The difficult meeting

Yesterday Chris met a 'know-it-all'. Part of his business had fallen away and he wanted to rebuild his revenue line. Our kneejerk reaction is that the internet is having an impact - he 'knows' that it isn't. We think he needs some research to find out why people have stopped calling him. He 'knows' that research is impossible. Whether he wants to work with us (or anyone else, for that matter) is moot. Chris listened to him for almost 2 hours which he described as one of the less happy experiences of his life.

It might be just a coincidence that this client has been sacked by his existing agency.

Why does someone, who claims to know it all, ask for help from an outside agency? My guess would be that he knows that he doesn't have the capacity to do everything that needs doing and so asks for help. Having asked a number of agencies in to talk about the business, why does he talk so much and listen so little? Probably just his personal style. It certainly drove Chris to distraction - he came back and said that "it might be a good thing if we didn't win the work". We don't say that often at this stage of a client relationship.