SN - Inside the Sweetwater Difference

In the previous edition of Sweet Notes, I introduced this column and discussed a little bit about my background and my own perspective on what we call the “Sweetwater Difference.” As I mentioned then, I've asked our editor to allow me a little room to actually bring you inside the company, so you can get a better feel for what the Sweetwater Difference really is. I'd like to begin our tour with a “week in the life” of a Sweetwater Sales Engineer.

I've discovered through painful personal experience that the “School of Hard Knocks,” while certainly an institution we all attend at one time or another, is not necessarily the best way to acquire knowledge (although knowledge acquired this way is generally hard to forget). The primary drawbacks to the School of Hard Knocks, as I see it, include: 1) you only attend when under duress and often don't learn the lesson until it's too late; 2) misinformation runs rampant (to test this theory, ask a handful of musicians what size amp is needed to power a specific set of speakers or what the difference is between an electret and true codenser microphone); and 3) it is a very inefficient way to learn.

Here at Sweetwater, we spend an incredible amount of time and effort to ensure that we offer our customers the most knowledgeable and professional sales staff in the industry. But what constitutes a professional sales staff, you might ask.

As defined in the American Heritage Dictionary, a professional is “one who has an assured competence in a particular field or occupation.” This is all well and good, but does that mean that we hire only professional sound engineers, professional sales people, professional musicians, professional customer service people etc.? The answer is a qualified “yes!”

It’s not enough for our Sales Engineers to be knowledgeable if they can't communicate clearly with customers or lack the business professionalism to follow-up and manage their business effectively. Nor is it acceptable for us to staff the Sales Department with MBA sales professionals who aren't passionate about the products, technology and the music industry itself, in addition to possessing a very high level of “practical application” knowledge and experience.

Equally important to hiring quality people is the long-term continuing development of the folks we bring on staff. To better illustrate this, I'd like to give you a brief guided tour of a week in the life of a member of our Sales Department. Let's start with Monday, 8:00 A.M. in the “Sales Lab.”

This is the classroom and practice field for our sales staff. Our Sales Manager, Lee Pomerantz (Lee's resume includes lengthy stints at Otari as National Sales Manager, and Signal Transport as the Director of Sales and Marketing before joining the Sweetwater team), runs the Sales Lab with occasional guest presenters like Chuck, myself or one of our senior Sales Engineers.

I suspect that very few of the current sales professionals in the world decided when they graduated from high school or college that they wanted to become salespeople.

Our staff is no different. Many members of our sales team came on board after years in the studio, playing professionally, or directly from a college music technology program like those offered at Berklee or Ball State with little or no business or sales background. The Sales Lab is one way we help build the business world skill set for these folks, so that they are better equipped to serve our customers.

For example, we may have a few sessions on database management to ensure that their follow-up with customers is top notch. We might, as a group, read a book like "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" and discuss ways we can apply the information to our job and daily lives. One of my fundamental beliefs is that every employee needs to be growing not only professionally, but personally, and this is a great book that will assist growth in both areas.

We also do a lot of role-playing (and no, we're not talking Dungeons and Dragons here). By utilizing the Sales Lab as a practice field, we are able to ensure that our sales staff will represent Sweetwater in a completely professional manner and be well qualified to accurately assess and fulfill your very individual needs.

This means that we will probably ask you more questions than you might be used to, but it also means that we are committed to helping you make the correct decision/investment the first time. It means that we are looking out, not only for your current needs, but are working with you to prepare for where you want to be with your studio or stage rig six months or a year from now.

In the next issue of Sweet Notes, I'll cover our Tuesday morning meeting and the famous - or infamous, depending upon your perspective - Sweetwater University. See you then!