Let me tell y’all a little story …
This week we met with two really exciting companies who found our work on the web and reached out to see if our agency could amplify their marketing efforts.
One company was self-funded and is extremely profitable, boasting great margins and a really keen eye for where they wanted to expand within their market.
The second company is a HOT startup based in Mountain View that has raised nearly 9-figures worth of venture funding and expanded into more than a dozen geographies in the past three years (talk about hockey stick growth!)
… both of these companies told me the same thing …
As we began our introductory conversations, both of the companies told me the same thing about our teams initial assessment of their products:
“Wow, you’ve actually tried our service. Nobody else we’ve talked to yet has done that yet.”
This statement absolutely blew me away: how could you pitch a business partnership without ever trying the prospects product or service?
By simply signing up and trying their service, we got a first-hand view of the user experience. Not only that, taking a moment to sign up put us ahead of our competitors because we’ve actually used their product and came into the meeting speaking their language.
… which made me really happy about one of our companies values …
Our company has values; they help guide our decision making processes for both big and small decisions.
The value that came into play this week was this: Never ask somebody to do something you haven’t tried yourself.
It’s a value we’ve practiced for the past three years and read about constantly from entrepreneurs such as Neil Patel, and it’s served us well over the past week.
Which leads me to ask …