Is the Tail Wagging the Dog at Your Business?

I remember we were doing a membership marketing campaign for a golf course near Atlanta, Georgia. Over a few months, we generated 405 membership leads, which was incredible because the goal was 50. All the leads registered on the club’s website and gave some personal information. Most of the leads should have been very good based on the information they provided.

A few weeks later, the manager called me because he was unhappy with the campaign. Hell, you would think that by accident, they would’ve picked up 20 or 30 new members, but they had, in fact, picked up zero. I asked him who was following up on leads, and he said that was the golf pro. I asked if the pro had ever had any sales training. He said he didn’t think so. I offered to send one of my guys up to train him for FREE.

A few days later, my guy made the six-hour drive to Atlanta. He walked into the pro shop, shook the pro’s hand, and walked with him into his back office. There, the pro turned to him and said, “Look, I’m really not interested in sales. I don’t like sales; it’s not what I signed up for when I took the job. But I’ll listen to what you have to say.”