Speed Beats Cheap

Speed beats cheap.

Speed wins out the majority of the time.

And it's not the speed of the company I work for. Not their product, not their service.

It's my speed.

It's Your Speed

Salespeople get this backwards. They think they're selling their company's turnaround time, their inventory, their service levels. That stuff matters. But the customer doesn't experience the company. The customer experiences you.

How fast you respond to the RFQ. How fast you get back to them on the RFP. How fast you pick up the phone when something goes wrong. That's what wins the account.

When I worked as a sales manager, we had a rule for sales and customer service: respond to every email within fifteen minutes. You didn't need the answer yet. "Got your email. On it." Or "I'll get back to you by noon." That was enough. That one message told the customer everything they needed to know: someone was taking care of it.

Why Speed Wins

Price is rarely the real deciding factor, even when the customer says it is. Speed tells a customer something price can't: that you take their business seriously, and that you'll be there when they need you.

You don't need to be the cheapest option in the room. You need to be the fastest one to respond.

Speed beats cheap every time.

Roy Waterhouse is the founder of Lean Sales Group, where he coaches salespeople on building trust and growing accounts.