Live Sound University Article Thu, December 04, 2008

Relationships, Relationships, Relationships

Nothing is more important to a salesperson than the relationships he or she forges. This was the crucial element that kept my father’s small town shoe store running year after year. By developing a level of trust, and each successive year continuing to advance that investment, both sides reap continuing rewards for as long as the manufacturer and retailer continue to focus on the market. Hamilton’s years at Scully, and as the largest MCI dealer in America, provided him with unparalleled access to the people who built the bedrock of our industry. Both companies were bucking the status quo within their respective markets. Hamilton and the brands he represented took full advantage of their upstart status and aggressively plumbed the market at a grass root level.

In the 60’s the studio market exploded. The new owners lacked the technical training of the record company or broadcast engineers who could build their own mixing consoles. They were in a hurry to start billing hours and cutting tracks, not spending hours, days and weeks going from one dealer to the next, perhaps ordering some key elements through a regional representative or even direct from the manufacturer. Hamilton and his Audiotechniques partner Robert Berliner spotted this trend and were able to capitalize on it because they knew so many end users and manufacturers. They utilized their experience and wide ranging networks to form a studio selling machine that took prospective clients in one end and produced a full studio, with wiring, patch bays, effects, and monitors out the other.
The value Audiotechniques added by streamlining the entire process increased their importance to the marketplace, allowed the company to reach the highest sales levels of that time. MCI became the centerpiece of this pioneering effort in systems integration, because it manufactured the two largest capital equipment investments for a professional studio, and the most critical ones operationally (tape recorders and mixing consoles). With easy-to-assimilate equipment packages that sounded as good as, if not better than, more expensive competitors, MCI became a market leader.

All along the way, Hamilton and his co-workers were increasing their known universe. All the “new comers” getting into the “recording business” would have to contact Audiotechniques for some piece of equipment which was sold by them exclusively. At one time or another this list included Lexicon, Allen & Heath, Audio & Design, and a full line of ancillary products including equipment cleaners, cue boxes, direct boxes, etc. This straddling of traditional roles is Ham all over. His marketing abilities were honed after many years in other sales oriented jobs for newspapers, broadcasters, etc. He understood first-hand the self-imposed limitations businesses commonly placed on their own success. He and Bob fought back with innovative products and marketing. They found new manufacturers mainly in Europe and the US to keep increasing the scope and performance of this web of knowledge.

Hamilton always promoted a close relationship with manufacturers. His work with MCI and then, after their purchase, with Sony Professional Audio in the 70s through to the early 90s, defines the way a sales team should operate. This was also the case with companies like Lexicon and Eventide: Audiotechniques took them on just after their inception, and saw the relationship through good times and bad. Ham was instrumental in keeping the manufacturer in the loop with the market because of his past and present experiences. Their respect for his opinions, which were, more often than not, correct, helped these companies create significant value for the market.

The other key to relationship investment is having the right people on your sales team to process these opportunities. Ham kept people for as long as possible, but always had his eyes open for new talent. I wouldn’t be surprised to find Audiotechniques’ alumni in each major segment of our industry, all still applying lessons learned during their time with Hamilton.

Ham’s long standing relationships with many industry luminaries stem from his willingness to accept people as they are, his ability to integrate their predilections (both professionally and socially), and his honesty in following through with his commitments. Without the follow through, the words used to win a sales opportunity are just words.

Honey draws more bees

And this brings up another operating principle that Hamilton highlighted for me. Once a relationship is underway, your daily actions determine the direction and success of the venture. Inevitably, things go wrong: the manufacturer’s ship date slips, another emergency takes place, etc. - like change, something going wrong is one of life’s guarantees. These moments are the best indicators of how a relationship will work or fail over the long term.

During these times, a company has the choice of taking two very different paths. One path is toward reconciliation. The other is confrontational and results in loss of long term business. Ham’s ability to work with clients, which he also instilled in his teams, put the dollars in the bank long term. He always took the reconciliation route if there was anything worth salvaging. There have been individuals in our business who took everyone with them down the sewer, but fortunately they are few and far between. Working with the other type of client (the overwhelming majority), Hamilton taught compromise to everyone’s benefit. His years in sales had reinforced that everyone needs to come out of a resolution feeling good. But, at Audiotechniques especially, his position demanded a constant balancing of everyone’s diverse needs. As a distributor, manufacturer, retailer, employer and/or regional representative, he was in the middle no matter where he stood. Yet he kept the balance effectively. No one gets it 100% of the time, but Hamilton has a damn good batting average. If a free roll of recording tape or a price consideration became necessary, Hamilton controlled or influenced the amount of “give” from each sector, providing an essential element of a proactive solution - one that not only stems the bleeding from the current situation, but also encourages future business, which always presents the ideal direction to pursue. Part of this approach of his comes from long-term vision, which is an inherent component of Hamilton’s worldview. The evolution of his career is evidence of the value of a durable view of life, which he continues to press forward this very day.

Make a decision, live with it, learn from it, and move on

Hamilton never spent unnecessary amounts of time deciding how to resolve discord. He would get together every knowledgeable and concerned party and let them volley ideas back and forth. Passion, intelligence, stupidity, and disagreement were all evident in these lively discussions, but the process of elimination quickly whittled down the choices till it was clear a few directions offered different plausible resolution strategies. Ham or Bob would then take the responsibility of selecting the most appropriate answer and direct its implementation. But once the decision was made you moved on. There was no hand wringing or second thoughts to distort the picture. These sessions taught those of us on staff how to resolve these types of situations. Their brevity helped maintain our focus on the company’s main thrust, to sell, instead of just swirling in the maelstrom of the repairing mode.
Were mistakes made? Absolutely, but that discussion would come later, once most of the impact had been revealed. Dissection could occur once the whole lesson was clear. Sometimes it was no more than a positive or negative comment uttered during a subsequent day. Giving the resolution this additional time to settle allowed both the client and salesman the luxury of not being second-guessed and strengthened the possibility of future engagements.

Never stop learning and trying

My favorite Hamilton story is the one he spun about being caught in rainstorm while on foot. As the storm was quite brisk, he stepped in the first door that looked inviting and found himself in a car dealership. Shaking the weather off, the salesman approached him and asked whether he could help him. Hamilton replied that he simply stepped in to get out of the rain and was not looking at a car right now. The salesman paused and asked him since he was just waiting here, would he mind if the salesman practiced his sales pitch. The salesman went on to explain that he had calculated that for every X number of times he went through his pitch, he made a sale. Again proving that a salesman is the easiest mark in the world, Hamilton said sure, go ahead. When he drove out of the dealership with a new car, he had learned another important lesson to pass onto his sales people - If you make enough sales presentations; you are bound to make sales.

He still hasn’t stopped learning and trying new things. As you might be aware, his son Matt re-purchased Digibid, and Hamilton is back in active management of this popular Internet site that specializes in the whole entertainment technology spectrum. Digibid was languishing because it didn’t interface well with the original purchaser’s other holdings. Now with Hamilton and his team back in charge, a revitalized Digibid re-enters the online auction fray.

This continuation of Ham’s pro audio career reinforces his unique thinking “outside of the box.” With Scully, aggressive competition for market share spawned new formats, relationships and technologies. With Audiotechniques and MCI, he pioneered a whole new approach to the marketplace that extended from the manufacturer to the end user. This junction formed a major step in an evolution that is still taking our business further towards its future.