Spent 1.5 days in Orlando. Exhausted, but I did learn lots of "how to talk to clients" techniques and "what our company does" from Dad.
At the boarding gate, Dad told me about all the companies he does business with, and what products we sell to them (snorkels, fins, dive masks, BCD's, dive knives, snorkel vests, dry bags, and boogie boards). Also, who are the big fishes and who are the small fishes? Big fishes are the companies that have many regions, small fishes are companies that have only one location. Our biggest fish is company S, who has locations in USA, France, Germany, Pacific Asia, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, and Italy. Once we get a deal in USA region office, and the rest of the region offices will have to buy products from us. We've also talked about payment terms for each company, some companies pay us before shipment, but some companies pay 150 days after the shipment.
I had two lunch meetings with 2 different clients. In these lunch meetings, it's mainly about the request of design changes or materials of the products, or issues they have when testing the products. They didn't talk about the money part at all, I guess that was already done in the email before. I didn't really participate to the meetings, but they actually chatted with me a little bit. Asking me about why am I here with my dad, have I been to the place where they live (Cancun, New York City). And I share a little bit of my travel experiences at those cities (Well I never been to Cancun, but I've been to New York City.) With different clients, Dad has different ways of talking to them. Dad told the Cancun guys almost everything he doe, such as all other companies he does business with. I asked him why and he told me it's because he has been friends with them for many years already. But to the New York City guys, Dad doesn't say much. When this client was introducing all nice restaurants in Orlando, and one of the restaurants he recommended was actually the Japanese restaurant we went last night, Dad didn't even say anything. I asked him why again afterwards. He said we should always let clients talk like he knows much more than we do. And we shouldn't expose too much of the information about ourselves, but to get more information from them. Clever. isn't it?
About the Dema show itself, nothing actually excites me besides getting freebies like I used to do at E3 Expo (annual trade show for the computer and video games industry). I had a walk with my dad's client Jessie, she showed me all the products my dad made at different companies. She also demonstrated me how to use a BCD. Looking at all the company names, I got an idea that what are the well known brands in this snorkeling/diving goods industry.
An interesting thing happened at the show.... At the first day, I bumped a cigarette from this Korean guy at smoking area. He asked me what we do and why am I here. I told him we manufactured snorkeling and diving goods. He asked me if I know the company A. I said yes, company A is the number one company of the industry. At the second day, he came to me and my dad, asked for catalogue or business cards. And then I found out he's the CEO from company A at Korea branch. However, Dad told me we wouldn't be doing business with them since we're already doing business with their biggest competitor. And that's the basic loyalty and reputation in this industry. That was pretty interesting, bumping cigarettes from people might get you potential clients.
The Orlando trip was worthy, getting connected, seeing is believing. No wonder people say if you want to start a business, you should go to its trade show first!
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