Is The Rotterdam Effect Skewing Your Sales Plan?

Thankfully the land of my birth have moved on from the annoying and unhelpful Hard/Soft textural prefixes when trying to sum up two opposing options.

Yet I fear we’re heading somewhere equally misleading when I hear countries as the fashion for labels. Norway or Switzerland this weekend made way for Canada-plus-plus-plus.

Which all combined to remind me of the power or drain of a misleading reason code.

The Rotterdam Effect being apposite right now.

As the largest seaport hub on the continent, goods can often by counted as trade with the Dutch, when in fact they are being in essence mis-counted before a final journey onwards.

So you think a figure is one thing. When in fact it is significantly clouded.

Sales has a classic reason code. Why did you win or lose a deal?

lost; product rubbish, price too high

won; took them on a jolly and laughed at all my jokes

I’ve had senior sales management tell me this is not the case when incontrovertible evidence patently exists within their domain to the contrary. ‘Yes, mate, buyers only select solely based on the scores of a tech spec checklist’. Really.

In part, sales reporting design must bear some of the blame. Think how we are blighted anytime we wish to end a retail contract and suffer the computer-says-no barriers with call centres trying to frustrate our cessation intention. Yet reason code confusion in selling stems from multiple blurs.

Where was our prospect’s deal birthed? What do they value above all else in any chosen solution? Who has final say? Why now? How will they decide overall?

With the calendar year-end fast approaching, perhaps we’re able to plan a moment when an audit of our own may well pay dividends?