5 indicators that a landscape lighting prospect will be difficult to work with

5 indicators that a landscape lighting prospect will be difficult to work with

By Mike Gambino

This is a companion article to my last blog post titled Rejected by a landscape lighting company?

Every day here at Gambino landscape lighting, we work hard to make sure the clients we love are extremely happy with our work and our results. At the same time, we work hard to keep OUT clients who will make us nuts, sap our energy, or for whom it will be impossible to do our best work.

I am not a sales person by profession neither do I employ one or more to fill that position in my company. I am a landscape lighting design and build expert and small business owner. So eliminating as much BS and time lost between attracting A-list prospects which are a good fit for my company, qualifying and signing new landscape lighting projects has always been my number one goal.

I feel a marketing and sales process should be easy, effortless, and enjoyable.

My philosophy has always been that the hard work should go into the actual designing and building of a spectacular landscape lighting system that will provide many years of enjoyment and value and not the actual marketing and sales process of finding clients properties to work on.

And if I’m doing things right then this website will act like a magnet, attract the A-list prospects who will reach out and become clients and those that do like to play games will become discouraged and see that games are not played here and find someone else.

My goal via this website and other forms of interaction with prospects for my landscape lighting service is to discourage the difficult, high-maintenance or non-enjoyable prospects. Here’s a marketing concept I believe in:

If the dating doesn’t go well, it won’t get better once you’re married.

As the great business maven, Donald Trump, once said:

“Sometimes the best deals are the ones you don’t do.”

Amen, MR Trump!

5 Signs that a Prospect is giving me Too Much Agita’ (Indigestion)

1. Agreeing to sign on and then backing off at the last minute or the next day to ask for references, birth certificates, blood tests, or guarantees.

2. Bargaining. Namely, asking for a price reduction with no corresponding reduction in services, terms, value, or relationship. (Asking for a price concession “just because” is a classic form of prospect games)

3. Undervaluing the services, track record, and expertise. “I could do this myself, I just don’t have time…” or “We’ve had several contractors work on our landscape lighting and have never been happy…”

4. Telling you upfront, “We’re notoriously difficult to work with / a control freak / a perfectionist / highly demanding – but don’t take it personally.” (This means they’ve been fired by other service providers in the past and they’re prepping me for the same eventuality while playing BOTH sides of good cop / bad cop. Nice!)

5. Using terms of false affection like “Big Guy'” and “My dear” or false compliments like “You are a great guy and the right guy for this project! But, we are going to shop around a little more and see what else is out there and get back to you.” If I was such a great guy and the guy for the job the shopping would stop here and I’d be hired would it not?

As poet Maya Angelou has so eloquently said, “When someone SHOWS you who they are, believe them.”


This landscape lighting blog is published by Mike Gambino of Gambino landscape lighting inc. all rights reserved. Mike is a professional landscape lighting system designer/ builder and has been designing, installing and maintaining landscape lighting systems for more than 20 years. Mike resides in the Los Angeles area with his wife and 2 sons. To visit his website go to www.gambinolighting.com . To inquire about hiring Mike please click here .

Blog articles may be published with permission on other websites without editing or removing links.

No Comments

Post A Comment