During ad:tech you meet tons of people. From the minute the showroom floor opens it’s a nonstop barrage of hand-shaking, smiling, and convincing people that what you do has tremendous value to their business. After one particular encounter, I started to wonder if, even with a great product, you can blow your own sales opportunity.

It is day two of ad:tech and a gentleman approaches me at our booth under the guise of being a potential client. He asks me what we do at MediaTrust. After my elevator pitch, he latches onto the social media component and says “can you explain to me what social media is?” Thinking that we need to start at entry-level, I go into social media 101. I start to talk about engagement and interaction on sites like facebook and Digg - really high-level stuff. All of a sudden, this social media novice turns into a buzz-word-firing, web 2.0 wunderkind. Within 20 seconds I realize that, not only was he playing possum about social media, he was now trying to pitch me his social media optimization platform. Talk about someone pulling the rug out from under your feet…

Clearly, this guy had been using this tactic all day because it was a finely recited routine. But was it effective? The concept of going to someone’s booth, playing dumb about an industry, then hitting them over the head with your pitch felt like the worst kind of ad:tech-bait-and-switch I had ever seen. Here I am talking to this person in social media baby language, and all of sudden he’s lecturing to me on the post-graduate level. The kicker in all of this is that I actually liked his product, but I won’t do business with him because I didn’t like the ethics of his pitch.

As I stewed about this for a few days I started to wonder how much business is lost because we can’t get out of our own way during the sales cycle.  Here are five rules that can help you close a sale and keep a client:

1. Place the focus on why your product is the best fit, not why others won’t work.

This will help you stay positive and upbeat. Bashing other companies makes you look unprofessional and desperate. 

2. Be genuine in your approach.

Be honest about what you can provide. You may get a client on-board with a slick sales pitch, but if you can’t deliver what you’ve promised, that relationship will be short-lived. Worse, word will spread about your firm’s incompetence.

3. Use personal anecdotes with caution.

Part of closing a deal is building a relationship. With that comes finding common ground through shared stories and experiences. However, I recommend caution when telling those tales. I can’t tell you how many times a salesperson blew it with me because they made some off-color remark during a sales call thinking that we were drinking buddies. Business is business. Be professional.

4. Never underestimate the power of relationship-building.

Lots of sales people are short-sighted. If a client doesn’t bite, the sales staff can’t get you off the phone fast enough. That’s a mistake. Even though it may not be the right time for that particular client to purchase your product or service, they will tell other decision-makers about you if they feel you treated them right. Plus, if you foster a strong relationship that client will seek you out when they are ready to make a deal. 

5. Make them feel valued.

One of the biggest differentiators between successful companies and failing ones, is customer service. After your client has signed that check, do they still feel valued? You’ve earned their business, now keep it by following up regularly. Most of the time the client will tell you that everything is going fine, but they’ll appreciate the fact that you were proactive and cared enough to check-in.