Bitch and complain – or pick up the phone?

An incident happened recently and I see a great lesson in it that I want to share with you.

Bitch and complain – or pick up the phone?

Despite the awards I have won as President of Find New Customers, such as a Top 50 Most Influential in Sales Lead Management and Top 25 Sales and Marketing Inflencers for 2012, a couple of well-known people bad-mouth me. Severely.

No big deal. As Celebrity CMO Jeffrey Hayzlett (who was a guest on Mad Marketing TV) told me “Don’t pay attention to the nay-sayers. Just prove them wrong with your success.” Amen, Jeffrey.

Someone else was upset with me, but instead of bad-mouthing me, he called.

How I Upset Him

We recently redid this blog for 2012 – a top to bottom total redesign. As the Fearless Competitor, we decided that the best image of fearless would be the King of Beasts. So I had a new logo made with a stylized lion head. (Find New Customers logo below)

One day my phone rang. It was the sales expert, Robert Terson. He was upset that I was using the lion symbol, as it’s his brand symbol for both his website (sellingfearlessly.com) and upcoming book “Selling Fearlessly.” (see lion head below).

I had seen his book and his profile picture, but it never crossed my mind when we considered the change. It was a simple oversight on my part. Bob and I had a nice chat, he explained his concerns, and I agreed to come up with a new symbol. I asked my graphics designer to come up with a new image. You can now see that the lion is gone.

The difference between Bob and the women that bad-mouth me struck me. When something happened that caused concern, those women bad-mouth me, but Bob called me.

It’s basic human nature. Some get mad and bitch.  A few (like Robert Terson) pick up the phone, talk to the “offender” and solve the problem. The latter works a hell of a lot better.

The moral: If you have an issue with someone, don’t just complain. Instead, pick up the phone and call them. Thanks for picking up the phone, Robert.

What do you think? We love comments and those who share.