"Why would we want to do that?"

Yesterday I had a great question from a potential customer. I stumbled a little bit in my head, but I think everything that came out of my mouth made sense...I hope!

I got someone on the phone and told her I was interested in being added to her carrier list. She replied, "Why would we want to do that?"

That's a great question. I've thought about that myself before, but I've never had anybody ask me. In this case I thought what she was asking was why would she go through the bother of adding a new vendor when she already has five possibilities on her current carrier list. I told her about all of the heavy haul work that we're capable of doing since we have specialized "multi-axle" equipment. That did the trick to get me to the next phase where she told me about not being able to take too many vendors, but that I could at least send over our rates and she'd see if there was any reason to change to us.

I really like this kind of honesty during sales calls. I want to know where I stand with them. If they've been using the same trucking company for 30 years and they've never made a mistake - I want to know that. I'll still try to at least give them my contact information in case that fateful day comes when the first mistake is made, but I know that they aren't just going to up and switch to my company tomorrow (and most likely not next week).

I think there's too many games in the sales world. Wouldn't it be nice if we all could just agree to be honest and if you're product or service is better than the other guys, you could get the business? That would be great for us, since our service IS better than the other guys - probably not so good for a lot of the other transportation companies in Portland though - I guess that why the games exist.