Are you a transactor or a relationship-builder?

When it comes to men’s fashion, I’ve never been partial to department stores; it didn’t matter how much I spent on a suit or sport coat, even at upscale venues like Barney’s and Bergdorf Goodman in New York or Stanley Korshak and Needless Mark-up in Dallas – oops, I meant Neiman Marcus – I felt like a customer making a transaction, not a client invested in a relationship.

But then I read the New York Times obit on Bruce Nordstrom, who if he were still with us, would take exception to my opinion.

For years Nordstrom led the retail empire that bears his name.? According to the story, “the Nordstrom chain was predicated on an ethos of decency and niceness.”

Menswear designer Joseph Abboud was among the Nordstrom devotees, commenting that,

“in their quiet, decent way, they led in innovation, and did it with an added weapon, which was this incredible old world concept that the customer comes first.”

I get this, but even a retailer as customer-committed as Bruce Nordstrom never will approach what it means to transform a customer into a client, a transaction into an ongoing, enduring professional/personal relationship.

Then again, when you think about client/agency relationships, you come to realize each does entail a transaction, one that is about compensation.? Here’s an example of what I mean:

Years ago, I needed to ask for a not-insignificant, nearly 15% increase the agency’s hourly fee from our largest, most meaningful client, Compaq Computer.? No matter how much lipstick on I put on this pig, it’s not really about the relationship; it’s a transaction.? So how did I go about approaching a key client , David Vining, on this?

Let me start by telling you what I did not do:

I didn’t simply pick up the phone and call him and ask him straight out, which only would serve to put him on the spot.

And although my initial instinct was to meet in-person, for that same reason I actually decided to not have this initial conversation face-to-face,

What I did instead is start with a rather brief, informal email overture, letting Vining know the agency is thinking about a fee increase, asking him, not telling him, if it would be okay if I sent him to a detailed follow-up email, explaining the reasons why. ?To that he almost was compelled to say, “Sure, send it; I’ll take a look,” knowing the only other alternative would be a soul-crushing, “No, there’s no way I’ll agree to a fee increase.”

Anticipating a “Yes” response, I already had the email prepared, allowing me to follow my previous, brief email with a much longer, more thoughtful one, laying out, as quantitatively as possible, why a fee increase was more than justified, and actually was less than we reasonably could have requested. ?

Providing this not only explained the need for an increase, it also efficiently equipped Vining to forward my explanation to his superiors.? It meant instead of us asking him to go to bat for us, the email allowed us to bat for ourselves.

After pressing send, I waited a day, giving Vining an opportunity to read and retain what I wrote, before following with a phone call, where we talked through the matter.? By then he already had done what I suggested he do, which is share the email with others, who agreed with the increase, making his approval as close as possible to a formality.

I suspect I know what many of you are thinking:? “That’s an enormous amount of work to secure a fee increase; there’s got to be an easier, faster way to achieve the same outcome.”

Perhaps there is, but it was time well-invested, given the increase was worth tens of thousands of dollars to the agency over the life of the relationship, which in turn would allow us to reward our best people plus grow our staff.? As a precursor to this, there was a well-established relationship that worked in concert to facilitate and enable the transaction.? ?

I’ve said this countless times before that relationships matter, but if someone were to ask me, “Are you a transactor or a relationship-builder?” and I were being honest, the answer should be “Both.”

• Tagged:
• #transactions
• #relationships
• #advertising
• #marketing
• #nordstrom