Life's lessons in numbers!

I can sit here and reflect back on the night leading up to the movie "TWILIGHT", and it was such a great fun, group of people! What we understood about this movie is minimal for us adults. all we knew about this film is that this series was to be a "pop" culture phenomenon. my daughter {soon 2 b 13} and all her friends are reading this series, or have read this series. soooo, being that i am this biggest fan of halloween, it would be appropriate to entertain the idea of a "vampire love story" with a wine event. why not? we have blood orange mimosa's, and vampire wines that did well during october's festivities. so, i felt it was appropriate to entertain our guest...with a tasting and a chance to see the movie that everyone was talking about!


i negotiated a private screening room with our local theatre. i had do the ground work, such as contact the GM and ask what we {winestyles}could do as local residents {of the same strip mall}to ensure we get our guest into the movie after a night of celebratory vampire activities. i had assured him {the GM} that we were grown adults...that enjoy wine, and not the "typical" sports bar crew that obnoxiously overstays their welcome!, in order to convince the {client} GM, that the winestyles group deserves to enjoy this movie at midnight. right? and, not have to stand in line at 7pm in order to get good seats at 12am. well, this took awhile to do.


the GM wants to meet his bottom line (ie. $$$, roi, revenue, etc). and i, of course, just want our clients to feel important, that they do not have to wait in line for a "pop" culture film, that chances are, if it wasn't for this event, they wouldn't have known about the film at all. I mean, let's face it... the buzz about this film...well......there wouldn't have been a buzz, except in the homes of some of these"parents" {like I} with tweens, teens, and the others talking, again, about this "Eduard", on and on and on. {tangent...bring it back pris...bring it back}


well, he wanted me to sell out this theatre of 89 people, in 3 days. was that going to be possible?hmm...in my mind, anything is possible and sky is the limit! {attitude}. however, that being said, i do know that no! is no...until after i have exhausted every possible scenario {objections is what we call it in sales!}.


well, the e.mail blast went out and that's when the actions started. now because we have a lag on our e.mail system, those of you that i have phone numbers for...know that you received a frantic text message to come out and support the efforts! well, let's just say{....during a time such as this, sometimes you realize just how important you are in some of your phone pals reach...}that, we received very few responses! {again, these are your phone pals so again...you would think that if they are in your top 5...they are a part of your team! right?} WRONG!


we had 5 family members...and the rest of the 40 tickets, went to total strangers, that were pounding pavement for us to meet our goal!


I'm so ama-cing {amazing}!
"Say it"......"Vampire"....."Are you scared?''....."No".............

well, the freaks came out last night to enjoy a night out with us and the vamps! yahoo! we had a great time as always with our peeps.


long story short...out of all the people you know {and here's the point of this entry}...in my experience inviting people to major events, you will get a 1% response. without having to follow up. hands down! with follow up, you may push that event to 10% but don't count on 15% without follow up. {...and this is how Team Obama made it happen! ouch!} and this my friends, is a prime example of seeing this life through different capitalist eyes. life is absolutely a numbers game! prime example...in my phone book i have 500 phone numbers, and in our database we have approx. 5000 contacts. in 2 days...without follow up...we got what we should have expected! see...told you! {btw-i think these are very conservative expectations..my worse case scenario's.}


so this, in a nut shell is how i plan my events...because i know that without a "follow up team", for 5500 contacts, the bare minimum, is what i can expect. and that my friends, was a golden nugget in sales 101, right? good.


at least your learning from an old sales pro! {toot, toot}


meet more people...because {bad news travel fast, duh!} 10% of who you meet...will not like you, so enjoy the other 90% that do!