Hello!

My daughter who is a senior in high school recently attempted to sign up for the second consecutive year as an “ambassador” for a national tuxedo rental company and well-known men’s fashion outlet. She was quite successful at this role during her junior year as she helped incentivize 25 or so of her male peers to rent a tux from their company (who in turn receive a $40 discount on their rental).

Her incentive? Compete for scholarship funds that would go toward her college education and at minimum, help her date get a free tux and her older brother a free suit for his college graduation. She was successful at the latter two but didn’t reach the volume to earn those illusive scholarship funds awarded by the tux rental company.

She headed back into competition this year determined to better her standing and leverage her learnings from the previous year to propel her into serious contention – after all, college was only a handful of months away. As she approached the retail counter to get signed for the 2017 campaign, a young lady at the counter looked puzzled. “You’re a girl and I don’t think girls can sign up to promote our tuxedo rental competition.” Wow. My daughter was both befuddled and offended. Seriously? Did you just say that? In this day and age? And oh by the way, I would like to willingly promote your product at my expense…hello!?!”

One could elaborate on this unfortunate story (it didn’t end there). Here’s the point. Do you have people who are shutting doors of promotion? Stifling raving fans? Creating edgy customer experiences? Providing customers with quack quack encounters? Do you track your “net promoter” score? Is it time to review your customer touch points? Fresh training needed?

Here’s to a genuine Hello.