog and I really like your site. I work at a web development type product company, myself. You blogged tonight about something I haven’t heard of — I’m genuinely interested. Thanks!
008 // Jeff Croft // 10.20.2009 // 10:23 AM
I did, no doubt about it.
He did actually mention the product in e-mail number one, but very off-handedly. Still, I definitely agree that e-mail number one was only a way to get to e-mail number two.
Haha. Nice. :)
009 // Mike D. // 10.20.2009 // 10:42 AM
I think you guys can probably work it all out over a naked bikram yoga session, no?
010 // Shaun Foster // 10.20.2009 // 10:56 AM
Dude, you need to relax a bit and give that guy the credit that he even bothered to find enough details about you to start a conversation. He could have waited for your better side to show up and hope that you had the time, memory and luxury of looking his product/service again.
Instead, he did what any decent person interested in getting his product known will do. Mention it/Sell it.
You can go write blog post about it or be a better person.
When writing/selling your books, you never did any of the PR stuff did you? Never mentioned your books to anyone without them asking? I would find that hard to believe.
011 // Jeff Croft // 10.20.2009 // 11:10 AM
Suck it. :)
Relax a bit? Do I come off as not relaxed? Wow. I thought I couldn’t have been more clear that I thought the guy did a good job, was better than most, and sounded like a nice guy. Trust me, I’m very relaxed. Or at least I was, until you started trolling.
Absolutely not. Of course, I’m not saying you shouldn’t. Just that I didn’t. It’s not my way.
012 // Daniel Tunkelang // 10.20.2009 // 11:18 AM
You might enjoy this post:
http://thenoisychannel.com/2009/03/10/more-adventures-with-pr-people/
And of course feel free to copy and paste from this one:
http://thenoisychannel.com/2009/02/19/a-reply-to-all-pr-people/
013 // Kyle Weems // 10.20.2009 // 11:29 AM
@Shaun - I think Jeff’s post reflects a fairly relaxed mindset, as opposed to tenseness or anger. Rather, it was a warning to marketers on a flawed approach.
If anything, it’s instructive rather than attacking.
014 // Paul Stamatiou // 10.20.2009 // 1:05 PM
Well said Jeff. I get a lot of meaningless PR emails and can definitely tell when they take 5 minutes to learn more about me. I have seen emails similar to what you talk about in this post though - they check you out for a few minutes, try to come up with something you’d reply to them first with, then their reply is a pitch, and you feel somewhat obliged to respond after you have made the connection/social reciprocity and all that junk.
015 // Greg // 10.20.2009 // 2:48 PM
Basically, you can either make a social contact because you want to get to know someone, or you can ask them to do you a favor for commercial reasons (talk about a job, review your product, etc.). But don’t do the latter and pretend it’s the former. Either be up-front about your ulterior motive, or don’t mention it at all. If you straddle the line, the other person is likely to feel at least slightly deceived.
016 // Daniel Schutzsmith // 10.21.2009 // 6:13 PM
Ha, awesome story. I totally hear where you are coming from. i’ve noticed as a salesman that I make the biggest deals through people that I am friends with - a genuine friendship.
I agree with what Josiah said but I really don’t think it was the “ask” that made you feel uncomfortable with the emailer, instead I think it was the impersonal reply you got, which was obviously a generic one he was sending back to anyone who responded to that first email.
Grow the relationship and you grow the sale.
I think we’ve discussed this before, but books like The Sales Bible, How to Win Friends, and Never Eat Alone, are all great testaments to the power of having a genuine interest in your customers.
017 // Jamie Web // 10.22.2009 // 1:23 AM
I think this was a good attempt of getting you interested in the company and the product they have to offer with that first email, as you went on to Google him and find out more. But then with that second email it was just to sales like which then made you uninterested and I would have been to.
Perhaps if the second email was worded differently or he tried to build a stronger relationship with you first then perhaps you would still be interested.
When people are trying to sell you something they need to build a relationship with you first so you trust them and feel comfortable buying there product.
018 // Eric // 10.22.2009 // 9:20 AM
You lost me at “Then I headed off to my yoga class.” ;).
019 // Jeff Croft // 10.22.2009 // 9:26 AM
Update: The guy e-mailed me again today. Clearly, he never read this blog post. Today’s e-mail states:
I responded, pointing him to this blog entry.
020 // Richard Trenholm // 10.22.2009 // 9:35 AM
Really? You’re interested in the product but you won’t look at it because you got a PR email about it? Isn’t that cutting off your nose to spite your face? I’d delete the second email and get on with my day.
021 // Jeff Croft // 10.22.2009 // 11:01 AM
No. That’s inaccurate. I didn’t say I was interested in the product but wasn’t going to look at it. Rather, I said I’m not interested in the product, because of the way the PR guy exploited my personal connection.
022 // trent Walton // 10.23.2009 // 6:22 AM
I agree with Greg. It’s gotta be one or the other. Either make a friend / contact or respect our time by being candid and to the point.
023 // Jason // 10.23.2009 // 6:38 AM
Back when I kept a land line I started getting telemarketing calls that started out with “Hey, how have you been”. This usually caught me off guard and I would start trying to figure out who the caller was, then they’d try to sell me something.
You’re just a victim of telemarketing 2.0
024 // Andrew // 10.28.2009 // 7:07 AM
That’s an interesting reaction—I’ve considered it, but only briefly. Thanks for articulating it.
My experience is that, while out riding Slickrock in Moab, I met up with a fellow biker. We first made a connection from the obvious fact that we were both mountain bikers. Then come to find out we both had four kids, lived in the same valley, and both did web work (he back-end and me front-end/marketing).
He’s a genuinely cool kid and I’d love to get him involved in some of my projects I’m kicking around.
Make friends, not commercials indeed.
025 // Karina // 10.29.2009 // 6:29 PM
Wow, I just had the same thing happening to me. A very similar scenario, different setting but that’s beside the point. I too was repelled after the second e-mail, but I liked what the guy was doing before, so I honestly replied to him giving a link to this post. Thanks for doing such a great job writing out what I thought. You nailed it :)
026 // Andy Ford // 10.30.2009 // 3:44 PM
I just received an email that started out: “This is a cold-call email, so I apologize in advance. But I’m not arbitrarily spamming you - I found your site on Haystack and I want to tell you about…”
In fact their product looks promising, but this is a shady way of trying to win folks over.
027 // Chris Jones // 11.04.2009 // 4:26 PM
I bet he spends his days firing off such messages to prospective customers. I hope he is reading and takes the constructive criticism on board. His sales performance could increase dramatically.
028 // speedmax85 // 12.19.2009 // 8:05 PM
Hi ! This is my first visit on this blog & i like it. keep it up
029 // Yuri Mizyuk // 01.21.2010 // 5:22 AM
I can call it marketing with a man’s face… We are used to all of marketing strategies were PR-managers don’t think about me as a customer but they think about the category of people who can be their customers. Personal approach is very important for modern marketing and Pr-managers should always think about the needs of specific person and just those managers will become successful.
030 // Louis Roque // 01.29.2010 // 2:40 AM
I get same reaction on PR emails, however they begin if they end on marketing - its puts me off from product. I always prefer do research and find products by myself or through referrals, but for some not understandable reason anything that gets pitched to me straight on round plate feels has a catch/hook in it and I start to search for that catch.