I spent the weekend working with my wife to prep a rental apartment we have for some new tenants. It involved basic prep work, cleaning, repairing some wear and tear, and also some easy touch up painting (or so I thought!).
The problem was we had no touch up paint left over from the original paint job to work with. So we decided to try to get a custom color mixed up for us. We were trying to match a light white, with a hint of tan…should not be that hard!
Well the first try, too grey.
The 2nd try, lighter, but still grey.
Then a 3rd try, and a 4th (each a trip to the paint store).
But the interesting thing was what we we did to test the paint. We did some testing of the color in spots in the closet (smart to test!), but looking at those spots it was pretty clearly not a match.
Then for some reason we ignored our eyes, hoped that when it dried it would be different, and proceeded to “try” to touch up the spots in the room. I’m sure you can guess the results…a spotted room that clearly wasn’t going to work.
So we spent the next day painting the entire room, and while painting I thought about this experience and realized it reminded me a lot of how companies often approach business and how sales people often approach sales.
- We test in some spots, but for some reason we deny the evidence we see with our own eyes (“I think that looks like a match”, “the color will lighten as it dries”)
- We continue on when we know we probably shouldn’t, hoping for the outcome we want, and denying the outcome we should expect based on our “tests”
Sales people often deny their own test evidence (“I’ve given them many discounts, this time they will sign”, “I’ve given a 6 figure quote, this one will make my year”).
And it’s not just sales people, companies often do the same thing (“the market wasn’t ready for this idea before, now it is”, “we built the wrong product before but now it’s right”).
Remember that in business. and sales, if you are testing the color directly on your walls, then all you end up with a lot of spots…with the only way to fix it to paint the entire room and start over!
Selling, like painting, requires patience, validation, and believing what you see with your own eyes!
Do that before you start “painting” everywhere…you will be glad you did!
